Prayers for Holly and Jessica

Prayers have been said in churches across the country for murdered schoolgirls Holly Wells and Jessica Chapman. The country churchyard at St Andrew's Anglican church in Soham, Cambridgeshire, where the girls lived, is now overflowing with a sea of flowers and messages. In his sermon in Soham yesterday, Rev Tim Alban Jones said: "This week there has been scarcely a person who has left the churchyard dry-eyed, many people have been visibly choked up and some have been seen to be weeping openly." Archbishop Vincent Nichols said in a statement last Sunday: "The names of Holly and Jessica, and Soham, have been in the hearts and on the lips of all who have prayed today. Catholics throughout England and and Wales are praying for them and their families in these terrible days. "In the face of this evil people of good will pull together as do the church communities in the village of Soham. May God give endurance and strength to all caught up in these horrors." A special memorial service at Ely Cathedral, to be attended by 2,000 invited guests, will be held next week. See also Letters Page