Candlelight Christmas Eve

Click above to view the recording of the "Hybrid" Candlelight Christmas Eve.

Online: https://www.youtube.com/c/TrinityUMCMontpelier (livestream will begin at 6:45pm)

​During this Advent, we have been reflecting on the image of The Inn: Housing the Holy. Our Advent journey has led us to this moment when the light shining through a closed-door becomes one opened to new possibilities, new relationships. What a poignant moment for us to gather-both online and in-person-this Christmas Eve to sing carols, listen to children reading poems, hear the Good News from the Scripture and message, and light the candles of hope, peace, joy, love, and Christ together.

Download the Bulletin

OFFERING.
Candlelight Christmas Eve is worship. Like the magi who offered frankincense, gold, and myrrh, one of the ways to express our response to Christ’s birth in each one of us is through our financial offering. There will be Christmas envelopes included in your bulletins if you are in-person, or choose one of our online options. 
We will NOT be passing offering plates during the in-person service to minimize contact. There will be offering plates placed near the exits where you can leave your offerings. 
Give —> https://www.paypal.com/paypalme/trinityvt

CANDLE LIGHTING.
If you are worshipping with us online, please have a candle ready with you so that we can light the candle together.  If you are joining us in-person, a candle will be provided to you as you enter the sanctuary. After singing the Silent Night, Holy Night, please DO NOT try to “blow” out the candles. This will cause everyone lowering their masks all at the same time. Instead, we will have ushers go around with candle snuffers.

ABOUT THE GUEST ORGANIST.
On Christmas Eve, we will be blessed by a guest organist, Christopher McWilliams. 

“Christopher McWilliams holds a BM Summa Cum Laude in Organ and Piano Performance and an MM With Distinction in Piano Pedagogy and Performance from Westminster Choir College of Rider University in Princeton, NJ. At WCC, he studied piano with Phyllis Lehrer and organ with Kenneth Cowan and Matthew Lewis. 
    After graduating, he has worked primarily as a piano instructor at the Westminster Conservatory of Music from 2012 to 2020, where he taught mostly one-on-one lessons to students aged 7 to 17. He has also taught music theory to violin students at the Princeton String Academy, and he accompanied flute and violin students during recitals both in Princeton, NJ and at Weill Recital Hall in NYC. While he taught at WCM, he performed regularly in chamber music recitals with his former colleagues including Melissa Bohl, oboe, Marjorie Selden, viola, Michael Carl Green, trumpet, and Phyllis Lehrer, piano.
Between 2011 and 2018, Mr. McWilliams served as organist of Princeton United Methodist Church, where he accompanied the elementary, youth and adult choirs and collaborated with solo instrumentalists. From 2014 to 2020, he also served as a weekly rehearsal accompanist for both First Dutch Neck Presbyterian Church in Princeton Junction and for the Taiwanese/American Fellowship Hall in Hillsborough, NJ. For a brief period between September and October 2019, he was an intern organist for the Abiding Presence Lutheran Church in Ewing, NJ. 
    Since June 2020, Mr. McWilliams holds a post as Director of Music at Bethany United Church of Christ in Montpelier, VT, where his main duties include leading the adult choir in worship, playing and maintaining the organ and pianos and collaborating with other soloists. Aside from being Director of Music, he is a faculty member of the Monteverdi School of Music and holds a teaching studio both at Bethany UCC and at his residence in Barre, VT.”