A cracking Christmas campaign with some simple wins for churches!

Published: Thursday September 27, 2018

#followthestar church of england campaign gloucester#FollowTheStar is the Church of England’s 2018 Christmas campaign. Thousands of Christmas services and events will be taking place in churches all over the country in the run up to Christmas.

The CofE will be running this co-ordinated campaign to draw people to their local church Christmas events, so this may be an easy-win for churches who already have their events organised (ish) and would like to reach more people in their communities!  To help co-ordinate events nationally, churches all around the country are being asked to:

  • Make sure your Christmas services are updated on your church’s ACNY page
  • Tag those services with ‘FollowTheStar’ as well as ‘Christmas’, ‘mince pies’ ‘mulled wine’ etc as appropriate
  • Become a ‘star church’ simply by displaying a star prominently. The bigger and more visible the better. If possible, illuminate at night and share on social media on Friday 21st December to be part of the ‘night of the stars’. More details will follow on this in the weeks ahead.
  • Take a look at (and order as you see fit) advent journey booklets, as well as other resources, posters, flyers, event ideas etc
  • Get involved with the social media push by sharing your own (and others’) videos/photos and tagging with #FollowTheStar

“For many of us, Christmas brings up so many emotions, memories and expectations. We have one nativity story, but it can seem like we all have very different Christmases. For you it might be a time of joy and togetherness. Or perhaps it’s all about planning and to-do lists. Many others can find it a sad and lonely time – nagged by the feeling that your Christmas is not like those ‘perfect’ ones we see in the media. But just like the unexpected assortment of people who were invited to meet the baby Jesus, #FollowTheStar doesn’t ask you to be perfect. It says: come just as you are to take the life-changing Christmas journey.”

Archbishops Justin Welby & John Sentamu

Resources:

A Church Near You for events listings (people will be pointed here so please don’t leave your church info blank!)
Church Print Hub for leaflets/flyers/posters
CHPublishing for booklets
Get involved with #FollowTheStar on: Twitter, Facebook, and takeover Instagram!
Further info: Church of England’s blog on the campaign

 

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