## **THE ORTHODOX EUCHARISTIC COMMUNITY IN SOUTH LONDON** Registered charity number 1105211 Address for contact: Birchenhoe, Crowfield, Brackley NN13 5TW ## **ANNUAL REPORT** for the calendar year 1 January 2023 to 31 December 2023 ## **Trustees** In the year, the following persons served as Trustees of the Orthodox Eucharistic Community in South London (“ **the Charity”)** : Very Reverend Archpriest Alexander Fostiropoulos (Chair) Ms. Carol S. Graves Mr. Alexis Martinowsky Ms. F.M.H. Rattray Mr. R.A. Hookway Mr. K.M.S. Alton Honeywell The Charity does not act as a custodian trustee. ## **Structure and Administration** The Charity was established by a Trust Deed dated 20 June 2004 and its object is to advance the Orthodox Christian Faith, as defined in the Trust Deed. It does this through its support for the canonical Orthodox Parish of St. Peter and St. Paul, Clapham, London SW4 which is a Parish within the jurisdiction of the Ecumenical Patriarchate of Constantinople headed by His All-Holiness Bartholomew, Archbishop of Constantinople. The Parish is part of the Deanery in the Archdiocese of Thyateira and Great Britain, headed by His Eminence Archbishop Nikitas. The Trust Deed permits a maximum of twelve trustees, all of whom must be communicant members of the Orthodox Church. New Trustees are appointed by the existing trustees when necessary or when a vacancy occurs. The Trustees hope that new, younger, Trustees will be appointed in the next few years. 1 ## **Public Benefit** The Trustees have given careful consideration to the Charity Commissioners’ advice and consider that the activities of the Charity are in the public benefit. ## **Vulnerable Beneficiaries** The Trustees have adopted formal policies for the protection of children and vulnerable beneficiaries, details of which are readily available to those attending the worship and activities of the Parish. ## **Review of the Year: Activities and Performance** Our parish is served by its rector, the Very Reverend Archpriest Alexander Fostiropoulos, and the non-stipendiary priests the Reverend Ian Page and the Reverend Stefan Strekopytov. In 2023 we sought to continue to build on the work of previous years but have still not been able to achieve our ultimate goal of offering weekly Liturgies as we are sharing the facilities of St. Peter’s Anglican Church in Clapham Manor Street. Securing a dedicated place of worship continues to be a very high priority as we are unlikely to be able to extend our opportunities for worship without such an arrangement. However, we are deeply grateful to the PCC and parishioners of St. Peter’s Church for their hospitality. Negotiations are continuing with the PCC of St. Peter’s Church to secure a longer-term agreement to enable us to stay there and have more services, and for facilities available to us to be improved. We are now paying St. Peter’s PCC £15,000 a year for our use of the Church premises. Our services have now resumed their pre-Covid pattern, with the Divine Liturgy on the second, fourth and fifth (when one occurs) Sunday of each month with the Vigil service on the evening before the second Sunday. They are primarily conducted in English with some Church Slavonic and Greek. At the Liturgy, the Lord’s Prayer is sung first in English, then Slavonic, Greek, and Romanian, and sometimes other languages, reflecting the countries and backgrounds of most of our parishioners. We celebrated Vesperal Liturgies on the eve of the Great Feasts. Near the end of the Sunday Liturgy, after Holy Communion, we have classes for our children, run by parents under the guidance of Father Alexander. The children’s ages range from toddlers up to early teens. The numbers taking part vary with holidays and half-terms but average some fifteen children. Our adult members are nurtured in the Christian faith by the sermon during each Sunday Liturgy, the didactic nature of the liturgical services and by our well-stocked bookstall which also sells icons, which in usual times is manned before and after the Sunday Liturgy by volunteers from the parish. Our priests continued the pastoral care of our parishioners by visiting them regularly, especially those who have had to move some distance away, are elderly, in ill-health, or incapacitated. 