KARACHI, Dec 23: Members of the Christian community in the city, like everywhere around the globe, will celebrate Christmas on Thursday.

The celebrations will start with the special midnight prayer meetings at all the churches in the city late on Wednesday night.

Special meetings will be held at all the churches. The main congregation of the Roman Catholics will be held at the St Patrick’s Cathedral, Shahrah-i-Iraq, Sadar and the central congregation of the Protestants will be held at the Holy Trinity Cathedral on Abdullah Haroon Road.

The bilingual midnight mass at the St Patrick’s Cathedral, led by Bishop Evarist Pinto, will begin on Wednesday at 11.45pm. Christmas day masses will be held on Thursday at 6.30am, 8am and 9.30am, while the mass in Urdu, led by Fr Joe D’ Mello, will be held at 5pm.

The Christmas eve programme at the Holy Trinity Cathedral begins on Wednesday night at 10pm with the Carols by candlelight.

The holy communion in English (with St Andrew’s congregation) will be led by Rt Rev Sadiq Daniel at 10.30pm. The holy communion in Urdu will led by Rev Wilson Nazim, at 11.45pm.

On the Christmas day (Thursday), the family service in English will be organized at 9.30am and the holy communion in Urdu will be organized at 11am.

PAT FUNCTION: The Pakistan Awami Tehreek is organizing a function at Manzoor Colony to celebrate Christmas on Wednesday evening at 5pm. PAT’s Iftikhar Bhatti, expressing solidarity with the Christian community, will cut the Christmas cake on behalf of PAT chief Dr Tahir-ul-Qadri.

KORANGI TOWN: A function is also being organized by Korangi Town at its seminar hall on Wednesday morning (11am). The Korangi Town Nazim, Abdul Jameel Khan, and others will speak on the occasion. The Nazim will give Christmas cakes to all Christian councillors of the UCs. Cakes on behalf of the Town will also be sent to the churches in the evening.