Vicar's Christmas Message
1 December 2013
Over the weekend of 14/15 December this year, St Mary's will be holding its Christmas Tree Festival. This will be our third year of doing this. So it is rapidly becoming a tradition; a much-appreciated one. Individuals, schools, nurseries, local businesses, communities, organisations, clubs, charities all bring their trees, set them up in St Mary's church and decorate them. It looks and feels brilliant.
Feels brilliant?
Well, yes. I imagine it feels just ever so slightly like stepping through a wardrobe of dusty old winter coats and out into Narnia. Or Aladdin's cave. Or... into a stable where lies a baby in a manger. It's special. It's different from the humdrum and the hurly-burly.
Like St Mary's Christmas Services themselves, it says something about the fact that no matter how hard our lives are - their complications, their difficulties - there is also, and always will be, something else going on. There is always another way of looking at things. Another way of being. And there is always someone or some group of people who care.
It may 'only' be a Christmas Tree Festival. But it is most definitely not just one. It is a symbol of hope, of a community of diverse people with diverse interests and needs, that cares. And, yes, it is a symbol of love. It is a symbol of everything that Christmas and the Christmas story brings: "Peace on Earth and Goodwill towards All."
Come and step into the world of Christmas this year; our services, our Christmas Tree Festival. You can find the dates and times of everything that's going on at St Mary's over this period here in our magazine. Come and experience the sights and sounds and feeling of Christmas for yourselves.
Wishing you every blessing for Christmas and a peaceful New Year.
God bless
Martin