By Christina Galeone

For the past several years, in this annual column, we’ve featured responses by Blackstone Valley pastors to a variety of questions. Their collective responses to sometimes complex questions have been clever, poignant and heartwarming. 

But these times have been more complex and challenging than most of us could have ever imagined. So, this year, we asked the pastors to simply provide their Christmas messages to the Blackstone Valley. And, as in past years, their words carry the holiday’s hope, peace and joy to the area.

1. Reverend Dr. Richard J. Robison, Baptist Church of Grafton, BCG (bcg1800.org), located at 1 South Street in Grafton: 

The old familiar carol asks, “Do You Hear What I Hear?”

Someone said: I heard the news tonight. It wasn’t very good. Then, I switched to another site, and the ads were popping up. Everything was on sale. Bring your coupon and store cash, and get an additional 30 percent off. All I heard was spend, spend, spend!

I heard some Christmas songs on Christmas radio! “Jolly Old Saint Nicholas,” “Rudolph the Red-Nosed Reindeer” and “White Christmas.” 

They asked some children what Christmas means to them. I heard one say, “Santa Claus has a white beard.” Another quipped, ‘My parents get all stressed about Christmas.’ Yet another said, “I wrote a letter to Santa. I asked him for a Moon Lamp, a Harry Potter LEGO set and a Nintendo Switch Light, but I don’t think I’ll get any of them.” Finally, I went to church. The music I heard was quiet and calming, and I heard something more. ‘Do not be afraid. I bring you good news of a great joy that will be for all the people’ (Luke 2:10)

And even more. I heard a song about the bells on Christmas Day, their old familiar carols play “of peace on Earth, good will to all.” Finally, I knew I had heard the voice of Christmas!

May you hear the Good News of Christmas, as though you have never heard it before!

Have a Blessed Holiday Season,

Pastor Rich Robison

Interim Pastor of the Baptist Church of Grafton

2. Reverend Anthony Mpagi, Saint James Catholic Church, www.stjamesgrafton.com, located at 89 Main Street in South Grafton:

‘The days are coming, says the LORD, when I will fulfill the promise.’ (Jeremiah 33, 14)

Dear Friends in Christ,

  Two years ago, October 2019, I traveled to Uganda accompanying,   my mother who was to be spending the winter at home. In Uganda, I providentially “run into” two people who made a lasting impression on me when I was growing up.

First, I randomly decided to pay an unannounced courtesy call to Father Larry Kanyike. Father Larry is Pastor of Saint Joseph’s Church Kyengera (Kampala Archdiocese, Uganda), but for a very long time, he was the chaplain of the Saint Augustine Community at Makerere University (one of the oldest and top universities in Uganda and Africa). Concurrently, he was and still is a faculty member at St. Mbaaga Major Seminary, where I was a student. Father Larry is an icon. He speaks with a very strong American accent; he studied at Notre Dame University for many years. He is very confident and personable, an all-round sportsman and an academician. He is also a man of culture and the Letters. 

His most lasting impression, however, on many students at the national university and in seminary was a strong Catholic life and Christian work ethic. He rebuilt the university chaplaincy from scratch. He celebrated Masses in student halls, organized faculty and student seminars, retreats, debates and outdoor picnics. He started a national television program called “Focus on Christian Faith,” in which he shared values and views with a Gospel perspective. He challenged us students not to be afraid; be a proud Christian and Catholic, most especially, after university. He educated many poor students, paying for their school fees himself.

After retiring from the university and seminary formation, he was given a new rural parish to build, and he has done an excellent job. With his contacts and friends in the U.S., he has built a beautiful modern parish with a school, a convent next to it and much more. He is in his late seventies and suffered a stroke but is still going strong and teaching. He was happy to see me, and we caught up on the seminary days and a lot about America that he still visits every year. After lunch, he told me he was off to count the Sunday collections that will not even amount to two hundred dollars.

  I also got a few days to go on a short retreat. I stumbled upon the Daniel Comboni Sisters Retreat Center in Namugongo. Saint Daniel Comboni was an Italian Missionary from Verona Italy. In the early 1900s, he started a missionary congregation to evangelize the African continent. Unlike many founders of congregations, Daniel Comboni’s mission was to “Save Africa with Africans.” His interest was to stop slave trade, educate the African people in Africa, and build schools, hospitals, and train leaders, who will oversee the holistic transformation of the society – building on African values and the Gospel side by side. 

I went to kindergarten in Our Lady of Africa Parish run by the Comboni missionaries. Our head teacher was Sister Gabriella, an Italian nun. I inquired where she was, if she was even still alive. To my shock and surprise, she was here! At this place I stumbled upon! Many of these missionaries have given themselves to the poorest of the poor. Sister Gabriella is now over 85 years old, but she has chosen to retire in Africa, where she has lived for more than 50 years. 

We had a great time with the nuns who run the center (four Italians, one Spanish and one from Eritrea). I celebrated Mass for them and the postulants every morning at 7 a.m., and what singing and joy! It was powerful to see how these religious women (and men) have “pitched a tent” in unbearable conditions to give dignity, a voice and education to the poorest, that they too may know that God is not far away. ‘He is with us’ (Emmanuel)

  Both visits touched me deeply to this day!

  As we gather this Thanksgiving, the season of Advent will begin. The Church prepares us in this special season, spiritually, for the birth of Christ. Christmas reminds us that God is with us. “The Word was made flesh and is dwelling among us. [John 1:14]” He has pitched a tent in our midst even though we may not realize it. We recall how through history and in our present daily living, through many people and events, God guided us by his grace. The future we will always enter confidently because of His grace.

