Dresden/Leipzig (dpa/sn) – Epiphany will be celebrated on Friday in Saxony with church services, concerts and carol singers. The Epiphany feast is a reminder that, according to tradition, wise men from the East visited the Jesus child. The Diocese of Dresden-Meißen invites you to a festive service with Bishop Heinrich Timmerevers in the Dresden Cathedral in the evening, which will be broadcast live on the Internet. At the same time, children are out and about as carol singers in many places to bless houses and collect donations for children in need. On Friday they will also stop at the State Chancellery with Prime Minister Michael Kretschmer (CDU).
The custom of carol singers is also maintained in some Protestant communities, as the Evangelical State Church of Saxony announced on Tuesday. For example in Machern, Riesa and Altenbach. In addition, nativity plays are performed in some places at Epiphany and cantatas from Bach’s Christmas Oratorio are performed – for example in the St. Thomas Church in Leipzig with the Thomanerchor and Gewandhaus Orchestra, but also in the Nikolai Church in Löbau. Meanwhile, a service with altar change is being celebrated in Zwickau Cathedral, and a service in dialect is planned in Heidersdorf in the Ore Mountains.
Events based on the English tradition can also be experienced in Saxony on Epiphany. The Nikolaikirche in Leipzig celebrates a service based on the English Christmas liturgy. In Bautzen, the Maria and Martha Church invites you to a traditional English Christmas service entitled “The Festival of Nine Lessons and Carols”, which is said to alternate between passages from the Bible and Christmas carols.
