foreign [Music] [Music] is [Music] [Laughter] [Music] is [Music] he is is [Music] is [Music] is is [Music] [Applause] is [Music] [Music] [Music] [Music] is [Music] so [Applause] [Music] so [Music] [Applause] [Music] [Music] sing through all jerusalem christ is born in bethlehem good morning and a happy christmas to you wherever you are in the world early in the morning of christmas day from the deanery at canterbury cathedral be welcome here as we come to the end of our advent journey and proclaim the birth of christ in bethlehem and begin to celebrate it here are the four advent candles which we've lit sunday by sunday in the garden in preparation for this day and here in the middle the great candle which proclaims as we light it the birth of christ on christmas day the light of the world we're going to say our prayers together inside today and we're going to enjoy the decorations of christmas and some of the christmas music this is the first day of christmas and for the next 12 days we shall be giving christmas music of all kinds and also be saying our prayers together in great joy as we gather both inside and outside over the next few days it's been quite a little journey and it's brought us to a christmas where many of us are separated from those that we love and would normally spend christmas with so in heart and mind today we not only go to bethlehem but we also go to the homes that we perhaps would be in had we been able to travel or to the friends that we would have been with had we been able to be one with them at the time of these restrictions of pandemic nevertheless we can encourage one another with the joy of christmas for christ is born in us whenever we claim him and today we on christmas day remember that especially in bethlehem so let's begin our prayers together and bring your concerns wherever you are o lord open our lips and our mouth shall proclaim your praise you laid the foundations of the earth and the heavens are the work of your hands blessed are you sovereign god creator of heaven and earth to you be praise and glory forever as your living word eternal in heaven assume the frailty of our mortal flesh may the light of your love be born in us to fill our hearts with joy as we sing blessed be god father son and holy spirit blessed be god forever the night has passed and the day lies open before us let us pray with one heart and mind and as we rejoice in the gift of this new day so may the light of your presence o god set our hearts on fire with love for you now and forever amen our son this morning on christmas morning is psalm 85 lord you were gracious to your land you restored the fortunes of jacob you forgave the offences of your people and covered all their sins you laid aside all your fury and turned from your wrothful indignation restore us again no god our savior and let your anger cease from us will you be displeased with us forever will you stretch out your roth from one generation to another will you not give us life again that your people may rejoice in you show us your mercy o lord and grant us your salvation i will listen to what the lord god will say for he shall speak peace to his people and to the faithful that they turn not again to folly truly his salvation is near to those who fear him that his glory may dwell in our land mercy and truth are met together righteousness and peace have kissed each other truth shall spring up from the earth and righteousness look down from heaven the lord will indeed give all that is good and our land will yield its increase righteousness shall go before him and direct his steps in the way beautiful psalm for this morning with images of earth touching heaven mercy and truth are met together righteousness and peace have kissed each other truth shall spring up from the earth and righteousness look down from heaven and truth today is laid in a manger by his mother mary and from the heavens the angels give their message not only of glory to god but of peace and good will to all humanity on earth we give thanks for that as we ourselves keep christmas day our lesson is taken from the gospel of saint matthew it's this the first chapter and i'm beginning at verse 18. now the birth of jesus christ took place in this way when his mother mary had been betrothed to joseph before they came together she was found to be with child from the holy spirit and her husband joseph being a just man and unwilling to put her to shame resolved to divorce her quietly but as he considered these things behold an angel of the lord appeared to him in a dream saying joseph son of david do not fear to take mary as your wife for that which is conceived in her is from the holy spirit she will bear a son and you shall call his name jesus for he will save his people from their sins all this took place to fulfill what the lord had spoken by the prophet behold the virgin shall conceive and bear a son and they shall call his name emmanuel which means god with us when joseph woke from sleep he did as the angel of the lord commanded him he took his wife but knew her not until she had given birth to a son and he called his name jesus just one of the stories that we read on christmas day we read lessons from st matthew from st luke about the shepherds and also saint luke about the fact that there was no room for the journeyers in the inn for all were travelling having been ordered to their own place to register and joseph being of the town of bethlehem takes mary though she is heavily pregnant and comes to the crowded city of bethlehem and finding no shelter is given freedom by the kindness of no doubt an innkeeper or his wife to use the stable and that is the story as we tell it and we tell also how angels appeared to shepherds in the fields and the shepherds were sent to bethlehem to be the first witnesses of that truth which the angel spoke to joseph god with us heaven reaching down to give humanity not only an example but grace and spiritual gifts and eventually the gift of the holy spirit for christ to be born in us and we too to fulfill the ministry of the messiah in the world of today which he fulfilled bringing as a prayer which he taught us to say whenever we meet together says thy kingdom come on earth as it is in heaven the qualities of the kingdom of heaven which the psalms spoke about righteousness and truth and peace and mercy are brought down and for the moment encapsulated in the child in the manger who like the shoot in the psalm will grow up and take his vocation in obedience and that story we trace in the four evangelists and also in the lives of the apostles as they travel and cause new shoots to spring up so that wherever we are in the world today we are part of the one body of christ as we claim his name and bethlehem is the beginning of all that i've had many cribs given to me in my time and they are some in boxes in the house here and some i've shared by giving them to others and they've come from different cultures and different people but what i've noticed is that wherever you are and this is a lovely fact the cribs are made to look like that particular community and culture and one of my favorite cultures of that which i have no intention of losing and i built up year by year with almost one creature or a group of them a year are the santon as they're called of provence i think that they were formed originally at a time of persecution and when one religious sect one arm of christianity for this happens in the church's history was saying to the other you will have no images in church at all and instead the little cribs giving the images and reflections and memories of the stories were created for their homes and here's just a really small one it's sitting two gathered together for really these should be in