Sunday, December 21 - The Fourth Sunday of Advent
8:00 am: Low Mass
9:00 am: Christmas Pageant & Sung Mass
11:15 am: Solemn Mass (Healey Willan: Missa Brevis IV; Colin Britt: There is no rose; John Taverner: Ave Maria)

Wednesday, December 24 - The Vigil of Christmas
4:30 pm: Family Mass & Procession to the Cr�che
10:15 pm: Musical Prelude
11:00 pm: Procession & Solemn Mass (Palestrina: Missa "Papae Marcelli"; Lassus: Resonet in laudibus; Lauridsen: O magnum mysterium)

Thursday, December 25 - Christmas Day
11:00 am: Solemn Mass

The Parish Clergy are available for Confession as a preparation for the Feast. You may call and make an appointment.

The Parish Office will be closed on Friday, December 26.

Wednesday, December 31
5:00 pm: Festival of Nine Lessons & Carols by Candlelight

Thursday, January 1 - The Holy Name
11:00 am: Mass

Tuesday, January 6 - The Epiphany
6:30 pm - Procession & Solemn Mass (Victoria: Missa "O magnum mysterium"; Magi viderunt stellam; O magnum mysterium (motet))

Each year stuffed animals and infants' clothing are presented at the cr�che during the 4:30 PM Mass on Christmas Eve. This year these donations will be given to The Fragment Society, who, since their inception in 1812, have been distributing clothes to Boston's poor and needy. They are especially in need of infant clothing and small stuffed animals to include in the more than 400 layettes that volunteer ladies involved in the organization assemble each year.

Abraham Michael Brooks was born last week, and papa Zach says Leah and baby are doing well. Now we want to show them some Advent loving care! If you can provide a meal to the Brooks family, just visit the Meal Rota website (https://www.lotsahelpinghands.com/c/625294/) to sign up for a specific day. There you'll find contact and address information. And if you find it difficult to deliver a meal, please consider leaving food for them at the church. Thanks! For further information contact Fr Wood.

The Annual Parish Meeting of the Church of the Advent will take place on Sunday, January 18. At this meeting reports on the state of the Parish are made by the rector and other members of the Parish. Vestry Members, Officers, and Diocesan and Deanery Delegates will be elected.

For the third year, the Meeting will be called to order immediately following a shortened 9 AM Sung Mass, which is to say, at 10:00 AM, and will take place in the Church as usual. This should give us a good hour to conduct the business necessary at the Annual Meeting, but, if need be, the 11:15 AM Solemn Mass will be delayed until 11:30 AM.

Contributions to the 2014 Annual Report are due in the Parish Office by 12:00 NOON Monday, January 5, 2015. The Annual Meeting of the Parish will be on January 18. All heads of committees or groups are asked to write a report.

Vestry Nominations. Please note that several members of the Vestry, a Treasurer and a Clerk will be elected at the Annual Meeting to be held on Sunday, January 18, 2015. It is not too early to think about members of the Parish whom you think would serve effectively on the Vestry. A Nominating Committee consisting of John Higgins, Jack Gurnon, Thatcher Gearhart, Father Warren, and the Wardens, Peter Madsen and Kara Rodgers, is ready to receive the names of those whom you wish to nominate. Please speak to them beforehand to make sure that they are willing to run.

A sheet giving qualifications for Vestry service and the duties of a member of the Vestry may be found at the rear of the Church. Please read this carefully before you present yourself or nominate someone else.

Our new Diocesan Bishop, the Rt Rev'd Alan Gates, will make his first official visit to the Advent on Sunday, January 25, 2015, at both the 9:00 and 11:15 AM Masses.

We beseech thee, Almighty God, to purify our consciences by thy daily visitation, that when thy Son our Lord cometh he may find in us a mansion prepared for himself; through the same Jesus Christ our Lord, who liveth and reigneth with thee, in the unity of the Holy Spirit, one God, now and for ever. Amen.

Collect for the Season:
Almighty God, give us grace that we may cast away the works of darkness, and put upon us the armor of light, now in the time of this mortal life in which thy Son Jesus Christ came to visit us in great humility; that in the last day, when he shall come again in his glorious majesty to judge both the quick and the dead, we may rise to the life immortal; through him who liveth and reigneth with thee and the Holy Ghost, one God, now and for ever. Amen.