2 Our parish now cares for over 300 souls including almost 100 children and young people, and our Sunday Liturgy now has typically over 80 worshippers. Our main opportunity to get to know each other is our ‘bring and share’ lunch on Sunday. The Parish Advisory Council are continuing to look at ways of encouraging more people to work together in the service of the church. We are especially grateful to Margaret Haig, Vitalie Rotaru, Caitlin Kelly and John Goldie-Scott for their dedicated and expert leadership of the singing during the celebration of the services. Christine Brown is the Parish Warden, and we are all most grateful to her for all that she does in this exacting role. ## **Summer Camp, and involvement in the local and wider community** The Summer Camp of the Deanery took place at its normal location in South Wales in 2023. Several children and helpers from our parish participated in the camp, which was run under the guidance and pastoral supervision of our parish rector. It is staffed entirely by volunteers and offers children 9-16 years old, almost all of them living in cities, the unique opportunity to experience 2 weeks of real tent camping in the countryside, where they can develop practical and leadership skills. No child is refused a place on account of their race, religion, or financial situation. Although the cost is kept minimal, bursaries are given to any child in financial need. The children attending the camp come from the whole of the U.K and in a few cases from abroad. Our Parish is an active member of the Churches Together in Clapham (CTiC), a group of some 13 churches of different denominations in Clapham which continues to support and works with the following community-based projects: The Hub, a safe place for vulnerable people through Friday and Saturday nights. The Robes, which offers an overnight shelter for the homeless during the winter months. A number of community groups including Alcoholics Anonymous (AA), Narcotics Anonymous (NA), Marijuana Anonymous (MA) and Co-Dependents Anonymous (CoDA), subject to the present restrictions, meet regularly at St. Peter’s Church and the facilities used by these groups have recently been refurbished by our Parish. The Parish also supports the work of the Ace of Clubs charity, a local Day Centre which helps homeless and vulnerable people by providing hot meals, showers, clothing, advice, and friendship, by organising money collections, especially at Christmas, and selling tickets to parishioners which they can give to homeless people to enable them to have a meal at the Ace of Clubs. We collect food donated by parishioners after every Liturgy and the food is taken by Christian Mittelu to the Olive Tree Aid, which was founded by St. Nectarios Orthodox Parish in Battersea. 3 Members of our parish participate annually in the Clapham area service for the international World Day of Prayer. The rector of the parish also works as a Chaplain in Higher Education, based at King’s College, London and at the London School of Economics. ## **Financial support and place of worship** Our finances continue to be robust (see attached report). We are, however, still aware that we need to raise more money by regular donations, preferably made under the Gift Aid scheme. Our long-term aspiration remains to have a dedicated place of worship whilst ideally continuing to pay for the services of a housed and dedicated full-time priest. We would like to express our heartfelt gratitude to all who have been so generous in donating money to our parish and to the Priest-in-Charge, people, and PCC of St. Peter’s Church for their hospitality. ## **Trustees’ Policies** The Trustees have adopted the following policies:- ## Safeguarding Our safeguarding policy follows that of the Deanery in the Archdiocese of Thyateira. This was last updated in November 2023 and can be viewed at https://thyateira-deanery.uk/node/235. ## Conflicts of Interest Trustees must declare any actual or potential conflicts of interest and abstain from voting on any matters in which they may have a contrary interest to that of the Charity. ## Internal Financial Controls, policy and procedures The Treasurer must authorize all payments and ensure that annual accounts are produced, and if necessary, a report must be obtained from an Independent Examiner. ## Financial Reserves, and investing charity funds, policies and procedures The Trustees aim to keep reserves at a constant level and will only invest funds not needed for immediate use, on professional advice. ## Complaints, Bullying and Harassment, policies and procedures Any such matters will be referred to the Rector of the Parish for investigation and resolution. If the Rector is himself the subject of the reference, the matter will instead be referred to the Dean of the Deanery or in his absence the Archbishop. 