From the Vicar's Pen:

Silent Night, Holy Night. Babs and I were able to spend three days during Christmas week at "the farm". We were surprised at how little snow there was, and I had forgotten how quiet it is 'in the bleak midwinter, earth as hard as iron, water like a stone.' Yes, the quiet made quite an impression on me and so did the darkness. We do have electricity, but we often use what was once "high tech" kerosene lamps to light the table and the sideboard near it. It doesn't take much darkness to swallow the light up however, so the nighttime atmosphere in the room is one of peace and quiet. It occurred to me that it was probably like that in the manger on that most holy of nights. No city lights, no distant radio or television to be heard or seen. There would have been just a quiet peaceful darkness that few of us are able to experience today. I looked out the window and saw only the soft cast of blue moonlight on the snow.
There was no wind and the trees stood as silent sentinels as if they were guarding the animals in the forest.
Advent is a soft quiet time of preparation. Christmas in our modern society is a festival of light and singing.
Lights burn on our trees and along the streets and the radios play an unending stream of carols. Then we reach the great liturgies of all churches on Christmas Eve and Christmas day.
The weather was good to us this year. It was good to see an almost full church for the 5 o'clock service. The church decorations and flowers this year were particularly beautiful. The organ playing and congregational singing were spirited. We also had very special treats of a beautiful violin descant during the singing of "Silent Night" and a duet of

"0 Holy Night". The church took on a more medieval and intimate nature as the hours turned to midnight and the magic of candlelight took over. The carillon rang "Silent Night" as a light snow was falling and the people left to go home. It seems like the magic of Christmas always comes, no matter what.

This comes to you with every good wish for the New Year.

Fr. Glen

 Thoughts of the Vicar's wife

Having taught the earth sciences for thirty seven years, I am acutely aware of the myriad faces of Mother Nature. I am also of the opinion that most of us, out of ignorance of the complexity of nature, make the mistake of assigning a value judgment to nature dependent on how we are affected by her actions. Having said this, I am now going to do exactly that. All the Gospel accounts of Jesus' entrance into Jerusalem and the events of Holy Week take place in a hot, dry, sunny location. Western New York was cold, snowy, and gray this Easter season. At first this seemed almost as bad as Christmas without snow. I knew this was the wrong attitude to start the Lenten-Easter season with, so I personally worked very hard at looking for the silver lining and adjusting my attitude to where it should be during this season.

Lent began in February, a time when us non-skiers begin to give up hope of ever being warm again or of ever experiencing a sunny day again. I worked at deciding that this rather dismal weather was perhaps appropriate for the penitential nature of Lent. Why should I expect to be ebullient about the weather? Perhaps the weather could help me focus on the "gray" areas in my life and allow me to address them in a helpful manner. The visual warmth of the honey-scented candles, the beauty of the music, and the solemnity of the service all served to make the Stations of the Cross and Benediction very meaningful and totally independent of the weather outside. Independent that is except for when weather forced us to cancel the service.

The earliness of Daylight Savings Time threatened to flood the church with too much sunlight during the Maundy Thursday, Good Friday, and Easter Vigil services, but Western New York's gray weather carne to the rescue, helping to darken the church and thus heighten the drama of these services, especially when the "New Light" was brought to the altar during the Vigil.

I think this was the coldest Easter Sunday I have ever experienced. Easter finery consisted of warm coats, mittens, and woolen hats. It was cold, but the sunlight was magnificent. So brilliant that I was forced to either wear sunglasses during the 8 o'clock service or to change my seat, and we all know what creatures of habit we are, so on went the glasses. Our church's lack of stained glass windows actually helped to enhance the joyful feeling this much welcomed sunlight offered us. Bright and cold to me isa better combination than warm and gray on Easter Sunday.

I was very happy on Easter and I think most of the congregation was also. The pews were quite full and the congregations' singing filled the church. All my senses seemed heightened. Susan played better than ever, the choir sang with such gusto that they sounded much bigger than they are, and Adrienne's violin descant was "the icing on the cake". The small sounds of the children in the pews spoke of the future in a positive way. The smells of various spring flowers and of leftover incense and beeswax candles made me glad I don't suffer from sinus problem.

Easter Sunday for me, and I hope for you, was wonderful and will be a reminder throughout the year, when I need it, of God's love. It was indeed a "day the Lord hath made". I rejoiced and I was glad in it.

Thoughts of the Vicar's wife