December 25, 2022 – We want to wish everyone a very blessed Christmas and a wonderful Christmas season. We pray that the coming year be filled with many blessings for you and your loved ones.

Christmas day begins for us here at Gethsemani at Vespers on Christmas Eve, but really hits home at Midnight Mass. At 11:30, when we gather in the Mass area, we see for the first time all the decorations that Br. Paul has conjured for us, a feast of light and color, highlighted by the quirky and delightful Christmas banner created by our former brother Lavrans. We spend the next hour-and-a-half singing psalms and hymns, and celebrating Mass. We end with a quiet moment and, still sitting, sing “Silent Night,” all together with our guests and the retreatants who have joined us.

Christmas continues the next day with the daytime Mass, during which we were favored by a wonderful (and rare) homily from our abbot. Since he gives us a chapter talk each Sunday, he is seldom asked to preach during Mass, but when he does it is always memorable. Then, of course, we have our Christmas dinner. The refectory is adorned with candles draped with ivy and holly, with a Christmas tree shining with light. The food prepared by our brothers in the kitchen is always extra special.

We were favored with snow the day before so we had a traditional white Christmas. The weather was not welcome to everyone, though. The cold and ice meant that many of our regular attendees from the neighborhood could not be with us for either the midnight or the daytime Mass. We send them special warm wishes from us here in the monastery for their faithful support through the years.

The Cistercian fathers and mothers held the incarnation in special honor, the wonder of the coming of God in the form of a human infant. We are glad that we can continue that tradition here in our own small way.