Silent Nights

Pastor’s Epistle—November 2020

Hey, y’all. Before we get started I just wanted to remind folks that we are worshipping in the sanctuary, 9:00 a.m. Sunday (Word and Sacrament) and 6:30 p.m. Wednesday (Vespers). We’ve also got a brief service of Morning Prayer (or Matins), 8:30 a.m. Sunday through Thursday. We’ve been averaging 20 or so attendees for Sunday morning worship, in a sanctuary that can easily hold 220, so social distancing isn’t a problem. Masks are still mandatory, as per state and synod guidelines, for love of our neighbor.

As for our educational ministries, Confirmation is now 10:30 a.m. on the first and third Sundays of each month, while Bible Study (in the fellowship hall) and Sunday School (in the sanctuary) are at 10:30 a.m. on the second and fourth Sundays of each month. We’ve got everybody safely spaced apart, and so far all seems to be going quite well. Come join us; you’d be more than welcome.

We’re also posting three or four videos each week both on our Facebook page and on our YouTube channel. Homilies from Sundays and Wednesdays, as well as weekly Faith5 reflections and biweekly Confirmation CliffsNotes, are uploaded regularly. If you haven’t checked us out, please do; the links may be found in every Monday morning email to the congregation. Feel free to share any and all videos: even a few social media shares can greatly increase our ministry’s reach online.

Now then, on to the topic at hand: November. We kick things off with the Hallowtide. Then we’ve got hunting season and Martinmas (generally known as Veterans’ Day), a few saints about whom really only I get excited, and of course Thanksgiving. The older I get, the more I enjoy Thanksgiving, though it holds a somewhat ambiguous position on the calendar. Neither a purely religious nor secular holiday, it commemorates our New England forebears—I myself have a Mayflower ancestor of whom I’m rather proud—while uneasily reminding us of King Philip’s War, which followed a generation later.

November then ends with Advent, marking a new year for the Church, and our period of preparation for the coming Christmastide. Advent is a season of quiet and of darkness, the perfect counterpoint to our culture’s hectic holiday extravaganza, which now takes up every waking moment from Black Friday unto New Year’s Eve. Advent, then, is the prescription for what ails us. It tells us to calm down just as everything ramps up. It reminds us that God awaits us not so much in the tinsel on the tree as in the silence of our souls. Hygge’s been the hot new buzz word lately. The Church just calls it holiness.

Advent is a season for contemplatives, mystics, and monks. It teaches us to let go, rather than grasp at yet more. If we listened to its message—the hymn of holy waiting—we might find that we enjoy our Christmastide all the more for our patience. This isn’t meant to be a wet blanket for folks happily playing Christmas carols. We all love those, even if we don’t all readily admit it. Rather, for those feeling the holiday stress, for those yearning for Yuletide craziness to abate, take heart. God awaits us in the silence.

Come light a candle. Come say a prayer. Come find the calm and quiet eye within our storm. All things pass away. God alone remains. And He will find you here in the silence.

In Jesus. Amen.