Sunday in the snow

Finally got out and made it to church at St. Luke's this morning.  The snowdrift that blocked me in on Christmas Eve was still there on Christmas morning, so it wasn't until afternoon Christmas Day that my dad and I got out and shoveled off the driveway.  We had over half an inch of ice under the snow to try to break up and remove, too.  The streets are still a mess around here.  In the South, municipal governments aren't equipped with snow plows as they are up north, so we wait for the weather to warm up and the limited car traffic there is to wear away the snow.  My parents' house is near the local hospital, so their street usually gets enough traffic to make the road passable after a day or so, but my tires were still spinning on my way up the hill.

Church attendance was light this morning.  I walked in five minutes before Mass was to start, and they were putting everybody up in the choir.  By the time the processional was going, enough more people had wandered in to fill up the first several rows of pews on both sides.  I think a little over 50 ended up finally there (the deacon told me there were only 18 people in church Christmas Eve, mostly people who lived near the church who could walk there).

Hymns this morning were Regent Square (Angels from the realms of glory) for the processional, Puer nobis nascitur (Unto us a boy is born) for the sequence, Venite adoremus (The snow lay on the ground) for the offertory, Antioch (Joy to the world, v. 1) for the fraction anthem, Greensleeves (What child is this) during communion, and In dulci jubilo (Good Christian men rejoice) for the recessional.

The Mass setting included a Taizé setting called "Glory to God" in lieu of the Gloria and Proulx's A Community Mass setting of the Sanctus and Benedictus.

The rector was out on his post-Christmas vacation, so the assistant, a priestess, was the celebrant.  She wore an ungirdled alb with her stole hanging straight down on both sides bishop-style, but at least she put on a chasuble for the consecration and communion.  The deacon preached this morning.  He talked about how God didn't make change in a big "shazam" way, but provided a tiny spark to build up inside us, and analogized that to how scientists believe that during the "big bang" that began the creation of the universe, it all started with a singularity that had no dimension, and yet within a couple of seconds, 75% of the universe was formed.  In case you were wondering, this isn't exactly a parish of Creationists!  LOL  We can get very scientific and rational here, since ConocoPhillips has a research and development center in town, and there are lots of scientists and engineers out there with one or two Ph.D.s.

It's always nice to be back at St. Luke's, since this is the parish where I grew up, and I still know lots of people there.  Sitting in the choir is always fun, too, since that is where I learned to sing as a young choir boy many years ago.

Time to go figure out what to fix for lunch.  Maybe if things clear off tomorrow, we can start running around town, but for now, we're essentially at home in the snow.