Graves Memorial Presbyterian Church is holding a Blue Christmas Service for those that grieve during the holiday season. The event will be held on Tuesday, Dec. 2, at the church sanctuary on 201 Fayetteville St., Clinton.
Graves Memorial Presbyterian Church’s pastor, Rev. Katie Rives, said that the church wanted to do something meaningful for the community for those that hurt during the holidays.
“It’s a worship for everyone I would say,” Rev. Rives said. “The idea is that we hold space for people who are grieving and people can grieve for all different kinds of reasons. They can have lost someone very important to themselves, of course, but it can also be grief about a pet, it can be grief about a broken relationship, the expectations in life or career changes that can cause people to suffer. It’s very often for regular everyday people living and in our culture this time of year, we have in all our songs and this feeling in the air that it’s the happiest time of year.”
During this time of healing and hardship, Rev. Rives said she believes that some people might think that God has forgotten about them, especially around the holidays.
“The other thing can be that sometimes people in their pain can think that God has forsaken them. And that most worship services are uplifting and energetic and constantly underscoring our praise and worship and that God is loving and kind,” Rev. Rives explained. “But people’s realities can be ‘I’m hurting, so where is God in all of this?’ So the idea of the Blue Christmas service is that it holds space for people in pain, in grief, and to hopefully experience that God is with them in it.”
The goal of the service is to give the community a place that feels sacred, holy and invitational. That the community will have a place to be able to grieve in their own ways without suffering from the isolation of being alone during the holiday season. This is the opportunity to be together as a group.
“We say at the beginning that, you are welcome to participate at any level in which you feel free to do so. So if all someone wants to do is sit and take in all that’s around you, that’s great. If you want to respond in the public spaces of response, that’s great. If you want to sing, if you don’t that’s OK. We will read various scriptures that we hope are encouraging and that acknowledge the pain.”
The event will see a total of five candles lit. Rev. Rives says that the white candle is the biggest, and the one that’s lit in the beginning. It’s to honor Christ, who brings the light of the world into the sanctuary. From there, they light four blue candles while explaining what each one represents.
“I think we had people 35-40 people that came last year, from different churches, and their comments were very encouraging and it was deeply meaningful and beneficial,” she said. “It wasn’t something that they really knew and had ever experienced but they were grateful.”
Rev. Rives spoke about last year’s event: “Our church was determined that we would offer it again because the experience of the value it offered the community. I’m hoping more people will understand and know about it and take advantage of the offering. It’s not about the numbers, but because I believe there’s healing that can happen through Jesus Christ when people who are hurting who might have shut themselves off from God because the pain is so great for them to possibly experience that God meets them in their pain and ministries to them very personally.”
If there’s anything that the event strives to tell the community, Rives said, it’s that the churches involved have their backs in their time of need.
“I really believe as I believe for all the ministers, we’re in this because we love the Lord, and we love people and want to see people transformed,” she stated. “We really believe God can be the one that can do that. We’re just a conduit for that. So I’m grateful that this year we will offer communion and I think that’s very sacred. People could have lost somebody this year, they could have lost somebody 20 years ago. They can feel depression and the holiday blues, right? Those realities can be exacerbated because of the loss people experience and the isolation they feel because of the time of the year. Feeling so disenfranchised that much more. So this service is unique in that it acknowledges that, which I’m proud of; proud that we want to do this.”