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I don't think I've mentioned here before that I'm helping put together the early Christmas Eve service at my church. It's a short 5pm service which is principally designed for families of young children; there's another service at 8pm which is more suitable for adults and older kids. (And a potluck in between, which I think is a fabulous idea. I remember how tense my mother always used to be about squeezing Christmas Eve dinner between the early church service and early bedtimes.)

The 5pm service is a new innovation by our RE director. As usually happens in these cases, I suppose, she was put in charge of running it herself. The problem: she doesn't personally celebrate Christmas. Because I love Christmas, I volunteered to give her a hand with the planning and arrangements.

I think it'll be a wonderful service. Tons of singing: every reading or spoken element will be followed by a carol. We've chosen to do the first verse, or first two verses, of several carols rather than complete versions; that way even pre-readers will be able to participate in most of the singing. The centerpiece of the service will be one of Becky's justly famous stories, a folktale she's adapting for the occasion. And we're going to end the service just the way the adult service ends: making a circle around the sanctuary, lighting candles, and singing "Silent Night." I persuaded her that even small children deserve a taste of that magic, and that parents are perfectly capable of deciding whether their children can hold a candle themselves.

I haven't contributed much beyond general ideas, except that I wrote the litany. It's based on one I remember from my childhood church, in which the minister would evoke the joys and excitements of Christmas and the congregation would respond, "We can't wait!" I don't remember anything that our minister used to say, but I remember the fun of being a small excited child shouting out "We can't wait!" on Christmas Eve. So we got some of the kids in the congregation to contribute the things they look forward to most about Christmas, and I wove them together with ideas of my own into a litany. I'll be reading this on Christmas Eve, while a first-grader friend leads the congregation in their response.

Christmas Eve Litany

For tastes and smells of Christmas: fresh pine, hot apple cider, cinnamon, peppermint, and Mom's coffee cake; for special cookies we look forward to all year; for sucking candy canes down to a point and then biting them off,

WE CAN'T WAIT!

For presents: for the moment we wake up and see that Santa has come; for fuzzy new flannel PJs on Christmas eve; for the complete surprise that opens up a whole new world and the long-wished-for gift that fulfils our heart's desire; for toys which delight our imagination and video games which stretch our skills,

WE CAN'T WAIT!

For giving: for the joy and satisfaction of finding exactly the right present; for the fun of sharing our favorite things with our friends and families; for hanging mittens on the mitten tree to warm tired hearts as well as cold fingers,

WE CAN'T WAIT!

For family: for pilings-on of sisters, brothers, aunts, uncles, grandparents, and cousins, until the house is spilling over at the seams; for the chosen families of our hearts coming together with bonds closer than blood; for sweet memories of the ones we miss,

WE CAN'T WAIT!

For the gift of the idea that a tiny, helpless baby could contain the most powerful force in the universe,

WE CAN'T WAIT!

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That's really lovely. You do good stuff.

I'm not happy about how some elements of our Christmas holiday have fallen out, but one thing I have absolutely no regrets about is that we'll be in our own church, celebrating in our own faith tradition, on Christmas Eve. In recent years it's felt increasingly weird to not be with our religious community then.

I miss this, too. And, unfortunately, it appears that the UU fellowship nearest my parents (in SoCal) isn't having a Christmas Eve service at all this year.

Also, that litany is lovely!

Edited 2007-12-20 21:55 (UTC)

Can I ask which fellowship is yours? (Feel free to e-mail me, moobabe@LJ.com, if you don't want it out there for the internets to see.)

I promise that I am not a stalker! I'm a UU, though, and am feeling kind of disconnected with my own fellowship, but it's probable that yours is too far. (I live in northern Maryland.)

I really like your litany, and I absolutely LOVE the idea of an early service. We've been planning to go back to our fellowship for Christmas eve service, after an absence that was partly inspired by moving farther from fellowship and partly because we just got a little burned out.

Heh. After I wrote that, I saw your tag, and some judicious Googling helped me find it. Sadly, it's probably too far for us.

Yeah, we're in downtown Baltimore. Are you in Harford County?

Cecil County, actually--even farther.

If you can make it down, we'd love to see you there. There's lots of street parking around the church, and it's easy to get to and from I-95. I know it's about an hour each way, which is hard with a little one in the car, but you're certainly welcome if you can make it down!

Thanks! It's definitely something I'm considering. We travel about half an hour to our current fellowship; even with the longer drive, since you guys have the early service, we'd still get home a lot earlier!

That is beautiful.

