A week of celebrations at St Luke’s (From Knutsford Guardian)

A week of celebrations at St Luke’s

11:10am Tuesday 25th September 2012 in News By James Wilson

A VILLAGE church is staging one of its most ambitious harvest festivals since its foundation more than 800 years ago.

St Luke’s, Goostrey, is preparing for the week-long celebration of harvest-time in the run-up to the church’s traditional harvest thanksgiving service on Sunday, September 30.

Each day during the week will be marked in the church with an event and displays featuring a different kind of harvest.

The harvests of grain, ocean, garden, earth and flocks will also provide children from Goostrey Community School and other local schools with the opportunity to take part in hands-on activities, including pottery-making, weaving woollen thread, sowing seeds and even making a boat to illustrate a Bible story from the Sea of Galilee.

The event called Harvest Experience, which is being arranged by a team of volunteers, is based on the success of the Easter Experience at St Luke’s two years ago.

Adults are being invited to take part in activities in the church linked to the harvest displays on Thursday, September 27, between 7.30pm and 9pm.

A harvest supper open to all and a folk band in the village hall on the Saturday has also been organised as part of the celebrations.

The vicar, Rev Ian Godfrey, said the events would focus on the religious significance as well as the practical aspects of the different harvests.

“Harvest festival is one of the most important times in the rural calendar, and as such it was felt it was more deserving of attention during the week leading up to our celebration week-end,” he said.

St Luke’s was built around 1220 and rebuilt in the 18th century when the timbered church was demolished, but a place of worship may have existed on the site since the Anglo Saxons.

The first recorded vicar was Abel in 1220, and a yew tree in the churchyard has been identified as 1,200 years old.