scenes very wide and some of them are very large but the interesting thing is that so many of the characters are dressed in the way that that little community would have dressed itself and they look like the people of that community we have here of course the angel crucial to the story of the joining of heaven and earth in this birth we have here also joseph the one who was puzzled and then reassured in his dream and became the guardian of the holy family and we have here of course the blessed virgin mary whose obedience to her vocation made all this possible as our creed keeps reminding us and every time we say it and in the midst of course the christ child heaven's gift to us tiny lying in the hay here and on each side of course the donkey the ass and the ox and they of course come from saint francis's first human crib that he brought together so that the people would learn the story and they're there in fulfillment of the prophecy of isaiah in his first chapter the ox knows its owner and the ass the master's crib but my people have not understood so they are privileged witnesses in our cribs and then the little group of shepherds and the interesting thing about this is the age diversity and also the fact that we have not only the the young man the very old man but also the woman here who looks like a fairly middle eye lay aged woman with a sheep being sheltered in her cloak but she is a woman shepard and she has come with them and here's one carrying the sheep quite a strong young man so the young and the old and the women and the men in the shepherds community in the community of bethlehem coming to be the second stage of witnesses the animals first and then the shepherds and really we shouldn't put them all together in the crib because we shall come to their story later on the magi the wise men and their camel who will come mitch epiphany and they're generally representing all the nations of the world having followed the star earlier this week there was the most wonderful conjunction of jupiter and saturn in the sky and that conjunction in its brightness reminded us of the sign in the heavens that caused the magi to journey to bethlehem to kneel with the christ child but the little animals here are very much european animals there's a white dark like our duck in the garden there's even a black cat and uh it's a uh certainty i'd have thought that there weren't ducks and cats and chickens there but every community is the community in which christ is born and every heart has the capacity to have christ born in that heart particularly on christmas morning but at any time let's remind ourselves that as the christmas music is surrounds us and the christmas lights are shining we ourselves have a special vocation this year to seek out and find those who need encouragement in loneliness on this christmas day they may be very near you and they may be someone that you could just go along to see not going into the house because that may be in your area not a lounge but simply to put something on the doorstep or through the door of encouragement or there may be someone that you can contact by telephone or by skype or online or the multitude of ways that we can encourage one another but at the same time we're all praying for the safety of one another the health of each other not just through the pandemic but in a multitude of sickness for salvation as we've said to each other in these weeks of preparation means healing and heavens healing comes to us in a very great way in the birth of the christ child in this world and the next for on this day heaven and earth were joined together and always will be when the christ is claimed that wonderful gospel of saint john the very first chapter which is read as the end of the lessons and carols in the beginning was the word and the word was with god and the word was god the same was in the beginning with god all things were made by him and without him was not anything made that was made in him was life and the life was the light of all people that we remember on christmas day it's a much bigger story emanating from the crib if we imagine this little round circle as our own little community or our individual lives heaven is surrounding it with grace on this christmas day so let's say our prayers for one another on this very special day of the year bring in heart and mind all those whom you love and would want to be with and those whom you know to need your prayers and even those you've heard about that you would want to send up a prayer for for that too is encouragement at a time when we're so separated and obviously we pray for our own leaders in the faith and our own leaders in government who have so many hard decisions to make at this particular time we pray for our intentions for the year ahead and we join that together in the christmas day prayer almighty god you have given us your only begotten son to take our nature upon him and as at this time to be born of a pure virgin grant that we who have been born again and made your children by adoption and grace may daily be renewed by your holy spirit through jesus christ our lord amen there's a poem i love to say on christmas day which is a a prayer in itself it's by gerald manny hopkins and it's one of his early poems and it's about making christmas a new beginning and generally i try and say it both at matins and even song to myself moonless darkness stands between past the past be no more seen but the bethlehem star will lead me to the sight of him who freed me from the self that i have been make me pure lord thou art holy make me meek lord thou word lowly now beginning and all way now begin on christmas day let's say the prayer our savior taught us in whatever language we like remembering that the cultures of the world claim christ as their own in bethlehem our father who art in heaven hallowed be thy name thy kingdom come thy will be done on earth as it is in heaven give us this day our daily bread and forgive us our trespasses as we forgive those who trespass against us and lead us not into temptation but deliver us from evil for thine is the kingdom the power and the glory forever and ever are men moment of silence in the middle of all the joy and bustle of christmas day in christ who by his coming at christmas time gathered into one the things of earth and the things of heaven fill you and those whom you love today with the spirit of inward peace and goodwill and the blessing of god almighty the father the son and the holy spirit be upon you those whom you love and those whom you would pray for today and always are men going to risk another carol and i think it ought to be a very joyful one so to the tune of handle we're going to just hear the music on this piano which is badly in need of tuning but there's no hope of that with the restrictions at the moment joy to the world the lord has come [Music] merry christmas to you all and a happy new year ahead [Music] oh [Music] is [Music] is [Music] dresses [Music] ah [Applause] [Music] ah [Music] chestnuts roasting on an open fire jack frost nipping at your nose tight carols being sung by a choir and folks dressed up like eskimos everybody knows a turkey and some mistletoe how to make the season bright [Music] tiny tops with their eyes all aglow will find it hard to sleep tonight know that santa's on his way he's loaded lots of and toys mother's child is gonna spy to see if reindeer really know how to fly so i'm offering this simple phrase to kids from 1 to 92. although it's been said many times many ways merry christmas to [Music] [Music] oh [Music] r [Music] jesus christ [Music] is [Music] is [Music] sure [Music] is [Music] me oh [Music] is [Music] r [Music] is [Music] oh [Music] is [Music] [Applause] [Music] so [Music] you