Today’s post is from Patrick Cabello Hansel, co-pastor at St. Paul’s Lutheran in Minneapolis, MN.

The first Baby Jesus at our church is now 11 years old.  He’s the goalie on our soccer team, which finished runner-up this year.  The year he was baby Jesus, his mom and dad were Maria y José (Mary and Joseph), and his six-year-old sister was an angel.  The now not-so-little boy was born here and holds the rights of U.S. citizenship. The rest of his family members are immigrants, who have not always found the welcome they came looking for.

La Posada is a traditional Mexican and Central American Christmas procession, in which the congregation walks with María and José looking for Posada, or shelter for the baby Jesus.  People walk from house to house singing Christmas carols, often carrying candles.  José sings a song at each house they stop at.  The English version goes something like this:

Lodging, I beg you, in the name of heaven.

My beloved wife is weary, she can’t walk anymore.

We line up the houses ahead of time, and the people who meet us at the door are coached to be mean innkeepers.  They sing back to the congregation something like this:

We don’t take people like you, you’re too poor.

Leave us alone, go away!

So the pilgrims continue walking. Depending on the weather, we visit a few more houses, then end up back at the church, where this time, the pilgrims are welcomed in. We sing carols in candlelight, then onto the fiesta: food, music, piñata.

No matter the cold, there is joy in walking outside in a winter night. There is mystery, there is danger, there is hope that someone will welcome us.

Today, there are more refugees in the world than any time since World War II, and immigrants are demonized across our land.  What if each of those families was Mary and Joseph?  What if each of those children was the Holy Child, the one bringing peace? What if each of us was the shelter, the posada?

Today’s post is from Lydia Posselt, Pastor at Family of God in in Buckingham, PA. This is the second of two posts about how congregations will be worshipping this year when the fourth Sunday of Advent falls on Christmas Eve.

I’m coming to the end of my first year as pastor in my congregation, and Christmas is the last “first” of the list. This also happens to be the year when Advent 4 is Christmas Eve. Since the day is so full, I decided to concentrate on Christmas Eve and to adapt an “Advent Lessons and Carols” service from Sundays and Seasons for the morning service. The result is a relaxed service that recognizes Advent 4. Since I know that many of my members will likely come to both the morning service and also one of the two Christmas Eve services we offer (at 4 and 8p.m.), this is a way we can give attention to both celebrations.

This particular Sundays and Seasons template we’re using is called “Savior of the Nations Come” and highlights Advent hymns from around the world.  For the most part I’m using the hymns S&S recommends, like “Come Now, O Prince of Peace” (ELW 247) and “He Came Down” (ELW 253), but I made a few small changes to the liturgy: I took out the opening dialogue so that we can still light the 4th candle on the Advent wreath and do our usual lighting liturgy, and I added where each of the hymns come from next to where they are listed in the bulletin. I also swapped out “The Angel Gabriel from Heaven Came” (ELW 265) for the “Canticle of the Turning” (ELW 723) which happens right after the annunciation reading from Luke 1:26-38. That way we hear the text of the annunciation and then we get to sing a version of the Magnificat “along with” Mary.

After I came back from a trip to Namibia in May to preach at the Lutheran World Federation Assembly, I have been introducing a few of the hymns I learned while there in our worship, and my congregation has enjoyed learning them. I think it’s important to highlight that Lutherans come from all over the world, as do great hymns. There are just too many good Advent hymns to include during any given Advent season, and I think this service is a great way to enjoy ones that might not otherwise make it into the rotation this year. Even though they may not be all that familiar to my congregation, they are catchy tunes that are easy to learn and very singable. If this goes over well, it will be something we can keep “in our back pocket” whenever the next time Advent 4 is also Christmas Eve… or really at any point during Advent we want to do something a little different!

Pictures are of members of Family of God painting the back glass wall of our sanctuary, which separates the sanctuary from the narthex (above) and the finished painting all ready for Advent (below).

