I doubt it will surprise anyone to hear that Advent is a busy season in a church and I have not been an exception. These past few weeks have been packed as I have, in addition to my normal jobs, I narrated the Lisburn Sunday School Christmas Service, I performed a narration and did a reading for the carol service, and of course, attended and helped to plan several Christmas parties.
Despite being so busy (and missing home, of course), I still had a great Christmas here. Christmas Eve I opened presents from my parents with them and my sisters over skype, then went to the Christmas Eve service at 11:30PM, where we took communion and confirmed three new members, including one girl who I work with in Sunday School and Flame (Youth Group/Fellowship), so that was a bit of an exciting moment for me. The sermon was also very interesting, focusing on gender roles in Christmas, and how it wouldn't happen without women. Women cook the dinners, wrap the presents, keep track of who to send cards to, who to invite to a Christmas party, men are given the tasks the women think we can't screw up, often after women have attempted to remove as much difficulty as possible, and yet so often we still screw things up--the gifts are poorly wrapped, some critical family member is forgotten on the card list. Even in the biblical account of the birth of Christ, it is Mary who does most of the work; all Joseph has to do is remember the names Jesus Emmanuel. Further, though David didn't mention this, we can assume it would have fallen to Joseph to ensure they had a place to stay (at which he was at best only partially successful).
On Christmas Day I went to the morning service, which was light and informal, instead of doing a sermon, David just ran around asking the children what they got for Christmas, there were a lot of new shirts and jumpers (sweaters), and several toys, including transformers.
Then he got to me, the only person he asked over the age of 10. I wasn't at all ready, and, unfortunately the first thing that came to mind was the Vietnamese silk dressing gown (robe), which my parents picked up on their trip, and gave the congregation a good laugh while giving my cheeks a bit of color. After the service, I went up to Joseen’s house for Christmas dinner. Joseen is a member of the Harmony Hill session, and is involved with the Base as well. Joseen’s daughter, Mary, is the member of the Lambeg Project Committee to whom John reports, and is the step-mother of one of the youth at Flame, and was present with her family as well. I was also excited to meet Joseen’s sister, Ruth Patterson, who is quite the amazing woman. She was the first woman to be ordained in Ireland, and served as the minister of Kilmakee Presbyterian (where my flat mate works, and where she is still something of a legend). She currently runs Restoration Ministries, which does work in peace-making and reconciliation. Christmas dinner her is fairly similar to what I’m used to at home, the core of the meal consists of turkey, ham, stuffing, gravy and potatoes, and was an excellent meal, though I do miss sweet potatoes.
I spend Boxing Day with David and his family, including his parents and his brother’s family, and that was also an excellent meal, with pork and lamb instead of turkey. Heather (David’s wife) is an excellent cook and hostess, and always makes me feel very welcome. After the meal we watched David’s eldest son’s wedding video as David’s parents had not yet seen it, and while I didn’t know most of the people involved, it was interesting to watch to see where British and American weddings differ (the differences are pretty subtle, but they exist). Once David’s family left, I hung around for a few more hours and just chatted about life and home. David seems to remain excited about letting me take a few services in the coming months, and while I’m very nervous, am excited for the opportunity to get some experience, and hopefully to become even more connected on the Harmony Hill side of my placement, where I sometimes feel that I am not doing enough.
Sunday morning came a bit too quickly—I was very disoriented when my alarm went off, and it took me a few minutes to remember why I had even set it the night before, since it certainly couldn’t be Sunday already (going to Church on 3 of 4 consecutive days is a bit disconcerting). Anyway, David managed to work the Vietnamese dressing gown into the sermon again, once again turning me a bit red. It seems the consensus is that I’ll keep hearing about it until I wear it to church, since after that it can’t be trumped. If it happens, I’ll post pictures.
Today I played football (soccer) with a bunch of the men from Harmony Hill (and one of the women), where I pretty much made a fool out of myself, but at least I can hide behind the excuse of being American. The game went well until the end when we had a minor injury, but nothing too terrible. This evening I had supper with Clarke’s family, and then watched Taken. Tomorrow Andy and I leave for Dublin, where we’ll be until the 2nd of January, when we go to London, returning to Belfast on the 4th. Happy New Year everyone.
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