Church Stewards 2025-26

Sue Colbourn

Looking back, over the 30-odd years that I’ve been a member here at Wokingham, I realise what a big part our church has played in my life during that time. I have been a pastoral visitor and  a junior church leader;  I set up a beaver colony  - it must be over 25 years ago now (!) - and then a youth café and ‘Study with Your Buddies’, a homework club; I have been secretary to a couple of committees, and was Church Council Secretary during those busy years of redevelopment, a time when there was a flurry of fundraising activity, including a host of car boot sales, ‘The Rose Street Revels’, and pantomimes, all of which so many of us were involved in.  My children still have such very fond memories of those times, and so do I.

As my accent reveals, I hale from the Black Country. I was baptised into the Methodist Church at a little chapel in Tividale, between Dudley and Oldbury, where my paternal grandfather, who died, sadly, even before my dad met my mum, had been the youngest local preacher on the circuit.  The family moved to Kingswinford in 1966 where I attended Stream Road Methodist Church until I moved down to college, in Reading. I met my husband-to-be down here and we were married, back in Kingswinford, in 1983.

I taught English at The Emmbrook School, during the eighties, and part-time at St Crispin’s, in the nineties and noughties, but most of those years were devoted to bringing up the family.  Fifteen years ago, I discovered The Reader, a charity based in Liverpool; this triggered a huge shift for me as I returned to studying, for an MA at the University of Liverpool, and led to me working for The Reader, delivering Shared Reading Groups (reading great literature aloud with people, for emotional and mental wellbeing) in various settings -  from Wokingham Library to Reading Gaol to Prospect Park Hospital. I’m still running, and training people to run, such groups.  And how fortunate I feel, to be involved in work that I am so passionate about.

Becoming a church steward has always felt, for me, a daunting role to take on.  But sometimes there is a voice that cannot be ignored, and so, here I am, willing to give it my best shot, getting to know people better and serving, however I can, as part of a wonderful team of people who I know (from early experience!) will help guide me every step of the way.

Helen Ani

I was born and raised in Enugu, Nigeria.  I attended the local Methodist school, where I have good memories of early friendship in a very good close community.  My primary and secondary schools were involved in a lot of Methodist church events and activities.

I was trained in Science laboratory Analysis at The University of Jos, Plateau State, Nigeria.  I worked as laboratory technician for couple of years before I met my husband.  In 1991, we got married in the Methodist Church Enugu.

That same year, I came to UK to join my husband and lived in North London for two years before moving to Nottingham in 1993.  In 1996 we relocated to Wokingham, as my husband was working for BG Group in the Thames valley Park.  We were part of the Wokingham Methodist Church and my four children were all christened here before we moved to Egypt in 2000.  We lived there for five years before moving again to Trinidad and Tobago for two more years.  We moved back to Wokingham in 2007. 

I studied health and social care with The Open University whilst at home looking after my children and living overseas.  All these moves were as a result of my husband’s job relocations.

My past experiences have helped me to fully understand what it takes to care for children and communicate with people from various backgrounds and appreciate their culture.  I hope to bring these qualities to my work at Rose Street as a steward.

Margaret Wells

John Williams

I was brought up just to the south east of London and progressed through Bible Class and Youth Fellowship (where Deirdre and I met) into the local Baptist church where we married in 1964.  It was in London that I graduated in chemistry at about the same time as Deirdre trained as a teacher of domestic science (then cookery and needlework).  I worked as a research scientist all my life, starting with Unilever in Port Sunlight.  Later on I was with Tate and Lyle for almost 40 years - first employed in their research department and later self employed as a consultant.  This involved a lot of travelling and when far from home I was very encouraged by verses from Psalm 139.  “If I flew away beyond the east or lived in farthest place in the west, you would be there to lead me; you would be there to help me.”  While I was doing all this Deirdre made very profitable use of her needlework skills.

Early on in our marriage Deirdre and I spent some time in India with the Baptist Missionary Society.  On returning we settled in our home area, which is where our three children: Bruce, Deborah and Peter, were born.  But after 6 years we were uprooted when Tate and Lyle decided to move everyone to Reading.  Thus we came to Wokingham and joined the Baptist church where we served in many different ways until 2006, when, just after I retired, we felt it was right for us to move to Rose Street and were immediately made very welcome.

Retirement saw us very much enjoying travelling and I took on voluntary work, which continued until I needed start looking after Deirdre: until she died in 2021.  She had really enjoyed our Alzheimer’s Cafe so when it reopened after lockdown it seemed logical for me to help out there.

From 2009 to 2012 Deirdre and I served as Stewards, and when we moved on to being Welcome Stewards we reckoned that was probably the best job in the church.  I was very privileged to be part of our Strategy Group during the period when the group was instrumental in starting up the Food Bank and our Alzheimer’s Cafe.

Becoming a Steward again is rather a daunting prospect, but looking back and remembering how enjoyable Deirdre and I found it to be,  I am looking forward to it and to serving with the team.

It was not without trepidation that I embarked upon this year of Senior Stewardship, having joined the team three years ago as a novice. The start of summer 2025 saw the church getting ready to say farewell to Catherine Bowstead, our minister here at Wokingham for 10 years, and then a month or so later we were readying ourselves to welcome our new minister, Wes Hampton and his wife Cherry.  A year of big changes this certainly has been, and much of it, so sadly, has been in the form of bereavement, thus hard to embrace.  We have lost too many of our church family and have felt the blow both personally and communally.

However, shaken though we have undoubtedly been, there has remained a willingness to help that I have been thankful for.  Indeed, I am often amazed at  people’s readiness to give of their time in so many ways: to cover sound and a/v in services; play the organ; be part of our music group; serve communion; fill the church with flowers; provide cakes and serve refreshments (and a friendly chat) during the week in Café Mosaic, plus entertainment and activity at ‘Thursdays in August’ and a friendly welcome at The Alzheimer’s’ Café’; produce minutes after meetings; make pastoral visits;  produce communications  to keep us all informed; ensure the premises are in good order; take part in Local Arrangement services when there is no preacher to cover on a Sunday.  The list goes on.

But there also remain roles to fill, and the obvious one at this time of year is Church Steward.  Three years ago, on Easter Sunday, Mike Goddard challenged the congregation from the lectern: there were no nominations for Church Stewards that year, and the situation felt dire.  What happens when there is no one to prepare the church for worship?  Three of the current stewards rose to meet Mike’s challenge.

Earlier this year, as the team dwindled with Judy needing to step down mid-term, it was with relief that we welcomed Malcolm out of retirement, and Kelli Hancock, with approval from Church Council to the team.  Kelli was due to be fully appointed at this year’s Annual Church Meeting but is now moving away, back to the USA in May.

If there are no nominations this year and all the stewards who are due to step down in April do so, then we will have just one person remaining as Senior, and only, Steward.  If I started last year in trepidation, then I cannot imagine the word to describe how John might be feeling at such a prospect.

And so, I close - first with a plea: that should any of you feel inclined, however hesitantly, to find out more about what being a steward entails, please do speak with one of us or with Wes. And then finally - with a heartfelt thank you, for people’s kindnesses, and for all those who so willingly came to the rescue whenever particular help, and prayer, was needed throughout this eventful and sometimes difficult year.

Sue Colbourn