  Let us ponder God who has been present to us and be thankful, but most of all, let us be challenged this Advent season to tell the Good news of the child born in Bethlehem, with the witness of service to our neighbor. Let the grace of God not stop at your door. Share it with others. Look and find Bethlehem today in the poorest, the lost, the isolated, the despised and depressed, the fearful and the anxious; transform them with your effort, self-sacrifice and good example that they may know that the Savior of the world is here!

  Happy Advent & a Blessed Christmas!

 In the Lord,

 Father Anthony Mpagi

3. Licensed Lay Minister Thomas Houston, Emanuel Lutheran Church, https://emanuelworc.org/, located at 200 Greenwood Street in Worcester: 

As we approached Christmas last year and were faced with the distress caused by the COVID-19 virus, I’m certain everyone was hoping and praying that things would be back to normal by Christmas 2021. And, while the vaccines have gone a long way in helping to modulate the effects of serious illness, the world remains in the grip of a global pandemic.  

God’s people have been denied a great many of those things that have been previously taken for granted. Warm hugs and friendly handshakes have been replaced with fist and elbow bumps. Get-togethers among families and friends have taken place online via Zoom. Masks, social-distancing, and never-ending hand washing have become the norm. For most of us, these have amounted to nuisances, but for many others, the effects of the pandemic have been much more impactful.  

Frontline workers have been stretched to the limit, businesses are unable to continue to operate, and job losses and income reductions have been an enormous strain on a great many of our neighbors. And most importantly, so many of our friends and family members have been stricken by this insidious disease; severe illness, extended hospital stays, intubations, and, sadly, far too many deaths have been the result of life in the shadow of COVID, now impacting another Christmas season.  

But we are Resurrection People! We have faith in the God who made us, forgiveness through the Savior who redeemed us and hope through the Spirit who sustains us. As we approach another Christmas with the spectre of COVID looming, we must always cling to the faith and belief that we do not face our troubles by ourselves. While it may often seem that we walk alone, we acknowledge that as people of faith, we place our trust in the One who travels the path of our lives with us. The God who cares deeply for all of humanity will prevail, and the scourge we face now will at some point be a distant memory.  

So, let us turn our hearts and minds to the celebration of the Incarnation, the walking of God in flesh among us. The newborn babe in the manger is the reminder that the joy of Christmas extends far beyond the tree, the lights, the presents and the department store crowds. The coming of the Christ-child into the world is the reassurance that, in spite of the chaos around us, we are the recipients of God’s promises, promises that will not be broken.  

The troubles of these times will be replaced with the glory of the risen Christ, when all will be made new, and God’s Resurrection People will share in new life, free from pain, sorrow and the ills of this world. So be of good cheer, enter the Christmas season with joy and hope! Look forward to a new year, one that, by the grace of God, will herald a return to hugs, handshakes, and the warm gatherings of family and friends. Merry Christmas, and God bless!

Minister Tom Houston

Emanuel Lutheran Church, Worcester

  

4. Pastor Jamie Walton, Cornerstone Church, cornerstonebv.org,  located at 6 East Hartford Ave. in Uxbridge: 

 As you read this, I know you feel the burden of the last couple of years. Maybe it is the loss of someone you love, time spent in isolation, a financial burden you did not expect or something else that has made life hard.  

It was ironic that not long after my thoughts about the hope of Advent were printed in this newspaper last year, my family and I had to go into quarantine, because of the virus that has plagued all of us. It was a difficult time of feeling the weight of isolation and the weariness of sickness. It was also a time of deep reflection, because I didn’t have much else to do. “Where is God in all this?” I asked myself. It felt dark and hopeless. Yet, it was then I remembered that it is in the darkest places, that the hope of the gospel at Christmas shines the brightest. 

  I remembered there was another man, a long time ago, feeling alone and depressed. His name was Joseph, and his soon to be wife was pregnant, and it was not his child. He was lying sleepless on his bed when an angel came and told him the boy was the hope of the world. “Behold the virgin shall conceive and bear a son, and they shall call his name Immanuel (which means God with us) - Matthew 1:23.  

I was reminded that Christmas means God with us. In the deepest places of pain, in the darkest hour of regret, and in our worst shame imaginable, God came to be with us. Christ was born, Christ died for us, and Christ rose again. This is the light that shines in the darkness.

  Whoever may read this and be feeling lonely, or sad, or sick or desperate, please feel the message of Christmas. It is precisely in the darkest places that Christ shines the brightest. There is hope because God is with us. Spend this Advent praying, celebrating with whomever you can find and join in worship. Cornerstone Church would gladly welcome you to join us at any of our weekend services and on Christmas Eve as well. Just find a church, and join the chorus of people who know that the hope of the world that was born on Christmas day is still the light we live by. God with us!

Pastor Jamie Walton,                                                                                                       Cornerstone Church

Clever, poignant and heartwarming still describe the pastors’ responses. We hope that these messages will bring the love of Christmas to the Blackstone Valley.

Finally, I went to church. The music I heard was quiet and calming, and I heard something more. ‘Do not be afraid. I bring you good news of a great joy that will be for all the people’ (Luke 2:10)

And even more. I heard a song about the bells on Christmas Day, their old familiar carols play “of peace on Earth, good will to all.” Finally, I knew I had heard the voice of Christmas!

May you hear the Good News of Christmas, as though you have never heard it before!

Have a Blessed Holiday Season,

Pastor Rich Robison

Interim Pastor of the Baptist Church of Grafton

2. Reverend Anthony Mpagi, Saint James Catholic Church, www.stjamesgrafton.com, located at 89 Main Street in South Grafton:

‘The days are coming, says the LORD, when I will fulfill the promise.’ (Jeremiah 33, 14)

Dear Friends in Christ,

  Two years ago, October 2019, I traveled to Uganda accompanying,