Fourth Sunday of Advent, 2007

First Presbyterian Church
Haddon Heights, NJ
December 23, 2007

I’m going to church pretty often lately. This is the sixth time this month, and there are at least two more services to go. (Actually, I know quite a few people, not in ministry or anything like that, who go to church more often than this.)

Today is the Fourth Sunday of Advent, and I choose a church in my denomination, The Presbyterian Church (USA). It’s another pretty sanctuary, with white and pale blue walls, and a lovely large stained glass window. I estimate that there are about 110 or so people here, in a sanctuary that would seat about 250. The front of the church features an abundance of poinsettias, lots of candles, the Advent wreath – it looks very nice. It’s common in churches to purchase poinsettias at Christmas to decorate the sanctuary in honor or in memory of family members, and then to take them home after the Christmas service.
The Cherub Choir is surprisingly good – you can actually hear the words they are singing. They wear smocks with large blue bows – very cute.

The pastor, Lynne Manilla, delivers a meditation about Joseph, the forgotten figure of the Christmas story. She notes that he has a small, nonspeaking role in the story, but a huge impact nonetheless, and talks about our relatively obscure roles in the larger scheme of things.

It’s all fine. The main thing I note is that there is definitely some holiday excitement in the air. These people want to be about their holiday business, and while they are very happy to be here and to be wishing all their friends and neighbors a merry Christmas, everyone is also anxious to get back home, or to begin their holiday travels. As soon as the service ends, there is what I can only describe as a bustle – an actual bustle – in the air, as people sort of explode in a burst of greeting and hugging and laughing and well wishing.

It makes me miss having a church family. I feel oddly close to all these strangers – they are so darn Presbyterian, so much my kind of people – and yet strangers. In many ways this is the service at which I feel most a stranger myself, perhaps because everything about this holiday service is so familiar. This used to be me.