On the 11th June, the Dean of Westminster Abbey visited us to launch our six-month-long Parish 800th Anniversary Festival.

In 1217 it was his predecessor, the Abbot of Westminster, who first presented a priest to look after the small village of Teddington, thereby creating a new parish.

A parish is essentially a community with a church at the heart of it. When the church embodies such values as compassion, generosity, sharing and celebration it blesses its community and the community flourishes.

Our Teddington 800 is shaping up to include all of these elements in abundance. Organisations, groups and individuals have shown such great generosity of time, money, creativity and facilities, that from June to November we are going to be able to share with everyone a programme of around 25 events, touching upon the heritage, interests and heart of this town.

The warm response of the wider parish as well as the congregation shows just how much more we can achieve together than separately and just how much fun we can have when we collaborate.

So, Teddington 800 is just about to start, there is great momentum and it's going to be a wonderful year. To give you a taster of some of the things planned, here are the June and July events:

June

  • 1-17th: 'From Every Seed' art exhibit at the Landmark Arts Centre
  • 10-11th: Teddington in Flower, open gardens, churchyard teas and flower festival themed as 'Visions of Teddington'
  • 22nd: Historial 'murder mystery' at the library
  • 25th: Teddington Village Fair and Pram Race including an 800 team entry 'Beer on a Bier' - taste our 800 home brewed ale if you fancy!

July

  • 9th: Join us at the TCC, TTCC and TRFC grounds in Bushy Park for the Town Sports Day and Inter Club Challenge
  • 19th: Come and watch a Teddington XI take on Bishops XI cricket team

Following that, in August we'll have children's activities: September a significant history and art exhibit, a quiz and even a ball; October we'll get serious with a science and religion lecture plus a poetry day and in Novvember, a play, plus much more like a River blessing, prayer walk, totally locally event, I could go on...

For more details of all of this see www.teddington800.org.uk, follow @TeddParish800 on Twitter and Facebook or look out for a full brochure with our June newsletter.

Best wishes,

Joe Moffatt