Meeting House Sunday

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On November 23, 2014, join one of Boston's oldest churches for worship in the same building where Samuel Adams signaled the start of the Boston Tea Party. Once a year, Old South Church in Boston returns to the Old South Meeting House, the congregation’s ancestral home, for Thanksgiving Festival Worship. The service begins at 11:15 am. Prelude music begins at 10:45 am. Music will include the great Thanksgiving hymns, the Old South Church Choir under the direction of Minister of Music Harry Huff, the Old South Ringers handbell choir, brass, percussion, and piano. Senior Minister Rev. Nancy Taylor will preach, and the Governor’s Thanksgiving Proclamation will be read.

Old South Church in Boston was gathered in 1669 when Boston was still in its infancy and the British Crown an undisputed authority in the colonies. The church's first building, the Cedar Meeting House, was surprisingly large given its quaint name. But as the church grew, the meeting house seemed to shrink. In 1729, Old South Church built a new house of worship, the Old South Meeting House, today a museum and National Historic Landmark on Boston’s Freedom Trail. Old South Church continued to grow and in the 1870s relocated a mile away to Boston's freshly filled Back Bay. Old South Church sold the 1729 Meeting House, but the building was saved from demolition in New England’s first successful historic preservation effort. In 1877, Old South Meeting House opened as an independently owned and operated museum. While Old South Church has prospered over the last 135+ years in Copley Square, the church has never forgotten its roots. Every year since 1955, Old South Church returns to its ancestral home, the Old South Meeting House, for worship.

All are welcome to attend this Christian worship service of the United Church of Christ. The museum is closed to visitors during the worship service and will reopen in the afternoon for regular museum visitation.