Longest Night Service Remembers Lives Lost in 2024
Friendship Center’s Cold Weather Triage Program Is Open To Help Unhoused
NEW BRITAIN – A “Longest Night Service” was held at South Church in the Downtown District December 20th to remember individuals who died here in 2024 after experiencing homelessness.
The late afternoon service that is observed each year as the “homeless persons’ Memorial Day” was held on the eve of the winter solstice that marks the longest night of the year. “Longest Night” or “Blue Christmas” services are held in hundreds of communities during Advent on the Christian calendar each year.
Hosted by South Church in collaboration with the Friendship Service Center (FSC), the service at the Erwin Chapel included carols, readings and prayers by local pastors. Twelve persons who died during the past year and who experienced homelessness were remembered with the reading of their first names.
The Friendship Center’s Cold Weather Triage program is open in New Britain and FSC advises that if you find anyone who may be disconnected outside, help is available at Hope Connection Center (57-61 Arch St) from roughly 7am-7pm and clients can be transitioned to the overflow shelter at First Lutheran Church (the back of 77 Franklin Sq).
Rev. Suzy Rivera, the finance director of the Friendship Service Center, read a poem by Jacob Folger, the founder of Friends of the Homeless.
The Rev. Jane Rowe of South Church shared remembrances from relatives, friends and neighbors of the 12 individuals who ranged in age from 27 to 72. Six were not yet 40 years old. “In Jesus we see God’s impulse to draw near to those who struggle,” said Rev. Rowe. “Those who are weary with heavy burdens, those on the margins of this world.”
In her meditation Rev. Rowe spoke of the Nativity story from the gospels of Luke and Matthew that is always re-told on Christmas of the family seeking shelter and of there being “no room at the inn” when Jesus “began his life in a makeshift shelter.”
Rev. Dr. Jonathon Counts of Spottswood AME Zion Church and Rev. Ben Groth of First Lutheran Church of the Resurrection then read the names of lives lost in 2024: Andy, Ashley, Barbara, Ivan, Kirk, Lourdes, Mark, Michael, Pedro, Rickey, Steven and William.
The “Longest Night” service occurred as the weather turned frigid in central Connecticut and the day after Governor Lamont announced cold weather protocols from Saturday, December 21st through Christmas Eve, December 24th.
The Friendship Center’s Cold Weather Triage program is open in New Britain and FSC advises that if you find anyone who may be disconnected outside, help is available at Hope Connection Center (57-61 Arch St) from roughly 7am-7pm and clients can be transitioned to the overflow shelter at First Lutheran Church (the back of 77 Franklin Sq).
