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<p>LARKSVILLE &#8212; In previous Christmas plays at St. John the Baptist Church, members of the Singer family have portrayed shepherds, kings and innkeepers.</p><p>On Christmas Eve, real-life spouses Scott and Lucy Singer, of Larksville, have the challenge of portraying a woman who dies at Christmastime and her devastated husband.</p><p>&#8220;He kind of reminds me of Job,&#8221; Lucy Singer said, naming a biblical character famous for enduring a great deal of suffering.</p><p>The protagonist in the play &#8212; Jack is the name the playwright, church pastor the Rev. Gerald Gurka gave him &#8212; similarly seems to have more than his share of affliction. A few years after he loses his wife to pneumonia, he loses his young daughter in a car accident and is left with a gold-wrapped box of her imaginary kisses.</p><p>By that point, Scott Singer said, the character is angry.</p><p>&#8220;I&#8217;d be angry too. First you take my wife? Then you take my daughter? Enough is enough,&#8221; Scott Singer said. &#8220;But he never gives up. He continues to go to church.&#8221;</p><p>Since the early 1980s, Gurka, or &#8220;Father Jerry&#8221; as he is affectionately known, has written dozens of plays, most of them for parishioners and friends to stage during the Christmas or Easter seasons.</p><p>His latest play, based on a short story he found online in a collection of Christmas tales, is set during the Great Depression at a fictional parish he calls St. Rudolph&#8217;s, where tragedy hits a family who had been generous with each other and with the poor.</p><p>&#8220;The Gold Wrapping Paper: Living Nativity 2017&#8221; has an air of melancholy, but that hasn&#8217;t dimmed the enthusiasm of the production&#8217;s participants.</p><p>&#8220;One of our young &#8216;angels&#8217; told me, &#8216;It&#8217;s morbid, but I love it,&#8217;&#8221; Gurka said.</p><p>Moments later, 9-year-old Gianna Gabel, already wearing her white angel robe and wings for a dress rehearsal last weekend, confirmed that&#8217;s how she felt, even though the thought of death makes her feel &#8220;a little scared&#8221; and &#8220;a little upset.&#8221;</p><p>&#8220;It&#8217;s an unfortunate fact of life we all have to deal with,&#8221; said Jeremy Shrawder, of Larksville, who serves as narrator for the production. &#8220;As much as you want to hold onto people, you can&#8217;t.&#8221;</p><p>Sooner or later, cast members said, everyone experiences the pain of separation.</p><p>&#8220;My dad passed away on Dec. 9 a couple years ago,&#8221; Lucy Singer recalled. &#8220;That first Christmas without him, there was a huge emptiness.&#8221;</p><p>Shrawder described missing his grandmother, who used to cook Christmas dinner with him, and his uncle, who used to bring homemade kielbasa to family feasts. &#8220;But as long as you remember (loved ones who passed away) you&#8217;ll still have them with you,&#8221; Shrawder said.</p><p>Gurka, who lost his father, mother and brother, added that he has found it is therapeutic to honor deceased loved ones by continuing the traditions he used to enjoy with them.</p><p>&#8220;Putting up the Christmas tree (several years ago, during the holiday season after his mother died) was painful, but it&#8217;s important to continue your life as usual,&#8221; Gurka said. &#8220;Go back to what you enjoyed with your relatives. It can be a different kind of healing.&#8221;</p><p>&#8220;You can feel alone, but you&#8217;re not eternally alone,&#8221; Gurka continued, pointing to the comfort of believing in the hereafter. &#8220;Jesus would have been just another baby if he didn&#8217;t come to die and rise again.&#8221;</p><p>The playwright priest said he had been planning to write &#8220;a lighthearted play&#8221; this year about a Christmas &#8220;Legend of the Birds.&#8221;</p><p>Then he reconsidered, believing it was time to address the all-too-human topic of mortality, and he gave lines to members of the Holy Family that explain how they understand Jack&#8217;s pain.</p><p>Joseph, in keeping with an old legend, describes himself as being a widower before he married Mary, and Mary, for her part, says she lost Joseph &#8220;when Jesus was only a teenager.&#8221;</p><p>&#8220;I was frightened to raise my son alone,&#8221; Mary continues. &#8220;And then I would lose my only son to a brutal Crucifixion, which he didn&#8217;t deserve. But Jesus rose from the dead. There is life after death.&#8221;</p><p>&#8220;You will see your wife and daughter again,&#8221; she promises Jack. &#8220;And their kisses will be real.&#8221;</p><style>
