Christmas Lessons and Carols

What do we do once Christmas Day has come and gone? Many of our children may believe that the 25th is it; presents received and game over. Thankfully, we've got at least 12 days of Christmas (depending on whose calendar you are following) until Epiphany on January 6, to celebrate the coming of the King. 

If you count yourself among those who can't get enough of Christmas - the stories, the music, and the joy - then Christmas Lessons and Carols, the First Sunday after Christmas, is for you.

Featuring six lessons from Genesis, Isaiah, and Luke, and six of everyone's favorite hymns, this is a more relaxed take on Christmas than the 24th, while still keeping all the wonder and mystery of the story. The choir is off for the weekend as a Christmas gift, and we can use every voice (whether you think it's any good or not!) to fill the space with a joyous sound. 

10:30 am in the church on Sunday, December 31. 

Christmas Eve and Christmas Day Services

Christmas Eve + Christmas Day Program

As we gather to celebrate the birth of our savior Jesus, please join us for one of three Christmas Services this weekend. 

At 5:00 the service is centered around the story of Mary and Joseph and the infant Jesus, as portrayed by the youth of Memorial. It’s the same story and many of the same words that we will hear later in the evening, but with a special interpretation that only children can give it. If you would like to be in bed sooner, rather than later, this is the service for you.

At 10:00 pm, the choir and musical guests will begin the last preparations for the arrival of Christmas. The service, sometimes referred to as “Midnight Mass” will begin at 10:30. With candlelight and all the music you remember this is one of the highlights of the liturgical year, and it comes right at the beginning! The service will end just before midnight with joy and fellowship and blessings of peace on earth and goodwill to all. This is, for many of us, a necessary refreshment after the harried and sometimes impatient period that is Advent. If you are in need of a break and a reminder of what Christmas is really all about, we’d love to see you at 10:30 on December 24.

On Christmas Day we will celebrate with an informal Eucharist with carols. A lovely, quiet way to start the Christmas season officially, it serves, for many, as a touchstone in the midst of Christmas Day busy-ness.  Come join us for that bit of joy and celebration on Christmas Day.

2018 pilgrimage to Spain

The diocese is sponsoring a pilgrimage to Spain June 13-22, 2018. Led by Canon Scott Slater and Vaughn Vigil, this pilgrimage will follow the route of the Camino de Santiago. Deposits need to be made by January 15. Contact Vaughn (vaughn@memorialepiscopal.org) for further details.

Pizza for justice

Make the switch to wind power

Switch to 100% Green-E windpower through Groundswell.

You’ll reduce your carbon footprint and Memorial gets $10 for each parishioner or friend who makes the switch!

It’s easy and economical to make the switch.  Just click on this link to enroll.  https://groundswell.org/clean-energy/wind-power/enroll/.

You will see the prices available for BGE customers.  Choose a 1-year contract, currently priced at 8.8 cents per kilowatt hour, or a 2-year contract at 8.7 cents.  Put in your personal information, and then select Memorial Episcopal Church on the drop-down list.  You will then be directed to the WGL website for the actual enrollment.  You will need to have your BGE bill ready, because you’ll need your account number and your customer choice ID number (on the BGE bill it’s the number to the right of the multi-colored circle on the front page).

Anyone who pays an electric bill, regardless of whether they rent an apartment or own a home, can sign up for a 1 or 2-year contract.  You will NOT receive a second bill and you will simply see a change in your electricity supplier from BGE to WGL.  If you are currently under contract with an electricity supplier other than BGE, you may not be able to enroll until your contract is up.

Grey and Vaughn as our spiritual and environmental leaders have already signed up!  Barbara Cates and Dick Williams regret that they are stuck for now in more expensive windpower contracts, also with WGL, but can attest that the power keeps working just as well as the old dirty power did. 

Who was Mark and why do we read him?

Join us for coffee, donuts and a study of The Book of Mark this Sunday and for four Sundays in January, 9:30 to 10:15 in the Upper Parish Hall right after Faith at 8. 

Mark is the first Gospel and the shortest – the story of Jesus that can be read in 40 minutes.

This Sunday we’ll be playing a game of identify the famous quotes from Mark. We’ll map out the whole story in one easy format.

If you know nothing about the Book of Mark, or everything, we need you.

Have you ever wondered why parts of Mark are read on 35 Sundays this church year? Why is Mark so important? What meaning does it have today?

Learn the whole story in one easy format. Be able to impress your friends with your knowledge of Scripture. Deepen your intellectual and spiritual connections.

Bruno Reich

The holidays come to Linden Park Apartments

“Jingle bells! Jingle bells! Jingle all the way!”

Residents of Linden Park were treated to a chorus of people ages 4-84 singing Christmas last Sunday Afternoon during the annual holiday party. Members of Memorial, Bolton Hill residents, and community members from around the area joined the residents for a festive luncheon with punch, hot cider, sandwiches and rolls and a LOT of desert.

Neighbor Peter Van Buren provided the musical entertainment, with assists from Monty Howard, Barbara Cates, and Erin Kelly, along with some of Memorial’s youngest members. Our Intern Bruno Reich organized the event in conjunction with the Linden Park resident services coordinator Ruth Royster, ensuring that there was a plenty of food, drink, and good cheer to go around.

Memorial has had a long history supporting Linden Park (formerly Memorial Apartments), and the residents were grateful to see that tradition continue.

