PARISHES across the Diocese of Salisbury will be celebrating Christmas in a number of ways, traditional and new, leading up to December 25.

The Bishop of Salisbury, Dr David Stancliffe, will visit the sick on December 22 and 23 before celebrating Midnight Mass at Salisbury Cathedral on Christmas Eve at 11.30pm, and preaching on Christmas Day at 10.30am.

Dr Stancliffe said: “The story of Jesus’ birth is no perfect fairy tale. It’s about God caring enough to come to us in person, to be born as a defenceless child. His family were refugees living under an oppressive regime in an occupied country, at a time of widespread terrorist violence.

He added: “This is a message of hope for many in our world living in those situations today. We remember especially our Christian brothers and sisters in the Sudan living in fear of renewed war, in Iraq and Israel/Palestine. Christmas is a reminder to us to renew our support to them, to bring them ‘glad tidings of great joy.”

There will also be a number of children’s services across the area.

St Mary’s East Knoyle will invite local children to dress as angels for a Choir of Angels service on December 20 at 6pm. St James’, Alderholt, will be running two services, featuring children in Nativity costumes on December 20, and children’s home made crib figures on Christmas Eve.

On December 17, the annual Christmas Lantern Parade takes place in Salisbury, with 1,000 lanterns carried from Salisbury Arts Centre to arrive at the Cathedral for 7.15pm.

The Bourne Valley Team of Churches and Cholderton Charlie Rare Breeds Farm in Cholderton will be collaborating for a Nativity service featuring live animals on December 21 at 11am.

St Paul’s Salisbury will host Saltmine’s Treasure Island Christian Pantomime on December 22nd at 6.30pm.

At the Midnight Mass service on Christmas Eve in Amesbury Abbey at 11.30pm, a living crib will take place, featuring local farmers as the shepherds, the Licensee of the George Inn as the Inn Keeper and the deputy mayor of Amesbury, the chairman of Amesbury Rotary and the chairman of the Chamber of Trade as the three wise persons, along with a teenage couple as Mary and Joseph.

The Vicar of Amesbury, Canon Simon Wilkinson said: “We’re trying to show the reality of the Christmas story. We’re using local people, playing their actual roles in their own clothes, to show that this was the way it was over 2,000 years ago - real people, known locally, were involved.

“The story of the birth of Jesus would have spread because local people would have believed the shepherds telling it, because they knew them. It has real resonance today.”