Christmas Pageant, Cookie Potluck, and more inside!
Weekly Highlights
Caring Conversation
How have you experienced faith recently?
  Week of December 4
Pledges Of Time, Talent And Treasure

If you were unable to bring your pledge card and time and talent sheet with you on Stewardship Sunday, be sure to drop them in the offering plate the next Sunday you're with us (or deliver them to the office). Thanks!
Year-End Office Information

The end of 2016 is almost upon us. Please be sure that any donations or pledges you want counted in 2016 are received by the office no later than  December 30 . If you have a question as to how much you have given towards your 2016 pledge, please contact Beth

The office will be closed for the Holidays on the following dates: Friday, December 23 (closed at noon); Monday, December 26; Tuesday, December 27; Monday, January 2.
Bethel Christmas Calendar

Children's Christmas Pageant - December 11
Christmas Cookie Potluck - December 11
Wassail Party - December 18
Blue Christmas Service - December 18, 2 PM
Family Service - December 24, 5pm
Candlelight Service - December 24, 11 PM
Christmas Day Service in your PJs - December 25
2016 Children's Christmas Pageant

Mark your calendar to join us Sunday, December 11 during the morning worship service for  Through the Doors of Advent , an all original Christmas pageant.   We will tag along with  a family as they journey back in time to discover the meaning behind the advent candles.  It's a new tune to an old story that you won't want to miss!

Bethel youth from Nursery through Teens are part of this production.  Owen Hofmann-Smith has written the music that will have you humming and singing for days to come. Afterwards, join us in the Fellowship Hall to indulge in a deluge of Christmas cookies (see below).  

There's still time to get involved.  If your child would like to be in the pageant, please contact Beth as soon as possible.  Rehearsals are already underway.
Christmas Cookie Potluck Pageant Sunday

Calling all bakers, we are going to celebrate after the Children's Pageant on Sunday, December 11. We want your favorite Christmas cookies to share during Fellowship Time. What's your favorite? Gingerbread, Sugar Cookies, Peppermint Shortbread? Bring lots!! Any leftovers will be shared mix and match style and taken home to enjoy.
Blue Christmas Worship Service 

Each year during Advent, Bethel offers a quieter, more meditative worship service for those who are coping with serious illness, grief, loss, or any of the other difficulties and challenges of life. This time of year, the culture around us seems to demand hearty good cheer at all times. When we are grieving, in pain, trying to make ends meet, or reeling from the violence and hatred in our nation and in the world, we may feel out of step and off balance. The Blue Christmas Worship Service gives us an opportunity to give voice to our pain and frustration, and the opportunity to allow the Holy Spirit to minister to us through candle light, music, and, if desired, the ancient practice of anointing with oil. 

This year's Blue Christmas Worship will take place on Sunday, December 18 at 2 pm in Bethel's sanctuary. Rev. David Randall-Bodman and Rev. Jean Doane will lead the service. The pastor and Called to Care members will be available after the service for any who wish to stay to speak privately with someone. For further information, please contact Pastor David or Jean Doane.
2016 Family Guide To Celebrate Advent 

This Sunday we continue to celebrate Advent and it's an ideal time to establish religious customs and traditions in your home which help your children and entire family remember the true meaning of Christmas. As a special gift to you, Bethel's Faith Development Committee has put together Opening the Doors of Advent: A Family Guide for Experiencing Hope, Faith, Joy, Peace and Love as we bring Bring "Christ" back into "Christ-mas". If you would like an "Advent Starter Kit," with all you'll need to start a couple of new holiday traditions with your family, please contact Beth.
ESL Giving Tree

Bethel's ESL Christmas party -- for our ESL students and teachers and their families - has been a tradition since 1999. Again this year, we hope to give each child at the party a Christmas gift from Bethel, via Bethel's Giving Tree. You take a gift tag, tell us which tag you took, use the suggestions on the tag to buy a gift or gift card in the $20-25 range, and return the gift to the Giving Tree by Dec. 11. The party is Dec. 15.