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<div class="neCaption">Dennis Lee plays Casper, one of the three Wise Men in this year&#8217;s Nativity play at St. John the Baptist Church in Larksville. </div></div><div class="metaInfo"><photo0>https://www.timesleader.com/wp-content/uploads/2017/12/web1_stj1_faa.jpg</photo0><caption0>Dennis Lee plays Casper, one of the three Wise Men in this year&#8217;s Nativity play at St. John the Baptist Church in Larksville. </caption0><photoCredit0>Fred Adams | For Times Leader </photoCredit0></div><div class="neFile"><img class="neImage" src="https://www.timesleader.com/wp-content/uploads/2017/12/web1_stj2_faa.jpg">
<div class="neCaption">Dannica Lee looks up as she reads the script during a rehearal for &#8216;The Gold Wrapping Paper: Living Nativity 2017,&#8217; which will be performed at 4 p.m. Sunday at St. John the Baptist Church in Larksville. </div></div><div class="metaInfo"><photo1>https://www.timesleader.com/wp-content/uploads/2017/12/web1_stj2_faa.jpg</photo1><caption1>Dannica Lee looks up as she reads the script during a rehearal for &#8216;The Gold Wrapping Paper: Living Nativity 2017,&#8217; which will be performed at 4 p.m. Sunday at St. John the Baptist Church in Larksville. </caption1><photoCredit1>Fred Adams | For Times Leader </photoCredit1></div><div class="neFile"><img class="neImage" src="https://www.timesleader.com/wp-content/uploads/2017/12/web1_stj3_faa.jpg">
<div class="neCaption">Lucy Singer and Scott Singer are married in real life and they play a married couple, Suzette and Jack, in &#8216;The Gold Wrapping Paper,&#8217; a Christmas play written by the Rev. Gerald Gurka. This play is not as lighthearted as some of the priest&#8217;s previous plays. &#8216;It&#8217;s very different; that&#8217;s for sure,&#8217; Lucy Singer said. </div></div><div class="metaInfo"><photo2>https://www.timesleader.com/wp-content/uploads/2017/12/web1_stj3_faa.jpg</photo2><caption2>Lucy Singer and Scott Singer are married in real life and they play a married couple, Suzette and Jack, in &#8216;The Gold Wrapping Paper,&#8217; a Christmas play written by the Rev. Gerald Gurka. This play is not as lighthearted as some of the priest&#8217;s previous plays. &#8216;It&#8217;s very different; that&#8217;s for sure,&#8217; Lucy Singer said. </caption2><photoCredit2>Fred Adams | For Times Leader </photoCredit2></div><div class="neFile"><img class="neImage" src="https://www.timesleader.com/wp-content/uploads/2017/12/web1_stj4_faa.jpg">
<div class="neCaption">The Rev. Gerald Gurka directs the cast of his latest Nativity play, &#8216;The Gold Wrapping Paper&#8217; during a rehearsal at St. John the Baptist Church in Larksville. The play will be presented on Sunday and followed by a Christmas Eve Mass. </div></div><div class="metaInfo"><photo3>https://www.timesleader.com/wp-content/uploads/2017/12/web1_stj4_faa.jpg</photo3><caption3>The Rev. Gerald Gurka directs the cast of his latest Nativity play, &#8216;The Gold Wrapping Paper&#8217; during a rehearsal at St. John the Baptist Church in Larksville. The play will be presented on Sunday and followed by a Christmas Eve Mass. </caption3><photoCredit3>Fred Adams | For Times Leader </photoCredit3></div><div class="neFile"><img class="neImage" src="https://www.timesleader.com/wp-content/uploads/2017/12/web1_stj5_faa.jpg">
<div class="neCaption">Father Jerry Gurka directs Marty Gabel of Forty Fort, who is portraying Father Damian in the play. </div></div><div class="metaInfo"><photo4>https://www.timesleader.com/wp-content/uploads/2017/12/web1_stj5_faa.jpg</photo4><caption4>Father Jerry Gurka directs Marty Gabel of Forty Fort, who is portraying Father Damian in the play. </caption4><photoCredit4>Fred Adams | For Times Leader </photoCredit4></div></div>
<div class="metaInfo"><subheadMeta>Script offers comfort in times of loss</subheadMeta></div><div class="metaInfo"><bylineMeta><p><strong>By Mary Therese Biebel</strong></p><p>mbiebel@www.timesleader.com</p></bylineMeta></div><div class="metaInfo"><factboxMeta><p><strong>IF YOU GO</strong></p><p><strong>What:</strong> &#8216;The Gold Wrapping Paper: Living Nativity 2017&#8217;</p><p><strong>When:</strong> 4 p.m. Sunday with Christmas Eve vigil Mass to follow</p><p><strong>Place:</strong> Saint John the Baptist Church, 126 Nesbitt Street, Larksville</p><p><strong>Info:</strong> 570-779-9620</p></factboxMeta></div><div class="metaInfo"><shirttailMeta><p>Reach Mary Therese Biebel at 570-991-6109 or on Twitter @BiebelMT.</p></shirttailMeta></div>

St. John the Baptist in Larksville to stage new Nativity play on Sunday