Christ Church Rayleigh United Reformed Church, in Essex, plans to bring a Latin American tradition to its community this Christmas. “We have several things planned for Christmas that the coronavirus can’t spoil!” said their Minister, the Revd Naomi Young-Rodas, before explaining.

A new interim, Assistant General Secretary has been appointed to serve the United Reformed Church (URC) for seven months.

The Revd Adrian Bulley, Synod Clerk for the URC National Synod of Wales and Convenor of the URC Business Committee, is being seconded from 1 January-31 July 2021. He will take on some of the duties carried out under the office of the Deputy General Secretary (Discipleship) on a part-time basis.

Generous members of the United Reformed Church (URC) have helped to raise £15,000 to help those affected by the massive explosion in the port of Beirut.

The Beirut Hope Appeal was launched following an explosion of 2,750 tonnes of ammonium nitrate at the port of Beirut on August 4 which made 300,000 people homeless, , killed more than 200 people, wounded 6,000, and left an undefined number of people reported as missing.