{"id":30132,"date":"2022-12-25T11:03:06","date_gmt":"2022-12-25T10:03:06","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/abingdonblog.co.uk\/?p=30132"},"modified":"2022-12-25T11:03:06","modified_gmt":"2022-12-25T10:03:06","slug":"midnight-service-on-christmas-eve-at-st-helens","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.abingdonblog.co.uk\/?p=30132","title":{"rendered":"Midnight Service on Christmas Eve at St Helen’s"},"content":{"rendered":"


\nAt 10:30 pm on Christmas Eve, the bells rang to call people to the midnight service at St Helen’s Church in Abingdon. The choir processed at the start and led the singing. The rector, Revd Charles Miller, led the service, and he welcomed people from St Michael’s Church. Incense was also used, which is normal at\u00a0 St Michael’s and less so at\u00a0St\u00a0 Helen’s.
\n
\nDuring the second hymn, a candle flame was passed among people. The gospel reading was about\u00a0Jesus coming as the light of the world. There was some lovely singing, thanks to the choir, and Revd Miller spoke about the real meaning of\u00a0 Christmas and quoted a\u00a0 Stephen Sondheim song with the lyric ‘Take me to a world where I can be alive’ and said that is what Jesus can do for us.
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\nThe church was packed earlier in the afternoon for the\u00a0 Christingle service. It was fairly full at midnight, as the rest of the town was quiet, and many were asleep.
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\nAt St Helen’s, they call their\u00a0 Christmas Tree a\u00a0 Jesse Tree (The family tree of Jesus). Through advent, it is a way of journeying through the stories of Jesus’s ancestors.
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\nThe roof of the (Lady Chapel) has panels, painted about 1390, that also show the Tree of Jesse, where Prophets and Kings alternate, ending in Jesus Christ’s crucified.
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\nChristmas and Easter are when candles are lit in each of the chandeliers in St Helens. There are hundreds to light and then extinguish. <\/p>\n

Revd Miller was at the door afterwards to wish everybody a Merry Christmas. Merry Christmas to you.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

At 10:30 pm on Christmas Eve, the bells rang to call people to the midnight service at St Helen’s Church in Abingdon. The choir processed at the start and led the singing. The rector, Revd Charles Miller, led the service, and he welcomed people from St Michael’s Church. Incense was also used, which is normal […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[35],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-30132","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-christmas"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.abingdonblog.co.uk\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/30132","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.abingdonblog.co.uk\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.abingdonblog.co.uk\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.abingdonblog.co.uk\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.abingdonblog.co.uk\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=30132"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.abingdonblog.co.uk\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/30132\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.abingdonblog.co.uk\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=30132"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.abingdonblog.co.uk\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=30132"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.abingdonblog.co.uk\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=30132"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}