The Parish of Eccleston in the County of -- Lancashire --

Flower Festival

The church of St Mary the Virgin has on two recent occasions held a Flower Festival. The following was provided by the church for us to present on our site.

From Father Iain Templeton

Welcome to our Jubilee Flower Festival. I hope you will enjoy the floral arrangements displayed around our beautiful ancient church of St. Mary.

There has been a church on this site for many hundreds of years. The present building dates mainly from the early 14th century, but it stands on the site of a Saxon church. The first written record of the church dates from 1094, so in 1994 we kept our 900th anniversary with a flower festival.

As this year we are celebrating the Golden Jubilee of Her Majesty Queen Elizabeth II, a number of parishioners thought that this was a good opportunity to celebrate by holding another Flower Festival. And as the festival extends over the feast of Saints Peter and Paul, foremost of apostles, the theme chosen is “the Apostles and the Seas”.

The ‘seas’ part came into the theme because of the maritime journeys of Peter and Paul and the many biblical incidents involving the apostles which took place around the sea of Galilee; also because the faith was first brought to these shores by sea. (Also, because it seemed like good fun at the time we thought of the theme!)

Thank you for visiting out Flower Festival – may you take many happy memories home with you, and let us remember each other in prayer as we continue our Christian pilgrimage.

Father Iain Templeton
Rector of Eccleston St. Mary

From the Friends of St. Mary’s

Welcome to the Parish Church of St. Mary’s Eccleston, we hope you enjoy the Wonderful display of Flowers, which have been carefully thought about, and created to bring you our theme “Apostles and the Seas”.

Our Friends of St. Mary’s have once again worked together to achieve and create this spectacular vision of beauty in our ancient Church. The time and talent of all those involved is greatly appreciated and the imagination and enthusiasm in what they have achieved is something to behold.

We hope you all enjoy out Flower Festival and visit our Refreshment Marquee at the back of the Church.

Sandra Lea
Chair, Friends of St. Mary’s

Below is shown the cover of the Flower festival Souvenir Program and a plan of the church contained in this program.

	Cover of the Flower festival Souvenir Program

	Plan of the Church of St Mary Source: Flower Festival plan