4 ## Serious Incidents, policies and procedures Any serious incidents must be referred to the Trustees who will consider the matter, take professional advice where appropriate, and contact the statutory authorities and make a report to the Charity Commission. ## Trustees’ Expenses Trustees are entitled to be repaid their proper expenses, and those incurred in attending meetings of the Trustees, using public transport (standard class fares) or mileage rates as approved by H.M. Revenue and Customs. Claims should be submitted to the Treasurer. ## Social Media The Charity does not have any social media accounts. ## Engaging External Speakers at Charity events The Charity does not undertake this. Occasionally an Orthodox cleric from another community might be asked to preach at a service, but this is a matter for the Parish clergy rather than the Trustees. 5 CHARITY COMMISSION FOR ENGLAND AND WALES Independent examinerfs report on the accounts Section A Independeiit Exaffliner's Report Report to thé trustees1 members of The OrthcKJox Eucharistic Community in South London On accounts for the year ended 31 De￿￿tsr 2023 Charlty no {If any) 1105211 Set out on pages 3and4 I report kn the tnjstees on exarnination ￿ the accounts of the above chanty {Ihe Trusf) for the year ended 3111212023. Responslbiliiles and bas15 of report As Ihe tharity's trustees, you are responsible for thè preparation of the accounts in &£ordaTh2 with the requirerr￿nts of the Charities Act 2011 (Xhe Acr). I report in resFeCt ￿ my e￿mInatiOn of the Trusfs a￿OUnts carried out under section 145 of the 2011 Ad and in carrying out my examination. I followed all the appliCa￿e Diredions given by the Charity Commission under section 145(5)(b) of the Act. Indepondant oxaminerf8 Statement Applie￿. Delete [ ] il not applicable. I have compw nry examination. I confirm that no material matters have come lo my attention in connection wrth the examinatson (olher than that dix40s￿l below") which gtves me (ause to believe that in. any materia the accounting records were kept in xcordance with section 130 of the Charities Act: or the a￿Unts did not accord wth the accounting records: or the a(thunts did not comply with the applicable requirements conceming the fomi and content of &wunts set out in the Charities (Accounts and Reports) R8gulations 2008 other than any requirement that the aczounts give a Irue and fairf view whth is not a matter nsidered as part d an independent examination. I have rK) ¢¢)ncems *MI haNE core across no other matters in Cl￿neCtIon th the examination to which attention should be drawn in this report in order lo enable a propeT ufKlerstanding of the aCc￿unt5 to be reached. ' Please delete the words in th8 brnL*ets rfthey do not apply. Signed: 45 Name: Lof IER Oct 2018 Relevant professional quallficatlonls) or body {rfanyl: AddMs: ooJ Section B Disclosure Only ￿rnplete if the exarniner needs to highlight material matters of concern (see CC32, Independent examinatson of chanty actounts.. directions and guidm for examiners). Give here brlef deta4s of any items that the examln•r wishes to dlsclose. IER Oet 2018 CHARITY COMMISSION FOR ENGiAND ANO WAIES Receipts and payments accounts CC16a For th• poriod from 01 Jan 23 To 31 Oec 23 Section A Receipts dnd payments un￿StrICted funds R•*tri¢tgd funds Endi)wment lund• Total funds Last year Ihe I￿rest£ to I￿ wr•st£ A1 R•eèi Ser￿e CoMe¢bon 4158 3.744 941 2,319 Other Dorthn (other serv¢o61 OthEr Danabon th Grft attform I wNeknpe Obl•r Dunatson (Extrwrthw, è g C Oth•r D¢nètian {EXtrtr￿(tsWYl Or(*rwth GfftAd fryms St￿<￿9 OtdoT. Othei Bank rtere#8 + iThe5trnerrtrwrn J.744 l319 28.401 13.850 13.850 14650 J,11Th1 8Doks 344 852 Isz Sub tOfal{Gr&ss iAKorne forARJ 123.473 287 A2 Asstt and in￿StMent Ml•s. { t4bhl. Sub total 123,473 267 A3 P4ymMts ¢7 10.911 15.750 10.911 •Jt7 Venue Books t3.2 Eyrms. Camp 291 Sub total 70.••9 •4.OS2 A4 Asset and inve•tm•nt pul¢M￿, Sub total IQD.fty) 1fJJ.C 170,169 171500 794.662 Net ofrKelP￿{paYfflentsJ . AS fran•f•rn bIt￿n fund¥ AS Cash lunds last yaar end Cash funds this yearond 41.027 72838 295,047 246.462 29S.0¢7 246,020 1,023,332 295.047 CCXX R3 accouts ISSI Scclion B Staternent of assets and liabilities at the end of the period Unv•stn¢tyd funds +nMresf E R•stiict•d Endowm•nt fun