{"id":141581,"date":"2025-12-02T17:02:00","date_gmt":"2025-12-02T22:02:00","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/kendallharmon.net\/?p=141581"},"modified":"2025-12-02T17:55:59","modified_gmt":"2025-12-02T22:55:59","slug":"church-times-church-of-england-launches-new-christmas-campaign-with-the-help-of-a-grumpy-owl","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/kendallharmon.net\/?p=141581","title":{"rendered":"(Church Times) Church of England launches new Christmas campaign with the help of a grumpy owl"},"content":{"rendered":"\n<p>The Church of England has launched what it describes as its \u201cbiggest-ever\u201d\u00a0<a href=\"https:\/\/www.churchtimes.co.uk\/topics\/advent\">Advent<\/a>\u00a0and\u00a0<a href=\"https:\/\/www.churchtimes.co.uk\/topics\/christmas\">Christmas<\/a>\u00a0campaign, which focuses on the theme \u201cThe Joy of Christmas\u201d.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>Announced on Monday, the campaign features a new&nbsp;<a href=\"https:\/\/www.churchtimes.co.uk\/topics\/children\">children<\/a>\u2019s&nbsp;<a href=\"https:\/\/www.churchtimes.co.uk\/topics\/books\">storybook<\/a>,&nbsp;<em>T<\/em><em>he Grumpy Owl and the Joy of Christmas<\/em>, written by Jonathan Maltz and Christopher Poch, with artwork by Jago Illustration.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>The&nbsp;<a href=\"https:\/\/www.churchtimes.co.uk\/topics\/bishop-of-stockport\">Bishop of Stockport<\/a>, the Rt Revd Sam Corley, said of the book: \u201cThere\u2019s a lot of talk \u2014 and quite a bit of singing \u2014 about joy at Christmas. . . If you feel like joining the grumpy owl in our story and shutting yourself away, then the message of Christmas is for you.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>The campaign is designed to help \u201cpeople pause, reflect and celebrate wherever they are\u201d, with the help of specially commissioned reflections and meditations. Among them is&nbsp;<em>Twelve Joys of Christmas<\/em>, written by the Dean of Salisbury, the Very Revd Nicholas Papadopulos, which explores the meaning of joy in everyday traditions. He also wrote&nbsp;<em>O Come Emmanuel<\/em>, a new set of Advent meditations based on the ancient \u201cO\u201d antiphons (<a href=\"https:\/\/www.churchtimes.co.uk\/articles\/2025\/7-november\/news\/uk\/uk-news-in-brief\">News, 7 November<\/a>).<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p><a href=\"https:\/\/www.postandcourier.com\/charleston_sc\/eviction-rate-south-carolina-charleston-housing\/article_6d35507b-f77d-4f95-bafa-8497f9c608d7.html\">Read it all<\/a>.<\/p><blockquote class=\"twitter-tweet\"><p lang=\"en\" dir=\"ltr\">The Church of England has launched what it describes as its \u201cbiggest-ever\u201d <a href=\"https:\/\/twitter.com\/hashtag\/Advent?src=hash&amp;ref_src=twsrc%5Etfw\">#Advent<\/a> and <a href=\"https:\/\/twitter.com\/hashtag\/Christmas?src=hash&amp;ref_src=twsrc%5Etfw\">#Christmas<\/a> campaign, which focuses on the theme \u201cThe Joy of Christmas\u201d.<a href=\"https:\/\/t.co\/cXyKKVbNyO\">https:\/\/t.co\/cXyKKVbNyO<\/a><\/p>&mdash; Church Times (@ChurchTimes) <a href=\"https:\/\/twitter.com\/ChurchTimes\/status\/1995480243939746000?ref_src=twsrc%5Etfw\">December 1, 2025<\/a><\/blockquote> <script async src=\"https:\/\/platform.twitter.com\/widgets.js\" charset=\"utf-8\"><\/script>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>The Church of England has launched what it describes as its \u201cbiggest-ever\u201d\u00a0Advent\u00a0and\u00a0Christmas\u00a0campaign, which focuses on the theme \u201cThe Joy of Christmas\u201d. Announced on Monday, the campaign features a new&nbsp;children\u2019s&nbsp;storybook,&nbsp;The Grumpy Owl and the Joy of Christmas, written by Jonathan Maltz<span class=\"ellipsis\">&hellip;<\/span><\/p>\n<div class=\"read-more\"><a href=\"https:\/\/kendallharmon.net\/?p=141581\">Read more &#8250;<\/a><\/div>\n<p><!-- end of .read-more --><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":794,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[574,575,389,187,199,184,108],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-141581","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-advent","category-christmas","category-church-of-england-coe","category-church-year-liturgical-seasons","category-england-uk","category-parish-ministry","category-religion-culture"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/kendallharmon.net\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/141581","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/kendallharmon.net\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/kendallharmon.net\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/kendallharmon.net\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/794"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/kendallharmon.net\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=141581"}],"version-history":[{"count":2,"href":"https:\/\/kendallharmon.net\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/141581\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":141583,"href":"https:\/\/kendallharmon.net\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/141581\/revisions\/141583"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/kendallharmon.net\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=141581"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/kendallharmon.net\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=141581"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/kendallharmon.net\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=141581"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}