Holiday
Diocese lights 27-foot Grand Army Plaza tree
BY MEAGHAN
MCGOLDRICK
The most wonderful
time of the year continues!
The Catholic Diocese
of Brooklyn offi cially
kicked off the Christmas
season on Wednesday,
Dec. 8 with the lighting of
a sprawling 27-foot tree at
Grand Army Plaza.
The borough’s new
bishop, Robert Brennan,
presided over the lighting
of 16,000 LED lights — a
sign of peace, prosperity
and hope for a brighter
future, the Brooklyn diocese
said Thursday.“As
we look at the Christmas
Tree and Nativity set before
us, we see signs of tremendous
hope and that is
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something that always
has to be inside us,” said
Bishop Brennan. “We are
a people of hope and if the
pandemic taught us anything,
it is to look out for
one another and build up
one another.”
At the lighting, Brennan
said he was “living
the dream.”
“One of my happy
memories was Christmas
in the city and now I’m
living it,” he said before
blessing the diocese’s Nativity
scene. “I’m living
the dream and I’m living
that dream with all
of you.”
The new bishop, who
was formally installed
on Nov. 30, also said he
“got a kick” out of the life
Top: The tree all aglow underneath the archway. Bottom:
Members of the St. Saviour’s Catholic High School Choir perform.
Photos by Paul Frangipane
buzzing around Grand
Army Plaza during the
ceremony.
“We’re telling a story
in the midst of where life
is lived,” Brennan told the
crowd. “God came to be
part of everyday life and
you can’t get any more everyday
than right here in
Grand Army Plaza.”
The tree lighting ceremony,
held each year by
the religious institution,
often plays host to musical
performances by local
Catholic school children.
This year’s festivities featured
a performance by
the St. Saviour’s Catholic
High School Choir, which
performed “O Come, O
Come, Emmanuel” following
the bishop’s blessing.
Monsignor David Cassato,
who serves as the
diocese’s vicar of Catholic
schools, applauded the
all-girls school in Park
Slope while boasting
“tremendous” growth in
enrollment at Catholic
schools across Brooklyn
and Queens.
“These schools are,
I always say, the hidden
gem of our diocese,” he
said.
“It is truly an awesome
sight to see a
Christmas tree standing
tall at the crossroads of
Brooklyn in Grand Army
Plaza,” John Quaglione,
deputy press secretary
for the Diocese of Brooklyn
said in a statement.
“This Christmas tree is
a chance for the Diocese
of Brooklyn and DeSales
Media to bring the joy of
Christmas to our corner
of the world.”
The joyful celebration
came just over a week after
the plaza also hosted
a giant menorah for Hanukkah,
and as neighborhoods
across the borough
mark the start of another
holiday season with lightings
galore.
The massive tree, located
in front of the Soldiers
and Sailors Memorial
Arch, will stand
until Jan. 2.
Additional reporting
by Paul Frangipane
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