We also welcome monetary donations, which we use to cover any tags that aren't taken, or to buy gift cards from scrip to give to the students for their gift or grocery shopping. If you'd like to help out with the Giving Tree or the party, check that box (under M&O) in your Time & Talent Pledge, or contact
Jim Keniston . Thank you!
BHS Winter Break Food Assembly

It's incredible but we have gotten all the foods we need for the Winter Break homeless student food bags! We also have a $10 Fred Meyer gift card for each student to get fresh food. Thank you to everyone who donated! If you still have something at your home, please bring it. If you want to make a student's life a little sweeter, bring some packets of instant cocoa! We are still hoping to get more bags-either cloth or brown paper bags with handles.

If you want to get some exercise, we'll be working on Sunday, Dec 11 after Faith Cafe at about 7:00 in the evening to bring the food out of storage and onto tables in the Fellowship Hall. Then we'll be starting the next morning at about 8:30 to continue with any last minute tasks. To assemble the bags come at 10:00 and deliveries, we hope, will be ready to go at around 10:45. We'll be delivering to Merle Davies, the former elementary school on Farmington Rd. that is now a part of BHS. We'll have directions for drivers. There will be people to unload your cars.
Food Cupboard Needs Volunteers

Not that we want to admit to age issues, but the Food Cupboard needs some muscle power on Wednesday mornings starting in mid-January to help with food pickup at OFB West. Contact Nancy Hilbrick for details (503) 372-9023
Scrip

Scrip will be sold every Sunday in November. Scrip will not be sold December 25 and January 1. Prepaid Visa cards are available on order.
Reuse. Recycle. But don't reduce! (Music, that is)

This eclectic program features music on the theme of ecology, favorites we're revisiting, and a couple of pieces we've revived from the dust bins of music history. Join us at one of three free concerts! 
  • Friday, December 2nd, 7:30 pm at St. Peter Catholic Church, 5905 SE 87th Avenue in Portland 
  • Saturday, December 3rd, 7:30 pm at Bethel Congregational United Church of Christ, 5150 SW Watson in Beaverton
  • Sunday, December 4th, 3:00 pm, also at Bethel.
This is a free event. Donations will be collected and 100% (yes, every penny) will be forwarded to our beneficiary, ReClaim It! Tickets are not required to reserve your seat. We encourage you to arrive early, but not too early! The doors will open a half hour prior to the start of the performance.
Bethel To Host "Cinderella - A British Panto Musical" Dec 9-10

Masque Alfresco presents: Cinderella - A British Panto Musical
Directed and adapted by Fayra Teeters

Friday and Saturday, December 9-10, 7:30 p.m.
Saturday Matinee at 2:30 p.m. 

Tickets are available at the door.
$12 Adults 
$10 Senior citizens & students 
$8 Kids under 12 years. 
Proceeds will benefit both Bethel and Masque Alfresco

British Panto is slapstick comedy that arose in the 1500s as England's answer to Commedia dell'arte, performed at Christmastime with a madcap assortment of stock characters. The Panto Dame is a comic-camp, female character always played by a man in drag. In Cinderella the Ugly Sisters are panto dames. The sidekick is a secondary character who encourages the audience to shout and clap while comically commenting on the action. In Cinderella that character is Buttons, her father's (Baron Von Hangover) servant and her friend. Rather than killing off Cinder's father, (as in the Disney version) he survives as a hen-pecked lush, who rises up to save the day.
Sexual Assault Resource Center Needs Volunteers

The Sexual Assault Resource Center is recruiting volunteer advocates to provide emotional support and resources to survivors of sexual assault in Washington County. If you are interested in becoming an advocate, contact volunteer@sarcoregon.org for more information. 

SARC puts on four advocate trainings a year, the next one starting mid-January. Advocacy is an incredible opportunity to learn about the dynamics of sexual violence in our society and to actively provide support and compassion to survivors in our community.
Mark Your Calendars

Teen Lock-In - December 30
Epiphany Sunday/John Nilsen Trio - January 8
Guest Organist - Dan Miller - January 22
Annual Meeting - January 29
Bethel Congregational United Church of Christ | (503) 646-1191 | Email
5150 SW Watson Ave, Beaverton, OR 97005