BRISBANE keeps serving up “firsts” for Archbishop Mark Coleridge.
The latest such experience involved Archbishop Coleridge flicking the switch on the annual Christmas lights display at St Gerard Majella Church, Chermside West, on November 30.
He told the parishioners who gathered for the celebration that it was the first time he had ever turned on Christmas lights.
“I’ve done many things as a bishop but I’ve never done this before, I’m a bit nervous,” the archbishop said.
Archbishop Coleridge told the crowd of several hundred he thought the initial invitation was itself a joke.
“You don’t invite the archbishop to turn on the Christmas lights; I thought they were the lights on the Christmas tree,” he said.
“Then someone said to me, ‘This is bigger than Ben Hur and the archbishop should definitely be there’, so I have longed to turn these lights on with you here tonight as we prepare for Christmas.”
St Gerard Majella parish administrator Fr Gerard McMorrow said the theme for the 2012 Christmas Lights display was “Grace in a Year of Faith – Contemplating the face of Christ”.
“Our theme has been taken from the Australian Catholic Bishops Conference’s Year of Grace and in that Year of Grace, coinciding with that, His Holiness Pope Benedict has asked us to celebrate a Year of Faith,” Fr McMorrow said.
He said two months of work and preparation went into the Christmas lights display that involved a host of volunteers – “from putting up the frames to repairing them, painting bulbs, and the ladies in the parish who spent a lot of time putting signs together”.
John Hopper, one of a team of eight to 10 “lighter” volunteers aged in their 60s and 70s, has been helping put up the thousands of lights each year for the past nine years.
He said Fr McMorrow liked to vary the theme for the display that took weeks to prepare.
“We’ve been doing it since about the middle of October; we started putting up the frameworks and then the lights have got to be put to them,” Mr Hopper said.
He said the display was entered in the City Christmas Lights competition and the whole parish community was hoping for a win.
“They (the judges) were here on Thursday night and we have as good a chance as anyone else I think,” he said.
