Restriction on Christmas Sacrament Meeting

I agree with Curt. It seems to be an overzealous AA.

We just had a new choir director called in our ward today, and it is similar to yours in that it is a thankless job and it’s hard to get people to participate sometimes. We have actually not had a real ward choir in about two years (her predecessor was pretty ineffective, but also in over her head). I am going to participate, at least partly taking pity on the poor girl who was just called but also somewhat eager to do something with music in our ward. I want to be part of the solution, not part of the problem.

That said, having been on the bishopric side in the past sometimes there is an overwhelming request to do music. The Primary wants to sing, the YW/YM want to sing, sometimes RS or EQ want to sing and then there’s the actual ward choir. Since I favor SM, especially Christmas and Easter, being more like Music and the Spoken Word, I’m good with that but not everyone agrees. Another solution is to have the various groups sing in the weeks leading up to Christmas.

I’m in the ward choir (don’t really enjoy it but I always feel so sorry for ward choir directors which is a thankless calling in our ward). The choir director recently told us that our Christmas sacrament program had to be a regular sacrament meeting (though Christmas themed) with (seemingly) a minimum of musical numbers (our bishop interprets this as “one”.) This came down from our area authority. I looked through the handbook and could only find that “pageants” are not permitted and any musical program should have at least one speaker. But it seems the door is open to still having a primarily musical sacrament meeting around Christmas time. Is this just an overinterpretation by an overzealous area authority (or perhaps our overzealous bishop)? Or is this the experience that the rest of you have? Just wondering.

Same here. They also got rid of rest hymns in regular sacrament meetings.

I think the rest hymn thing is where there is some misunderstanding. The policy is that you don’t have to have rest hymns, not that you can’t have a rest hymn. That seems to be misinterpreted by some leaders.

The missionaries came over for dinner last night. Their spiritual message was to share a clip of the new Church Christmas video. It looks excellent. (in the original language, no subtitles, very realistic) They also mentioned that December 22nd is supposed to be strictly a Christmas worship service – perhaps even without the sacrament. They said it isn’t supposed to look like a typical Mormon Sacrament Meeting; instead, people of other denominations and religions are supposed to feel totally comfortable that day being in a more standard Christian worship service.

I have no idea if that means no music or only one hymn. It might, but it might not. We’ll see. It sounds like there might be some misinterpretation in your area.

For what it’s worth, I love what they described for a Christmas service. I have wanted that for a long time.

As I recall, last year they used the “Christmas worship service” (or similar) terminology as well. While I think it’s sort of sad the central leadership needs to remind local leaders that’s what it’s supposed to be, I also totally buy in. I do hope they have the sacrament, though. The emphasis on Sabbath worship/keeping the Sabbath has not gone away, as is evidenced by the new TR question. Our visiting GA at stake conference said it’s still one of the top three priorities. I would think the sacrament itself is important to that priority. And, c=for those who might be visiting and are used to weekly communion/Eucharist it might be weird if we don’t have it.

Over zealous. I know in my Stake every ward would have their sacrament meeting following a Christmas program. This is often the time for many members to invite non-members to church seeing as it is not a regular sacrament meeting and they might enjoy it and not be bored, and understand that Mormons are also Christians. lol

I know, different places, different leaders. Our SP is somewhat progressive but very Christ centered (which in some cases could be progressive). We had stake council last night where the SP introduced the 2019 “light the world” campaign with materials he got from the AA. It sounds nothing like what others have described. You can see for yourselves on 11/14 when light the world goes fully live.

In a nutshell:

-Dec. 22 will be a “special Christ centered” SM and no other meetings except that units are encouraged to have social time with refreshments afterwards. The SP used “just like last year” in reference to the special SM. In fairness, my ward, and I believe my stake, did well at it last year but we do tend to be more Christ centered and my ward has always done well for Christmas. Maybe having “coffee and donuts” afterwards will make others feel more comfortable because it’s more similar to their own churches?

-There is a video which I believe will be on light the world that has a similar theme to others I have seen recently with the “come and see” theme. This one does specifically say come and pray, come and sing, come and worship (and perhaps something else) specifically referencing the above SM.

-You can sign up on light the world to get daily prompts for small acts of one-on-one kindness throughout December.

-There is a new Nativity video which is apparently very moving and well done.

Invite your friends because we’re going to have a special meeting that focuses on Christ sounds like the advertisement I’ve heard for the last several years now. That the meeting is considered special because of a focus on Christ has very sad implications about the rest of our SMs.

Agreed. I think I said earlier that it’s sad we have to be reminded to talk about Christ in SM. I have seen vast improvement over the past few years in this respect but it’s still not totally there.

I also recall the instruction was to hold SM only but in our ward that translated into SM being very close to two hours long. My ward does not do brevity. We’re always cutting out the rest hymns to give people more time to talk talk talk.

We don’t generally have a rest hymn in my ward these days, but sometimes we do. Other units in the stake do regularly have rest hymns. They don’t usually cut them and the meetings tend to go over. (My ward tends to go over even without them.) I don’t anticipate a longer than usual SM, and I think last year the instruction was specific that it was supposed to be an hour. The SP said we “leaders” should all get an email about the whole thing from HQ shortly.

I’ve never heard the thing about limiting music numbers though. Every year we’ve done Christmas our ward has done the thing where someone reads a line out of Luke 2, the choir or congregation sings a Christmas hymn that corresponds to the verse, we cycle on that pattern for about 8 songs, the BP speaks, the end.

We’ve done this before but not recently. We tend to have quite a bit of singing, including Primary, and a couple shorter talks. One is usually by the bishop under the current regime.

That said, I’m also in my ward’s choir and we haven’t practiced anything for the Christmas program yet. I haven’t inquired about it.

Our ward has struggled with a choir the last few years, partly because the previous choir director just threw up her hands and gave up. We just got a new director and it was announced we will be singing at Christmas but that was just last Sunday. We have not yet practiced anything. When I first returned to activity I was not inclined to be part of the choir and it was almost non-existent then (that was shortly before she gave up). I have agreed to be part of the choir this time, but I’m gone at least 2 of the 5 Sundays between now and Dec. 22 so if practices are right before or after church (likely after) I’ll not get much practice. I can do bass or tenor, and usually end up tenor since there are fewer tenors but I generally don’t like either part because they tend to be monotone. (I love the tenor part to Away in a Manger.)

In a nutshell:

-Dec. 22 will be a “special Christ centered” SM and no other meetings….

Is this part confirmed? I have heard an indirect rumor from 2-3 sources at my branch listed as offhand comments about something else. Unfortunately, I read into their non-verbals that this was off-hand knowledge that I should already know, so I haven’t followed up on it (because I didn’t know).

It came directly from my SP who was reading off materials he got from the AA. He showed a few videos as well, one of which was about inviting people to the special Christmas service – that’s the one with the come and pray, come and sing, come and worship. The only one I can see that’s generally available to everyone is the trailer for the new Nativity video.