And we're going to end the service just the way the adult service ends: making a circle around the sanctuary, lighting candles, and singing "Silent Night." I persuaded her that even small children deserve a taste of that magic, and that parents are perfectly capable of deciding whether their children can hold a candle themselves.

A thousand times yes. Just thinking about it, and how proud I felt when I first got to hold the candle brings tears to my eyes and happy shivers down my spine.

As a parent, the main thing I would worry about would be if we were lined up in the pews and there was the potential to set the hair or coat of someone sitting in front of us on fire. In a big spread-out circle I think it will be fine.

My old synagogue in Albany did a really wonderful thing with candles every year for the Friday night during Channukah. Every family brought their Channukah menora from home, and we set up folding tables in the sanctuary and all lit the candles together. (I thought the best part was passing the flame from one shamash to another, all around the room.) It was really stunning. The first time I saw it was a night with lots of candles, but even when it was just 3 per menora the emotional force was overpowering.

One year, my partner was part of the fire protection team standing by the doors with extinguishers and wet towels. He didn't miss the candlelighting service...he saw the whole thing (perhaps more of it than I did, from the middle of it) and was deeply moved by the image and the idea that he was helping protect the community. We never had any trouble finding volunteers for the fire protection team. I don't know if your service could use one, or if handheld candles are enough more stable than a wide variety of candleholders on folding tables.

That's wonderful, Rivka. It makes me feel like Christmas used to feel.

I can't wait, either. (-:

This sounds fabulous! My (Catholic) church always has a children's liturgy at 5 p.m. on Christmas Eve. We musicians refer to it as "the Zoo." Children's liturgy means that the Bible readings are in simplified language and the kids participate as much as possible. Instead of Father giving a homily after the Gospel, the children put on a Nativity play.

It's always extremely crowded and noisy and chaotic as most people are there just to see their kids. It's not something you go to for a sacred worship experience, but the vitality and energy in the place are awesome. I enjoy being an ensemble player in it because I do music solo at 7:30 a.m. (I do it solo because no other musicians want to be up that early. Since I sing and can play both piano and guitar, it works.) I love Christmas with kids.

That is a wonderful litany.

We're going to the service at our UU church on Christmas Eve for the first time. It starts with cocoa and cookies in the fellowship hall, and there is a mitten tree. I'm very much looking forward to it.

Christmas for me is about family, and love, and wonder and good cheer. It's a wonderful, amazing time of year. And as a new parent, I'm seeing things in a whole new light, and enjoying creating new traditions.

and the long-wished-for gift that fulfils our heart's desire; for toys which delight our imagination .

While reading these words, my mind's eye was suddenly filled with the vision of the splendiferous, many-colored, humongous box of Crayolas -- it must have had at least a hundred crayons in two long long rows in a shallow gold box -- that I found under the Tree one Christmas morning back around, oh, 1962 or thereabouts. Along with a really big pad of nice drawing paper. We only had three Christmases in that house - for 3rd, 4th and 5th grades - and I'm not sure just which one it was, but I can remember the smell of the brand new sharp crayons, and lying on my stomach in front of the living room fireplace to start drawing, like it was yesterday. Haven't thought of that in years!

Thanks for the memories :-)

HLC in NYC
who'd been feeling a touch of the holiday glooms until just now

This sounds awesome!

I know it's probably too late to suggest this to the congregation, unless it can be said this Sunday, but maybe suggest to people to bring those little electric tea lights for the littlest kids?

My niece was baptised/first communioned/confirmed in one fell swoop this past Easter; my parent's church does it as part of the Easter Vigil. It was pretty cool starting across the street from the church and walking over and filing into the church to get their candles lit and then spend the first part of the service in a completely candlelit church.

This reminds me, I should try to hit vespers at Old St. Paul's this Sunday (a great way to take a time out from the holiday madness):
http://www.osp1692.org/vespers.htm

Oh, that's going to be wonderful.

Beautiful. And enough to make me wish there was a UU congregation in Dunedin. (The only one in NZ is in Auckland, at the other end of the country.)

Oh, thank you for posting your litany.

That's lovely.

Tons of singing: every reading or spoken element will be followed by a carol.

*nods* This works really well, IME - it's how the traditional Festival of Nine Lessons and Carols is supposed to work in an Anglican Church, and it has a lovely rhythm. I've been to abbreviated versions that had two spoken elements per carol, and I feel they aren't nearly as good - they don't leave enough room for reflection.

We've chosen to do the first verse, or first two verses, of several carols rather than complete versions; that way even pre-readers will be able to participate in most of the singing.

I really like that idea.

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