Log Chapel Midnight Mass
by Father James Patrick Kelly

Father Jim Kelly

The book of Gospels shook so violently I could hardly read it.  The log chapel was cold.  Most of the pews were empty.  It was Christmas midnight Mass—mine and Dungannon’s first.

It wasn’t anyone’s fault in particular that the church was cold.  The eight members of the parish had worked hard to make this a beautiful occasion—Mrs. Sawyer had practiced the Mass for months.  There was a small crib in the sanctuary.  Flowers were on the altar.

Several hours before the fire had been lighted in the stove at the back of church.  But the smoke kept coming out of the door instead of going up the chimney.  The fire went out several times and never did burst into a roaring flame.

Blazing Sacristy Fireplace           

There was  good fire in the fireplace in the sacristy.  The congregation gathered around it before Mass and helped the priest vest there.  But little of its heat reached out to the altar.  At the beginning of Mass, all went out to the chapel; the priest to the altar and the people to the pews nearest the stove.  One non-Catholic family came in as Mass started—a little bewildered by what was going on but reverent.  They were certain that it was important even though they did not fully understand.

Christmas Misunderstood

Even for the Catholics it was all a little new.  All were converts or had had little Catholic training.  They lived in a typical rural community where the meaning of Christmas was not well known.  Many churches in these little towns do not even have services on this day.  For the thousands who belong to no church, the great blessing to us of Christ’s birth is hardly understood at all.

Organist and Choir of Three

My choir and my server had come with me from Norton.  The choir was Tommy, his wife and Buford.  Mrs. Sawyer played the organ.  They were cold too but their heart was in it.  It sounded good to me.  It was the only High Mass I had ever sung in Dungannon.  It was the only time I had a choir.

My server Jimmie was the only Catholic in his family.  He had joined at 12.  Now he wants to be a priest.

I don’t remember what I preached on that night, but even without my words, the simple words of the Gospel were an eloquent sermon.  Everything served to print deep in their hearts that Jesus had come down to earth and was doing it again this night.

All except the non-Catholics went to Communion.  They knelt on the cold rough stone steps at the rail as I said the prayer.  They had gathered and laid those stones themselves, just as they had gathered the logs in the walls.  The altar itself was made of three huge poplar logs hewn flat on two sides and laid one on top of another.

Like Bethlehem

I am sure that it was easy for them to imagine the Christmas scene.  The crib looked surprisingly like their log chapel.  Snow lay heavy on the roof.  It was cold as the crib must have been cold.  And while the singing of Glory to God in the Highest in this Mass didn’t have all the splendor of the Angelic Choir of that first Christmas, it did have the same earnestness and desire to please God.