Barnes in Common

the magazine of Churches Together in Barnes
March/April 2009

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Twelfth Night at St Osmund's

Rare would be the ‘true love’ who could stay the 12-day course of Christmas these days. With commercial Christmas starting at Halloween and most of December being party month, it’s no wonder most people are happy to finish celebrating on Boxing Day. In fact, the only Twelfth Night custom visible in this country seems to be the ritual dumping of forlorn Christmas trees by the dustbin on January 6th.

I don’t think I was the only one, therefore, who set off for St. Osmund’s Epiphany Banquet with the feeling that the Christmas season was past its sell-by-date. But Father Dominic’s opening prayer enlightened me about the importance of the festival. In fact, in the early Church it was more important than December 25th and certainly many European countries still mark the specialness of the day with rituals and customs.

One such is the ‘blessing of the chalk’, done, for example, in Austria. Father Dominic blessed a basket full of chalk and marked above the door frame 2009 and CMB (the initials of the three wise men, Casper, Melchior and Balthasar) before distributing the chalk to the children to do the same in their homes. The inscription also means ‘Bless this House’. A medieval touch was the presentation of two boars’ heads before the buffet supper started. All the food was free, donated by parishioners (another reminder of early church values) and there were carols by the choir and prayer and poetry readings.
For desert, the French Epiphany cakes ‘Galette des Rois’ (King Cake) were served. Hidden in them is a figurine and whoever gets this is king for the day and entitled to wear the paper crown served on the cake. And finally, a modern twist, was a raffle with prizes wittily themed on the Twelve Days of Christmas.

It was a rare treat on a cold January night to see 200 contented and well-fed guests ranging from babes in arms to senior citizens – a reminder of the power of traditional customs to draw people together as well, perhaps, to re-focus the Christmas season away from that dictated by the market. The Epiphany is also a very international part of the Christmas story with the message that the good news of the incarnation is for all of humanity wherever they were from. In a globalized society, perhaps it is a festival worth reviving. Certainly, the feeling at St. Osmund’s is that the banquet should be repeated in years to come.

Theresa Munford