Welcome to this service.
Welcome to the Third Sunday of Advent, December 13! This week we honor Joy with a special Family Christmas celebration. Along with readings that you will find here, we will meet by Zoom on Sunday, Dec. 13, starting at 10 am, for the Family Celebration followed by Joys and Concerns.
Click here on Sunday morning to join the worship by Zoom.
Click here if you need more detailed instructions on getting onto Zoom.
You can respond with thoughts about the service or with anything you would like to say by using the comment feature at the end of the post or by emailing us. You can also bring others into this experience by sharing the link to this service by email or social media.
Whoever you are, wherever you are on your journey, you are welcome here and in our church community.
The United Church of Strafford Council
Readings in this post
- Prelude
- Call to Worship: A Haiku by Herbert Goertz
- Advent Reading
- Scripture Reading
- Offering
- Announcements
Prelude
Members of our choir sing “Il Est Ne, Le Divin Enfant.”
Reading for Second Sunday of Advent
Offering
This congregation is a small but meaningful part of the movement to establish God’s realm of peace, justice and care for God’s creation on earth, actively engaged in serving our community and supporting the wider worldwide movement.
One of the ways we work together and increase our strength beyond our individual abilities is by pooling our resources. This is hard to do when we are forced apart by the pandemic, so we hope you will take just a minute to use our online donation service.
To make your offering on line, please click here. (This is a service we are providing through an extremely well established on-line donation company specializing in churches that is recommended by the national United Church of Christ and used by thousands of churches like ours. To read more about our decision to allow on line donations, click here.)
Announcements
Please note that we are gathering as a congregation by Zoom at 10:30 AM on Sunday mornings to say hello to one another and share our Joys and Concerns and Prayer requests and offer our compassion and support and company for this journey.
Our Heartfulness Contemplative Training Circle is also meeting by Zoom on Thursdays at 6:00 PM. This is for anyone who is interested in practicing mindfulness or meditation, or heartfulness and centering prayer. It is a time for talking about those practices and also more generally about our spiritual life.
You can find links to instructions on how to be part of those Zoom gatherings on the Welcome Page of our website.
If you are not on our weekly email list and would like to be, please email us at unitedchurchofstrafford@gmail.com and we will make sure you receive all our church news with many more announcements than we print here.
You can also see more news on this website by clicking here.
It is extremely important that we stay connected now. Please reach out by phone or email to neighbors and other members of the congregation, especially those who live by themselves or are struggling or vulnerable. Our Deacons, Becky Bailey, Kim Welsh and Maggie Hooker, are coordinating our Deacons Fund and our outreach to people in need of support, and Danette Harris, Chair of our Mission Committee, is leading our work with the Food Shelf. Becky, Danette and Joey Hawkins are on the town committee that is coordinating outreach as well. If you would like to donate or help please email us or use the comment feature on this page.
United Church of Strafford, Vermont 