Keep Christ in Christmas / Light Up for Christ

02/28/2019

Council: 13181 - SABATTUS

Project Description:

Council #13181 intended to host the annual “Light Up For Christ” celebration by having the Prince of Peace Parish Nativity located at Our Lady of the Rosary in Sabattus. Plans were made to have a coloring contest to select a child from the community to “light” the nativity. Additional plans were made to host a pancake breakfast the Sunday prior to the Nativity lighting to draw excitement, awareness and exposure to the event and to get as many people in the community to participate and to literally “Keep Christ In Christmas” by starting off the Christmas season on the right foot. The event did not go as planned and changes needed to be made at the last minute, but it still served the purpose of getting the community involved and aware.

Beginning in the summer of 2018, representatives from the Holy Cross Council approached our Council about hosting this Light Up for Christ ceremony. We eagerly agreed and began making plans and arrangements to do so. One of the requirements, of course, is th be able to power the nativity scene. However, the power source we intended to use – a light pole in the front of the church, was not suitable. We began to look for alternative places around the church from which we could safely draw power for the nativity. Unfortunately, we discovered that there is no external power readily available and we had to reluctantly defer to hosting this event this year. We will work with the electricians in our Council to add an outlet for use hopefully before next Christmas.

Holy Family Council agreed to take the Nativity and host the even at their church in Lewiston. On December 4th, representatives from several Prince of Peace Parish Churches and Knights of Columbus Councils met at 7:30 PM to first hold a rosary prayer service in the church and then proceed outside for the Nativity lighting ceremony. The event was concluded with refreshments in the basement of the church.

During the planning of this event, Brother Knights Robert Michaud, Dan Bouffard and Maurice Lachapelle worked to find options to power the Nativity scene at Our Lady of the Rosary. Robert Michaud also began the planning for the pancake breakfast and created the coloring contest by selecting appropriate coloring pages, hosting them on the Council web site and printing them out and distributing them at church. On the day of the event, Robert Michaud was joined by his wife, Stephanie and son Nicolas for the rosary and Nativity lighting ceremony at Holy Family.