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This script does not necessarily exactly reflect the transmission. It may include editorial notes prepared by the producer, and minor spelling and other errors.

It may contain gaps to be filled in at the time so that prayers may reflect the needs of the world, and changes may also be made at the last minute for timing reasons, or to reflect current events.

Today's Lent image mentioned by the Dean of Winchester (Compassion by Mike Quirke) can be found here: https://www.onlineprayer.net/day-33/

Debbie Thrower - Good morning, and welcome to our act of worship this Passion Sunday
Almost a year since the first lockdown, we shall be led in an act of remembrance by the Archbishop of York, to commemorate the deaths of more than a hundred and twenty-five thousand people with Covid-19, many of whom were in their old age. 
What an extraordinary year it has been, for all of us. Key workers bearing the brunt of long shifts, others confined to home have had to find ways to pass the time, longing for the company of family and friends, denied the comfort of human touch. One woman in her seventies said to me the other day, ‘I haven’t hugged my grandchildren in over a year... I have hungry arms.’ Another, a frail woman who is housebound, asked on the phone, ‘will I ever see another human being again, before I die?’
We shall be looking at the ways spiritual care is being given to people at this time in their own homes, but first the Passiontide hymn, ‘Alone thou goest forth O Lord.’ 
Hymn: Alone thou goest forth O Lord St Martin In The Fields Choir conducted by Andrew Earis
Debbie: From the Book of Lamentations:
Is it nothing to you, all you who pass by? Look and see if there is any sorrow like my sorrow.(Lamentations 1.12)
Prayer by Martyn Payne 
Debbie: One way of supporting older people is Anna Chaplaincy. It’s a community-based offering of spiritual care to people in later life. I was the first Anna Chaplain, where it began here in Hampshire, in the market town of Alton. A decade or so later -we’re now part of The Bible Reading Fellowship, BRF, that’s also home to Messy Church – and Anna Chaplaincy is spreading fast nationally.  
It takes its name from the elderly widow, ‘Anna’ in Luke’s gospel. Her prophetic gifts, at 84, and her hopefulness that God would act, make her an inspiring role model for this ministry among retired men and women, and carers. Incidentally, the work is largely carried out by lay women, just like Anna. 
Whether you’re someone who’s spent more time alone this past year than you’d ever have imagined, or you’re no stranger to loneliness and have seen others struggling to come to terms with what is your customary lot – we join in worship today of the God who promises to be with us always… to the end of time. 
Hymn - It is well with my soul - Chris Rice
Album - Peace Like A River (The Hymns Project) Publisher – Fair Trade Services 
Debbie: The gospel song, ‘It is well with my soul’ by Chris Rice. 
Especially after a whole year of life subject to restrictions, jobs furloughed, plans upended, and the threat, and in too many cases the reality, of contracting the[  virus… it’s not surprising many have found enforced time alone hard to bear. 
Emily Kenward, runs a Brighton-based charity, Time to Talk Befriending. She described the mood among those she and her team are now supporting at home by phone: 
Emily Kenward comments
Debbie: : A significant proportion of Covid-19 deaths have been among residents in care homes. Chaplain, Erica Roberts and I visited one in Southampton.
There we spoke to resident, Joan Wedge, in her wheelchair on a terrace outside. Joan had only moved in a few months before the pandemic started. Occasionally, she’s been able to see her family by speaking through a fence… It soon became clear she’s felt incarcerated. Her faith has helped sustain her, though, as we learned when Erica said prayers with Joan:
Joan Wedge prayers
Hymn: You Raise Me Up - Celtic Woman
Album – One World    Publisher  – Universal Music Publishing

Debbie: Celtic Woman, with ‘You raise me up.’  
Debbie: Even before the pandemic, we were aware that, in places, as few as ten per cent of care home residents receive a regular - weekly - visit from anyone. That’s 90 per cent left with few or no visitors. 
Pope Francis, in his latest book, Let Us Dream, describes the exclusion and isolation of ‘the elderly’ as ‘a sad sign of the times.’ ‘The abandonment of the elderly is an enormous injustice,’ he writes.
Such lack of attention is a tragedy not only for the individual, it impoverishes us all. A person’s story becomes ever more precious as they grow older. Chaplains learn the importance of listening carefully to a person’s life story. It is through the telling and re-telling of the details of our lives that we make sense of who we were, who we are now, and so recognise our true identity, our true worth… as we age and face death. 
