Norwich bulletin., 1917-12-26
CHRISTMAS DAY SERVICES
Feast of the Nativity Celebrated Parcs ChurchRev. J. Eldred Brown Delivers Christmas Message-Special Music Rendered in All the Rtualistic Churches.

tors. There was a good attendance
 at all the services. Practically all the
 rectors used the war as 8 back
 ! ground, presentino the oldest story.
 in new light.
 Trinity Episcopal Church.
 1 At the Trinity Episcopal church on
 l Christmas morning Rev. J. Eldred
 | Brown preached a Christmas sermon,
 taking as his text, God so loved the
 world that He. gave His only begotten
 Son that whosoever believeth ill Him
 l should not perish but have everlast-
 ing life est. John 3:16). He spoke
 as follows:
 | There is doubtless a feeling among
 us all today that we cannot enter into
 the spirit of Christmas as we do or
 ] dinarily. This. year we cannot but | think of the depression and suffering | of, large part of the world For, when we stop to- think of it, we real
 l iZe that those previous customs of l ours if not wholly selfish in the past
 would at least be selfish under pres | ent conditions. But after all this de- pression is good augury for the fu 1 ture and an encouraging sign of our l spiritual condition. If our humane ! sentiments and our love of justice and i fair play. had not, been growing and l developing we should simply not al- | low the miseries of OUT fellows to dis l tress us.
 i Now, great as Gods love for the | world must have been to induce Him
 to make this unique sacrifice. for the 1 gift involved all the sufferingS and 1 death of Christ. yet that love was no l indulgent love, no mere matter of sen | timent. No, it was righteous, | strong, remeeding love. God knows l that there is no real and enduring
 happiness except through righteous
 ness and God knows that He made
 mans happiness conditional upon his
 righteousness. God does indeed love His children as a Father.
 I hn hay
 been able to accomplish for the up- | lift of the world the peaceful ideals. 1 the sense of brotherhood, the minis tries of mercy, the development of | trust and good will and the recogni- | ton of the rights of others. both as | nations and as individuals are threat
 ened by this war: As yet we have
 will demand. In so doing we shah ] not only be freely giving what we have freely received, but we shall be illustrating the Christian spirit which demption and the salvation of others. At Christ Church.
 Tuesday morning at Christ Episco- | pal church the rector, Rev. Richard R. Graham, preached a Christmas ser ! mon, taking as his text Except ye be- | come as little children ye shall in no | wise enter into the kingdom of ! heaven. Matt. 1S:3.
 If when we are calling on men to | fight in what we believe is the cause | of righteousness. the familiar Christ I mas message of peace and good will ] to men seems inappropriate. what shall be the message this holy sea- son brings to our hearts?
 In a world where sorrow and suffer- ] ing are so dominant, where the sad ness of life always present is forced upon our attention never before the | idea of Christmas nirth and jollity l cannot be prominent. Ought the mes sage Of the church to Christian men ! today be therefore one of sadness? I think our instincts say, No. We l don't want to shut our eyes and ears ] to the grim facts of lite; it would not | be right, even if it were possible. for us to observe this Christmas in an altogether carefree way. as though everything was alE right with the world, but at the s@me time we feel | that Christmas should bring us some ] of cheer should be of a. very human | in innate character. This is Christ | mas. and neither the gloom of Good | Friday, nor the exultant triumph of Easter seems quite to meet the wants | of our hearts.
 We want that many of the tradi- tional ceremonies connected with our observance of Christfnes are pagan | ir' their origin, and we have felt that there is a fitness in this fer it is sym bolic of what the coming of/tJle Christ was to do for all life, namely. take the common things of ordinary life and baptize them with. His spirit, so. that henceforth they should speak to us of the love, and tenderness of our Father in heaven.
 But is it not true that these Christ mas observanceS were tending to lapse hack into their original pagaDism and Christmas was in danger of becoming a purely secular festival in which. the religious significance which gave birth | to it's observance was overlooked, if not entirely lost?
 church to us today be to make our observance of Christmas more relig- | ious than it has been in the past? ,? that it should be associated in our minds not with Santa Claus, but with Jesus the Christ: not with semi l mythical, fantastic being, the embod- iment Of jolly, careless good nature: but with. One who actually walked as The Man of Sorrows, because He was acquainted with the grief that is ! so inseparable from the life of man? Does this mean then that religious mirth has something unchristian in it ?r Assrredly not. The religion of the Incarnation, of which Christmas is the festival has a meaning for all life, and while there is undoubtedly l much of sadness in life, yet there is l place for joy,S and even for mirth. It is hard for us to shake off en- tirely the effects of that Puritanism which exercised such a strong in- fiuence on religious thought and which is by no means without it's in- f1uence still, even among us who never accepted its teaching in it's fitness, and now repudiate it's conceptions of life. The Merry Christmas' idea arose when and where men most firm ly believed in the religious message of Christmas. The Crucifix which in a most ghastly and realistic way told of the them enjoying the comedy, nay the farce of the miracle play. A merry Christmas is only possible for children, or it may be for child