Do you like going to church at Christmas but at no other time?

[ifigoup]

Through a complex series of events I have found myself responsible for organising some family-friendly Christmas events for a local church. I strongly feel that church should be accessible to anyone who wants to go, not just people who consider themselves religious. I know in the past I’ve been put off going by worrying about DC being noisy, or silly stuff like knowing when to stand up and sit down.

If you’re the kind of person who likes going to church at Christmas but not really at other times, what kind of event would you want to go to, especially with kids? What things would you want to know in advance that would make it easier for you?

My son is 12 but his Catholic primary school stopped doing Christmas plays a few years ago, bar a nativity for the reception class. Instead they did a Cristingle and it was wonderful and the kids loved it, especially the bit where their candles are lit and the lights go out, quite magical.

Our church does a mix of services - some formal and some "family" - in the family ones, children are very much encouraged and involved in the whole service. They often move around the church or do a treasure hunt or read part of the story. At certain times of the year, the younger ones might make some thing (like big paper palms on Palm sunday) at the back to then show off later on in the service.
Then always tea/coffee/biscuits at the end.
We also have a play area

Essentially the family services are the ones you know the kids can be kids in, the formal ones are for people who don't like that kind of service.

We also have some Messy Church sessions - Sunday afternoon, craft and story sessions with tea at the end (our church has a kitchen area) - no prayers or sermon, just a very loose bible message in the story. This is really good for pre-schoolers - you can have them in church without worrying they'll knock over the oldies/their tea cups as they race about at the end.
The church is also used for lots of community events, coffee mornings and lunches - they got rid of a big section of wooden pews to enable more usable space.
Its really good to see them changing with the times.
Better than my mums local church where they are still very much "children sit quietly in the pew" and sing the awful hymns no one likes.

I dont go to church except at Christmas and honestly for me, its nostalgia for the carols we sang at school. I go to a lovely family crib service where all kids can join in and theres something interactive e.g glow sticks or fake candles and sweets/mince pies on the way out. It's a bit noisy and chaotic, no judgments at loud toddlers and the songs are things like little donkey, o little town of Bethlehem,good king wenceslas etc. To me its a celebration of family and I love it. They do 3 services on the day and its rammed so doing something right.

I go to church for Christmas carols, christening, or weddings. I love a good sing song - carols (traditional), hymns etc . I always feel like the only one who sings! But I do, with gusto

Christingle and nativity/ tableaux service at 4pm on Christmas Eve. Still uses real candles with supervision. Such a special part of our Christmas. It’s so popular that they have two “sittings”.
It’s nostalgia for my own childhood really. DD loves it, although one time we went she was worried that they wouldn’t let us heathens in. Initially she loved it for the sweets but now it’s for family tradition.
The thing with the cuddly toys sounds adorable.

My local childhood church is great at Christmas Eve barely standing room only.
They do an improv nativity and tell all the children to come dressed as whatever nativity characters they want which means they often end up with a huge squad of Mary's and angels but they basically walk everyone through the nativity with the use of a large projector for each 'scene' and plenty of helpers.
They pause after every couple of slides to sing carols/hymns.
One of the local farmers also brings an actual donkey for the pre-chosen adult Mary to sit on and a couple of sheep to add to the chaos.
It's so lovely, funny and chaotic,it feels so Christmassy it's always been a tradition and the only time I go to church.

A rural CofE Church near us puts on an amazing performance every Christmas where they re enact the nativity.
It gets more spectacular every year, like the film Nativity they even had an angel abseiling off the bell tower!
There are lots of farm yard animals too in the "stables", and the wise men always turn up on horseback. It's a really lovely event.
All done outside in the car park.

I am a regular churchgoer but admit to enjoying the Advent and Christmas services a lot more than the rest of the year. The Christingle service is always popular in our church. Some of the dads have a long-running competition as to who can make the biggest and/or weirdest Christingle! Also the Nativity service; we tend to have adults or older children narrating and then any child who turns up can borrow a costume and be whoever they want.

I go to a Christmas carol concert at our cathedral, they don't pray or anything, it's quite secular barring the carols and surroundings ha but won't go to anything remotely akin to a church service as I vehemently oppose organised religion and the misogyny that goes with it. Though I acknowledge a carol service still makes me a bit of a hypocrite!

We have a Christmas Eve pyjamas service here too. It’s lovely.

Forgot to say that when possible they use a real baby for the nativity play! I love it.

Yes we always go to a Carol by candlelight service and it is so lovely.

We aren't overly religious but I like to try and believe. We don't tend to go to church during the year, but I like us all to go at Christmas and acknowledge the Christian element of it.

The one we usually go to is around 45 minutes long and we go after our meal out.
This year we moved so I thought rather than miss it all together we would go to the local catholic church. I won't be doing that again, I didnt realise how long mass was and it is far too long for children. It was too long for me even

I want traditional Christmas carols, not random hymns or new fangled songs. When I moved up here aged 15, we went to midnight mass at our nearest church and they sang normal hymns and not one Christmas Carol! I stayed up til midnight for that!

Perhaps the chance to make a Christingle before hand and try to cater for older children as well as preschoolers.

Definitely mince pies and a brew afterwards.

None of my family are churchgoers or religious at all really, but we have always spent Christmas with my grandmother who lives in a village, and the local church when I was little did a children's Christmas Eve service which I'd go to with her every year. It was probably at 6ish, fairly short, lots of carols (an absolute must) and my favourite bit was that all the children would get a raffle ticket and they'd draw them out for each character in the Nativity and the winner would get to go and place them in the stable scene. They moved it to the partner church in a different village and we weren't committed enough to travel so stopped going, or I'd probably still be up for it.