Are you calm? We live in tense, anxious times worried about global conflict, climate change, the cost of living the increased tensions and divisions in society. When we retreat into our church communities we become anxious about numbers, finance, and buildings. As a church we stress about the theological and doctrinal divisions that we strive to avoid tearing us apart.

It is hard to find calm. In church life finding calm at Christmas is nearly impossible. It is the season where the work seems to increase. Christmas fairs, carol concerts, extra services all great in themselves yet all increasing the busyness and stress. Then there is the getting ready for the festivities, shopping, cooking, decorating – all things to aid our enjoyment but all adding to the pressure, the stress, the noise.

We need calm. We cannot live our lives at full pace hurling ourselves from one thing to the other. That’s why we have the sabbath, made for humanity by an omnipresent God, A God who does not need to rest but recognised at the moment of creation that the world would need peace. At least for a moment.

Silent Night, Gruber’s famous carol first performed on Christmas Eve, has formed the inspiration for the church of England’s advent and Christmas campaign 2024. It offers a note of calm often in the midst of a rousing carol service or concert. It is in itself a simple quiet carol that contrasts with most of the others we sing and provides a moment to quietly reflect on the beautiful moment of God’s incarnation. Through the inevitable trauma of labour and childbirth comes the time when all is still and we can sleep in heavenly peace. While the shepherds are quaking and the choirs of angels are singing at the centre is the calming presence of Jesus. Jesus, who later would calm the storm, would model times for prayer and solitude in the midst of his busy ministry, and would stand calmly defiant in the face of the persecution that led to his victory on the cross.

We all have storms in our lives and we all need to recognise for the people and communities we serve Christmas is not always a time of joy and celebration but can be an occasion when the storms in their lives reach a crescendo and they need calm.

This advent, this Christmas, I pray that your church can be for you and for your community a place of calm. That you can bring yourselves and others to stand before the prince of peace to find the peace, the calm that you need this Christmas.

Bishop John