Thanks to everyone who volunteered, baked, cooked, and sang.

Bolton Hill Can Drive 2017 - sponsored by the Samaritan Community

This coming Sunday, December 17, between 12:30 pm and 1:30 pm volunteers and children will be coming around the neighborhood to pick up canned goods and other non-perishable items to give to those in need this Christmas. If you live in the neighborhood, please feel free to put your items on your front stoop. If you do not live in the neighborhood, but would like to contribute, you can bring your items to church at the 10:30 service or drop them off at Memorial that afternoon. Thank you for your support.

Christmas Services

Christmas Eve! Christmas Day! 

Advent is a season of patience and preparation, and Christmas is the celebration for which we have been waiting and preparing (somewhat) patiently. This year at Memorial we will have four services on Christmas Eve – splendor and joy from 8 am to midnight. We hope that most of you will join us for at least one of these services. 

Faith @ 8, our Contemporary Eucharist service, will celebrate the Fourth Sunday of Advent at 8:00 am in Upper Farnham Hall. Faith @ 8 is more discussion based and free-flowing than the traditional services at Memorial, and as such engages an entirely different side of your brain. If you have ever felt that traditional services leave you with too many questions and no one to ask, Faith @ 8 may be exactly what you’ve been looking for. All are welcome!

At 10:30 am we celebrate the Fourth Sunday of Advent with Holy Eucharist, Rite II. With choir and acolytes and welcomers and all, we will close out the season of anticipation in glorious fashion and immediately dive in to Christmas Eve with the “greening of the church” and the assembly of Angel Baskets.

An annual tradition at Memorial, we decorate the church with fresh cut greens and trees from Feldhof Farm. Members of the congregation will travel to Feldhof Farm on Saturday the 16th to choose and cut the trees for the church, which the Fanning family generously donate in memory of Dougie Wells. On Sunday after church we will put up all the trees and arrange the greens, while those who wish to assemble Angel Baskets for members of the congregation who may be in need this Christmas. 

Once the greening is completed we will take a brief, but well earned, break before returning for the 5:00 pm Christmas Pageant service. At 5:00 the service is centered around the story of Mary and Joseph and the infant Jesus, as portrayed by the youth of Memorial. It’s the same story and many of the same words that we will hear later in the evening, but with a special interpretation that only children can give it. If you would like to be in bed sooner, rather than later, this is the service for you.

At last, at 10:00 pm, the choir and musical guests will begin the last preparations for the arrival of Christmas. The service, sometimes referred to as “Midnight Mass” will begin at 10:30. With candlelight and all the music you remember this is one of the highlights of the liturgical year, and it comes right at the beginning! The service will end just before midnight with joy and fellowship and blessings of peace on earth and goodwill to all. This is, for many of us, a necessary refreshment after the harried and sometimes impatient period that is Advent. If you are in need of a break and a reminder of what Christmas is really all about, we’d love to see you at 10:30 on December 24.

On Christmas Day we will celebrate with an informal Eucharist with carols. A lovely, quiet way to start the Christmas season officially, it serves, for many, as a touchstone in the midst of Christmas Day busy-ness.  Come join us for that bit of joy and celebration on Christmas Day.

The view from Bolton Street

What happens when Christmas Eve is on a Sunday?

This year, as happens every decade or so, Christmas Eve falls on a Sunday, which means it is the fourth Sunday of Advent. Why, you ask? Because according to the Church calendar the Feast of Christmas is celebrated on December 25. It has been customary, of course, in many Episcopal and Anglican churches around the world to celebrate Christmas on Christmas Eve — often with a Midnight Mass that rings in the Feast of Christmas with candles, bells, carols and a lot of Christmas joy.

The question that might be on your mind is “Do I HAVE to come to church on Sunday morning AND Sunday evening?”

Now, you should know by now that in the Episcopal Church there is very little you HAVE to do, and even less that I or any other authority can MAKE you do!  As people of faith, we worship God both communally and individually, and you have to make the best decision for you.  

But let me say that it might be a good idea to approach Christmas with a different lens this year than most.  Plan to be here at 8 or 10:30 a.m. on Sunday for the Advent IV liturgy.  Spend some time pondering, for a few more hours, the waiting and wanting and hoping for the return of the Savior.  Put behind you the lights and the present buying and the office parties and everything else. It will be a slow day, and the day after it even slower, so languish a bit in the slowness of life with us on Sunday morning.  

Join in the festivities after services as we green the church. Find yourself a cup of chili or hot cocoa and help string greens and decorate Christmas trees and prepare this place for the coming of the baby Jesus.  

And then come back in the evening — maybe for the 5 pm pageant service, with a rather industrious bunch of children singers. Or for the 10:30 Midnight Mass to bask in the organ, the incense, the music, the candles and perhaps some memories of Christmases past and some hope for Christmases present and future as you invite the child Christ back into your heart and into your life. Or do something totally different this year. Come back and join us as we gather around the font for an informal service on Christmas Day with your favorite Christmas carols (picked by you) and maybe some more hot cocoa, coffee and leftover Christmas cookies. 

However you choose to celebrate Christmas this year, I am grateful to have you as part of the Memorial family, and I hope that this Christmas season offers you an opportunity to invite Jesus back into your life, and rekindle a passion for living out the Gospels all the time: tending the sick, giving rest to the weary, soothing the suffering and shielding the joyous, all for Jesus’ sake.