Michael still laughs when he remembers his first Christmas at Old First. “That tree in the lower narthex, sort of pint size and undecorated. It’s like that sad little tree from Charlie Brown’s Christmas.”
It took him a while to get up the nerve to ask Alice, who was then the decorating the Sanctuary for Christmas diva. Everything else was so deliberate; a whole bunch of decorating traditions that we hold on to. So he stuttered and stammered carefully, “Um, I think we forgot something on that tree downstairs.”
Very patiently, Alice explained that was the Christmas card tree. “Instead of sending each other a whole forest worth of cards, we can just put our wishes for the whole community on a single card and share it on that tree.”
What a nice, green idea!
Since so many of us are newer than Michael, maybe you’ve been wondering why there’s an undecorated, artificial tree in the lower narthex. Now you know.
Now you might want to get the congregation a card and place it there…
