Day 649 Saturday, Christmas Day, 2021

Awesome divine presence, May your love and light shine through us

(Patti England as Secret Santa)

Tomorrow We are all invited to our Emmaus Christmas Celebration

We'll open the celebration at 4:00 and start our liturgy at 5:00

From 4:00 - 5:00 share Christmas stories Past, Present or Future

Brief liturgy at 5:00 (we're all busy with family etc....)

Join Zoom Meeting

https://us02web.zoom.us/j/5193158573

Passcode: 1234

Meeting ID: 519 315 8573

One tap mobile for phones

+16699006833,,5193158573# US (San Jose)

(Linda Wildman as Secret Santa #2)

A Prayer gift from Hermine:

Awesome divine presence,

May your love and light shine through us

at this Christmastime and throughout the New Year!

You are the battery of hope, creativity and continuing life.

Be with us.

Let us be grateful for all that we have and that we can give.

Amen 🙏

-- 💕 Hermine

A Winter Solstice Prayer - a gift from Victoria

The dark shadow of space leans over us. . . . .

We are mindful that the darkness of greed, exploitation, and hatred

also lengthens its shadow over our small planet Earth.

As our ancestors feared death and evil and all the dark powers of winter,

we fear that the darkness of war, discrimination, and selfishness

may doom us and our planet to an eternal winter.

May we find hope in the lights we have kindled on this sacred night,

hope in one another and in all who form the web-work of peace and justice

that spans the world.

In the heart of every person on this Earth

burns the spark of luminous goodness;

in no heart is there total darkness.

May we who have celebrated this winter solstice,

by our lives and service, by our prayers and love,

call forth from one another the light and the love

that is hidden in every heart.

Amen.

- Edward Hayes

(And from our friends at the Community of St. Anthony's in Santa Barbara)

Christmas Joy!

WE Believe in an Emerging Emmanuel within us

We Sense God’s presence in Creation and in the immensity of our Universe. In the incredible display of life on this planet…And in our consciousness of something far greater than ourselves.

We Rejoice in the birth of Jesus. In Him we see the fullness of possibility to make God visible in our lives. Like all of us He grew in wisdom as he aged. He questioned. He searched for meaning. He shaped his convictions and opinions. He experienced love and came to know love’s connectedness with the Creator God and all Creation.

He Stood firmly in his own religious tradition and preached good news to all people dreaming of a better humanity. We Believe and Rejoice that he taught us not to imagine a manipulative, intervening God, but one who is as close as breath and as soft as a whisper.

We Rejoice that Jesus led people to discover the sacred in the ordinary; in the lowly; and in everyday life; In human yearnings to be better people; And in being neighbor to one another.

We Rejoice that Jesus’ teachings sets humanity free to believe that we live in God and that God lives in us in wonderful diversity of expressions. We believe in an eternal dimension to this intimate connectedness, giving meaning to who we are as humans.

We Rejoice that Jesus became one of us. Because of this we ask You Creator God to continue to make all ordinary things blessed and give us vision to see anew.

ALL: We are the Emerging Emmanuel.

AMEN, Alleluia!

Announcements:

A Christmas message from Greg Boyle

(Don't miss this - brief and wonderful)

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=oGVIZSksFIw