Rev. Samuel Marsden holds the first Christian service on land in New Zealand at Rangihoua Bay.

Samuel Marsden was an English-born priest of the Church of England in Australia and a prominent member of the Church Missionary Society. He played a leading role in bringing Christianity to New Zealand. Marsden was a prominent figure in early New South Wales and Australian history, partly through his ecclesiastical offices as the colony's senior Church of England cleric and as a pioneer of the Australian wool industry, but also for his employment of convicts for farming and his actions as a magistrate at Parramatta, both of which attracted contemporary criticism.

Rangihoua Bay is a bay at the southern end of the Purerua Peninsula, on the north-west shore of the Bay of Islands in Northland, New Zealand. It is 10 km north across the Bay of Islands from Russell and 12 km north from Paihia. By road it is 32 km from Kerikeri.

December 25 is the 359th day of the year in the Gregorian calendar; six days remain until the end of the year.