The Christmas Fund has been caring for active and retired clergy and lay employees of the United Church of Christ for over 100 years, providing emergency grants, supplementation of small annuities and health premiums, and Christmas "Thank You" gift checks each Year to our lower-income retirees. This year we will take up the offering on Sunday, January 7, 2024.

United Church of Christ congregations and members have blessed the Christmas Fund with their generosity for many years. This year, your care and compassion will be especially appreciated by those servants of the church who are facing a time of need, expressed in thank you messages sent to the Pension Board such as this one.

"I loved working in small churches. I remember a day in seminary when I overheard a couple of students talking, saying that the thing to do was get a small church to start and then that’s your stepping-stone to a bigger church. That’s when I decided I would always serve small churches. They deserve people with experience. But I didn’t stop to think about the tiny annuity I would have at the time I made the decision to work with small congregations. Help from donations to the Christmas Fund has been a Godsend. Thank you!"

Please prayerfully consider your support of this offering for the wider United Church of Christ. And Thank You!

In 1957 St. John’s Evangelical and Reformed Church became St. John’s United Church of Christ as a result of a merger. The denominations of the Congregational Christian Church, along with Evangelical and Reformed Church joined to form United Church of Christ. UCC is a distinct and diverse community of Christians that came together as one church. They joined faith and actions and currently are over 5,000 churches with nearly one million members across the U.S. The UCC serves God in the co-creation of a just and sustainable world. The UCC is a church of "firsts," a church of extravagant welcome, and a church where "…they may all be one".