---

Fall Season Worship Resources

---

  

All Saints Day, Halloween, etc.

 

All Saints Day commemorates all saints, known and unknown, on Nov. 1. All Saints' Day is one of the seven principal feasts of the church year, and one of the four days recommended for the administration of baptism. All Saints' Day may also be celebrated on the Sunday following Nov. 1. 

Click here for ideas for the Service

Click here for ideas for Activities

Ideas for the Service

From St. Andrew's, Big Rapids

Between the Prayers of the People and the Peace we've got this:

----------------------------
The Remembering of the Faithful Departed

We remember those we love who have gone before us to take their rest with the saints in heaven. You are invited to come forward, name the person you are remembering, and take a lighted candle to the altar.
If you are unable to carry the candle to the altar, the ushers will assist. If you have more than one person, you may light a candle for each. Please
remember: this is a time of remembering and so there is no hurry or rush, and there is no need to be concerned about "doing it right." All are welcome.

Music accompaniment: "Jesus, Remember Me" (Taize)
---------------------------

The acolyte will stand at the head of the aisle at a table with the Pascal Candle and a basket of tea lights. People come up, say the name of the loved one who now rests with the saints in light, then place the tea light(s) on the altar. 2 ushers are there to assist. The lights burn for the duration of the service. The sermon may have a lot to say about the people who have had memorial service in the past year, but I don't know yet. The final blessing comes from BOS 29.
  

  

From St. Martin of Tours, Kalamazoo

Tithing of Halloween Candy

After Trick-or-Treating the children take out 10% of their candy & bring it into church.  They give it at the offering & it's brought to people who may not get candy

  

---

 

Ideas for Activities

   

  

From St. Martin of Tours, Kalamazoo

   

Saintly Pumpkins

The week before, hand out drawings of the saints symbols.  Ask people to carve them into pumpkins & bring them in for the All Saints service. 

  

  

---

Thanksgiving

  

Click here to view Resources for Church Publishing (.pdf)

   

   

A Thanksgiving Prayer

We gather together this day, O God, because others in times past have done the same, an example and model for us and our prayers of thanksgiving.  Like our predecessors, we come to you in a time of great need and transition, in the midst of circumstances which daily demonstrate we are not in control of our lives.   So often, in focusing on these problems and needs, we forget our past, those who have gone before us, without whom we would not, could not, be here.

            On this day we remember families, communities, and nations created by your gifts of grace and guidance.  Whether Israel of old, or our Pilgrim fathers and mothers, we are heirs of those who have been brought from slavery to freedom, and from death to new life.  Your promises to them are ours.

            Today we are called to imagine new ways of being together, as family, as friends, as members of church and society living into these promises of new life and abundance.  Give us the willingness, the determination, and the courage to work with others to find new and better ways to be the people you wish us to be.

We give thanks for what we have been so richly given. We give thanks for what we have yet to experience and receive.  We give thanks for the grace to understand how, together with our neighbors and even with those with whom we disagree, we can live into your future.

Gather us, cause us to remember our stories of the past, give us the gift of imagination for the future. In the midst of our thanksgiving, give us boldness and confidence to go forward in ministry and service in our church and our world.  At all times and in all places, may we give thanks to you for your guidance, for making everything we've been, everything we are, and everything we will be, possible.

Amen.
November 25, 2008

Berkeley, CA -- Donn Morgan, President and Dean, Church Divinity School of the Pacific, offers the following prayer this Thanksgiving: