Merry Christmas & Happy New Year! In the midst of all the activity that these Christmas days bring with them, I wanted to take the opportunity in today’s column to say thank you! It’s something that while I always feel it, I don’t always remember to say it, so again, thank you!

  Thank you to all those who helped to make the days of our Advent & Christmas seasons days of such joyful celebrations of God’s presence & love among us, especially this year, with the quick turnaround (about 4 hours or so) between our last celebration of the Advent season & our first celebration of the Christmas season. Rather than starting to name individual people, as I know that I will inevitably & accidentally end up forgetting someone, or I will remember another person who should definitely receive a round of thanks right after the bulletin is submitted & after it will be too late to add them to the list (plus, due to bulletin deadlines I am actually writing this before the decorating/celebrating itself is actually done). A tremendous amount of time & effort goes into making sure everything is ready for our celebrations. Whether it was through helping to decorate or clean the church, or helping to minister at Mass, or helping to make everyone feel welcome, or helping point out to visitors where the restrooms were, or putting a hymnal back in the rack, or anything/everything else, it was all very much appreciated. Again, thank you for all that you did to help worship & celebrate & encounter Christ well!

  This weekend we celebrate the Epiphany of our Lord, the revelation of Jesus to the nations. In so many ways each & every one of you have been revelations of God’s love & presence through your kindness & generosity to so many. Thank you, not just for what you do, but more importantly for who you are!