Imagining Peace

It is with both shame and delight that most years I have to confess to eating mince pies as soon as they arrive on the shelf. In Oxford, we are very much used to getting into Christmas early, as seventh week becomes Advent and in eighth week we celebrate Oxmas. To kick off these two weeks of liturgical acceleration, this weekend the city’s Christmas Light Festival promises to illuminate the encroaching darkness.

At St Mary’s on Saturday evening (7.00-9.00pm) we will be home to one of the festival’s main events – an extraordinary light installation, Son et Lumière, by Luxmuralis, in which the medieval stone of the church building will be bathed in dramatic and powerful projections, full of colour and vitality. For a sneak preview, click here.

Entitled ‘Imagine Peace’, it is a space to begin to reflect and envision how something of the light and peace of the Christ-child can ring true in our lives, our society, our world. We are flinging wide the gates and welcoming Oxford in, asking together how we can build for a future of peace between all peoples, and experience that peace within ourselves too. The prospect of such deep and far-reaching peace can seem rather visionary – it takes a lot more than imagination, but it takes nothing less than it either. Join us to experience this remarkable occasion as, through the medium of colour, sound and space, we begin to imagine that peace promised to us in the gift of the Word made flesh.

The wonderful Vaults and Garden café will be open throughout, and entry is free – do bring friends, neighbours and family. Entrance is via Radcliffe Square.

The Revd James Crockford

Assistant Priest