In the last 12 months, despite the lockdowns, 25 people have joined our network: from all over the country - London, Wales, Suffolk, Guernsey, Kent, Cumbria, East Sussex, Buckinghamshire, Devon, and Orkney. 
In Barrow in Furness, Babs Lowes, has seen her idea to send gifts of knitted crosses to all care home residents, just snowball in her area. 
Babs Lowes comments 
Just as some limited visiting is now being allowed, so a number of chaplains are starting to get back into care homes; being Covid-tested first, and wearing full PPE. 
A disturbing aspect of the last 12 months has been the impact on those living with dementia. In the first four months of the pandemic, of all deaths involving Covid-19 [from March to June 2020], Alzheimer’s disease and other types of dementia were the most common underlying conditions in more than a quarter, 27 and a half per cent of them, according to the British Medical Journal.
Without regular contact with relatives and friends - and the stimulus of the sorts of activities laid on in normal times – people’s memory loss has accelerated. Prolonged periods on their own has hastened the demise of some… and caused a noticeable deterioration in others. Marion Hitchens, would usually be in and out of care homes leading worship, visiting people one-to-one. She can only imagine how tough it is: 
Marion Hitchens comments
Hymn - Psalm 121 ‘I Will Lift Up Mine Eyes Unto The Hills
Winchester Cathedral Choir   Album – Hymns & Psalms From Winchester Publisher – Herald AV Publications Release date - 1995
Debbie: The choir of Winchester Cathedral signing Psalm 121…. And now we join the Archbishop of York, the Most Revd Stephen Cottrell, for a time of remembrance. 
Archbishop Stephen Cottrell: Throughout this year, one piece of scripture has kept me going more than any other. It is that story where the woman who had been suffering from haemorrhages for 12 years approaches Jesus in the crowd and touches the hem of his garment. 
I find this story helpful in many ways. First of all, it is kindness that prevents her from touching Jesus. She doesn’t want to make him unclean. 
This is something we’ve all been doing this year. Not touching each other, not embracing, has been an act of love - though a hard and costly one, as it was for this woman who was so isolated by her suffering. 
Secondly, when she does touch Jesus’ cloak, she is healed. She is restored to community. She receives the fullness of his presence. 
This, too, has been true this year. We haven’t been able to gather for worship. We haven’t received the comfort of the sacraments. We haven’t been able to meet. But Jesus has been with us, alongside us and bringing the comfort and peace of God’s presence. And we’ve found other ways of reaching out to each other and making community.
Finally, when Jesus asks, who touched me, the disciples are surprised and aghast. What a foolish question. There is a whole crowd pressing in.
But Jesus doesn’t see crowds. He sees us one at a time. Each one unique. Each one precious. 
As we remember this hard and difficult locked-down year, and as we look to a new beginning beyond Covid, let us come to Jesus and bring him our remembrances of sorrow and thanksgiving. For with great tenderness he looks at each one of us.
And so we pray –
Lord Jesus, as I reach out to you, so please reach out to me; and as I remember all those who have suffered and died in this difficult year so gather them into your presence. Amen.
Hymn - The Lord’s Prayer 
Cambridge Singers    Publisher - Collegium Records 
Debbie: Today’s gospel reading is from Luke chapter 7, and is read for us by Canon Richard Fisher, Chief Executive of The Bible Reading Fellowship, BRF.  
Reading: Luke 7: 11-17
Debbie: Our preacher this morning, is the Dean of Winchester, Catherine Ogle. 
Dean Catherine: Good morning! When my dear mum grew older and her health was beginning to fail, but she was still living independently, it gave me great comfort to know that just about every day she’d take a walk into town.  And there, she was meeting people who knew her.  She’d see friends and acquaintances and staff in the shops who knew her by name, she’d meet people who’d known Dad and had some glimpse into the overall richness of her life’s experience.  Mum told me that as she got older she felt increasingly invisible, but I knew that in this daily walk she’d be seen and known.
When Jesus came to the town of Nain he was at the centre of a crowd of followers.  They following him because they were excited by him and what he was saying and doing.  And that day this crowd of people around Jesus ran into another very different crowd coming in the opposite direction.  A crowd of mourners carrying the dead body of a young man, on a bier, for burial outside the town.
The events that happen next, recalled in Luke’s gospel, are miraculous and lead us more deeply into the heart of God’s love and Gods loving purposes for his creation and for us all.         The first thing, which has a great significance for me, is that in this busyness of these two crowds of people coming together, Jesus sees the dead man’s mother.  He doesn’t just notice her, he sees her.  She’s the chief mourner of course, but in every other way, as a woman who’s a widow, and now with the death of her only son, without male protection, she has no status, no wealth and no rights.  She’s vulnerable and insignificant. 
But God can’t take his eyes off his children and God’s Son sees those who are  overlooked and regards and values everyone.   
Jesus sees the mother in her grief and, St Luke writes, Jesus feels compassion.  The word for compassion here conveys a really physical sense, Jesus has a gut-stirring response to the woman’s suffering.  She is grieving the loss of her only son and the loss of her connection with future happiness through this son. 
His deep compassion flows into action.  Jesus steps forward and touches the funeral bier saying these astonishing words: ‘Young man, I say to you, rise’.  At that, we’re told, the dead man sat up and began to speak, and Jesus ‘gave him to his mother’.  This has been beautifully portrayed by the artist, Mike Quirke, and you can see his painting imagining the scene, on the Sunday Worship section of the ´óÏó´«Ã½ web-site.  Do take a look at the painting if you can and see the dignity and love on the mother’s face and the way that the grave clothes, tight around the son’s body, look rather like swaddling bands, for a new birth, or perhaps a chrysalis for transformation.  
Jesus gives the son back to his mother.  And on this Passion Sunday we can see that this miracle pre-figures the crucifixion of Christ himself, during which, according to Johns gospel, Jesus unites his own mother with the beloved disciple, saying ‘Woman, here is your son’.    
The miracle in the town of Nain reveals to the crowds, and to us, the love of God in Jesus Christ overcoming death, grief and loss.  Reveals that God intends us not for isolation but for connection and community, not destitution but for mutual care and support. 
The miracle reveals that God loves us and knows our need, before we ask.  You may have noticed that the story doesn't record the woman actually saying anything.  Lots of people ask Jesus for all sorts of things but she doesn’t actually asked for anything, perhaps in her grief she cant even imagine a different outcome.  But the deep compassion of Jesus means that the future can be different, for her and her son, and for us all.  The compassion of Christ for all of humanity, and his particular care for the least and the lost, takes him to the cross, to his Passion and his death, and on to resurrection and new life.  Which opens new possibilities for us all.  
Hymn - The King Of Love My Shepherd Is
Cambridge Singers   Album – Sing, Ye Heavens – Hymns For All Time Label – Collegium Records
As we come through difficult times, with a weight of grief and loss alongside isolation and separation, we can be assured that God is with us in suffering.  And reassured that God made us for connection and for human touch.  Perhaps alongside our recent and powerful experience of shared human frailty we’ve also seen the potential of our shared strength.  That a life woven in community and caring relationships, a life of giving as well as receiving, seeing and being seen is the best and happiest way to be.  That recognising the worth of every child of every race, as the hymn puts it, and seeing every person, young and old, as of infinite value, is how the world is meant to be, as a foretaste of life in the Kingdom of Heaven. Amen.  
Debbie: The Dean of Winchester, Catherine Ogle. 
Introducing our prayers of intercession is Jennie Cuthbert who supports older people in Tunbridge Wells.
Jennie: Thank you Lord and Father that Simeon and Anna recognised who Jesus was.
Thank you for the love you have lavished on us. Please let us be tangibly aware of your peace, joy and loving presence with us today, and every day. Thank you that we have the record of Anna and Simeon in the Bible, as they are great role models of faithful, hopeful, older people. 
We especially thank you for all those who support us in our later years and fill our lives with hope. 
We pray for all who are ill as a result of the virus and for all who give medical care and support. May we see the end of the pandemic as soon as possible and the alleviation of suffering in body, mind and spirit. Keep us, good Lord, under the shadow of Your mercy: sustain and support the anxious, be with those who care for the sick, and lift up all who are brought low; that we may find peace and comfort knowing that nothing can separate us from Your love in Christ Jesus our Lord.  
Debbie: Prayer by Martin Payne)
Debbie: The prophetess Anna found a new home in the Temple in Jerusalem, and a new role: speaking of redemption to everyone who would listen. In her mid-eighties she’d discovered a different, yet rewarding, way of life. How encouraging that even as our bodies weaken we can look forward to a greater spiritual maturity through the God who pledges never to leave us, nor forsake us. 
Debbie: (Prayer: Journey for a Soul, George Appleton)
MUSIC: YOU RAISE ME UP - Celtic Woman 
Many apprehensions remain. With this final prayer we admit to our worries yet place ourselves confidently in God’s hands. 
(Prayer by Martin Payne) 
MUSIC: You Raise Me Up - Celtic Woman