Today’s post is by Gretchen Rode, Associate Pastor at House of Hope in New Hope, MN. This is the first of two posts on how congregations will be worshipping on the 4th Sunday of Advent/Christmas Eve.

This year, the 4^th Sunday of Advent is also Christmas Eve.  At House of Hope in New Hope, Minnesota, we know that a morning worship service is important so that those who come home for the holidays or routinely come on Sunday morning have a place to be during this usual time.  We also want to honor that it is a busy day for us as pastors/church staff and that most of our people will already be in the Christmas Eve mood.  With this in mind, we hope to have a light-hearted time of gathering to mark this last day of Advent and begin to move into Christmas together as a community.

So, to bridge between Advent and Christmas, we have created a service that starts in Advent and ends in Christmas.  Our service begins in the darkness of Advent with the lighting of the Advent wreath, singing Advent hymns “Come Thou Long Expected Jesus” and “Prepare the Royal Highway,” and reading the Gospel for the Day (Luke 1:26-38) which tells the story of the Angel Gabriel coming to Mary.  The Gospel is a perfect bridge to our well-known Christmas story.  We will sing “The Angel Gabriel” after the Gospel (skipping the sermon time) and transition to the Christmas portion of our service.  This second half of the service will include a statement of faith crafted from Psalm 98*, Christmas hymns “Joy to the World” and “Go Tell It on the Mountain,” and, in a nod to the traditions of the season, we will bless Christmas ornaments* and gifts* and sing “Deck the Halls.”  We hope that this shortened service will send our people out into the day, centered on Christ and ready to celebrate together this blessed time of Christmas!

We will be using liturgy from Sundays and Seasons for quite a few parts of this service.  We love the “Call to Worship from Psalm 98” and will be using it as our statement of faith: “Justice for everyone, everything fair! Sing to God something brand new!  For God has done wonderful things!”  For the blessing of Christmas ornaments, we will invite congregation members to bring an ornament from home (and we will have some on hand to give out as well).  This blessing will be a slightly altered “Blessing of the Christmas Tree,”* adding to the last line “May we who stand in its light eagerly welcome the true Light that never fades, and as we carry these ornaments home may we remember that your light goes with us wherever we go. All glory be yours now and forever. Amen.”  We envision that everyone will hold their ornament as they sit in the pew and saying this blessing together.  If there are many children at this service, I might invite them up during this time to help lead the blessing from the front.  We intend to incorporate the Blessing of the Gifts Rite during the Benediction as a sending.

We hope that each part of the service will help our congregation to celebrate this joyful day and to connect rites that are done at home with the welcoming of God into the world that we celebrate at Christmas time in the Church.

*Liturgy for the Statement of Faith from Psalm 98, the Blessing of the Christmas Tree, and the Blessing of Gifts come from Sundays and Seasons in the Seasonal Rites for Christmas for Year B, 2018.

Advent is the first season in the church year, comprising the four weeks before Christmas. The word “Advent” comes from the Latin, “to come,” and the church has observed Advent as weeks of preparation since the fifth century with themes of watchfulness, preparation, and hope infusing this season. Together we both anticipate the celebration of God’s coming in the form of the Christ child and the final coming of Christ in the time to come. Blue or purple is the appointed color for the season.

A Few Notes on Current Practices for Celebrating Advent

• Lutheran churches observe Advent in numerous ways. Most light the advent wreath during the four weeks of Advent, adding one new candle each week. These candles are typically lit during the Gathering rite. Prayers for the Advent Wreath lighting can be found in Sundays and Seasons.

• Some congregations hold midweek services during the Advent season.

• Many congregations experience the challenge of celebrating Advent in a culture that celebrates Christmas during the month of December. The commercialism of Christmas can so easily creep into the faith practices of the church. Some congregations hold Advent Festivals for the Sunday school or Advent musical events to help the faithful understand how to keep Advent amid the culture’s early celebration of Christmas. Advent devotional booklets for home use are also a helpful resource.

• Theological issues related to Advent often come up when discussing worship planning, especially related to musical matters. On the one hand, Advent is a time to prepare, to sing music related to the impending birth of Christ. On the other hand, as Christians, we know that Christ is already present with us. It is important that Advent is not a “pretend time,” as if Jesus had never come into the world. Focusing on the waiting for the light of Christ in a dark world and on the eschatological nature of Advent can help make Advent a more depth-filled, honest time of waiting.

• Keeping this in mind, it is wise to make musical decisions in Advent (as in all other times) with care. Some assemblies do not sing any Christmas carols in Advent, remaining true to the spirit of watching and waiting that characterizes the season. Other congregations, for pastoral or teaching reasons, begin to sing some Christmas carols in Advent. If a new Christmas hymn is to be learned, for example, Advent might be a time for teaching.

Today’s post is from Kelly Sherman-Conroy (Oglala Sioux), Luther Seminary student and member of the American Indian/Alaska Native Lutheran Association.

In August of 2016 the ELCA made a promise to the Native people.  The Churchwide Assembly, made up of members of the ELCA, passed a resolution written by ELCA Native American clergy Bishop Guy Erwin (Osage Nation) and Pastor Joan Conroy (Oglala Sioux) to recognize and celebrate contributions of Native Americans in the life of the church and community.

The whole body of the ELCA confessed that they were wrong and repudiated, explicitly and clearly, the European-derived Doctrine of Discovery, a document that has been used to justify racism against and enslavement of indigenous peoples since it was written in 1493.

This papal bull, known in Latin as “Inter Caetera,” gave Christian explorers the right to claim lands they “discovered” for their Christian monarchs. Any land discovered that was not inhabited by Christians could be exploited. If pagan inhabitants could not be converted, they could be enslaved or killed. Indigenous people have felt the sting of that papal edict since Europeans first landed in North America. The Native culture, according to early missionaries, did not fit the Christian religion, and belief in the Gospel required them to give up who they were in order to become something they could never be… white.

When the ELCA passed the resolution formally repudiating the Doctrine of Discovery, one of the commitments that was made was to “encourage the Office of the Presiding Bishop to plan an appropriate national ceremony of repentance and reconciliation with tribal leaders, providing appropriate worship resources for similar synodical and congregational observances with local tribal leaders, at such times and places as are appropriate.”

This Native American Liturgical Celebration and Service of Reconciliation was created by Kelly Sherman-Conroy, a member of the Oglala Sioux Tribe in Pine Ridge South Dakota, who attends Nativity Lutheran Church in St. Anthony, MN and also currently attends Luther Seminary. This liturgy, with the help of many people, was put together to in a meaningful way integrate Native culture and spirituality, and also keep some boundaries of the Lutheran Christian traditions. The result is that a profound and deeply spiritual experience has been created for all involved, not just in the worship practices themselves but in relationship with God and the other. In other words, inculturation (the adaptation of worship to various cultural settings) aims to deepen the spiritual life of the assembly through a fuller experience of Christ who is revealed in Native people’s language, rites, arts, and symbols.

On November 22^nd this service will be live streamed from Nativity Lutheran Church in its entirety. You will be able to join the live stream at Nativity’s web site, and more information about the event is available on Facebook. It is my hope that this service and celebration will serve as an example as to how this liturgy can be used in regions across the ELCA, and that the participants will have a blessed, faith-filled and formative experience.

If you would like to host this liturgy in your own synod or congregation, the worship resources themselves and a list of guidelines created to aid in the use of the liturgy may be found from ELCA.org. The American Indian/Alaska Native Lutheran Association is also available for conversation via email at ELCANATIVE@gmail.com.

Images:

Image 1 is a photo of Kelly Sherman-Conroy, taken at Luther Seminary during worship