A 75-year-old brick and stone church has been the rock of Belle Harbor.
Parishioners finally had heat for services on Christmas morning. They've been sitting in the cold since the storm.
Christmas mass is a return to normalcy for a place that's been anything but since Superstorm Sandy.
Belle Harbor is celebrating the holiday. Outside one of the homes damaged by Hurricane Sandy was a Christmas wreath wired to plywood.
But joy and elation are muted this year. It's just been too hard.
Progress is being made but the scars of the storm are all too visible. Sandy wreaked havoc on this community of several thousand. Valuable beach front property has been reduced to rubble, but residents say Belle Harbor will endure.
Just ask Glen Post, the man in the wheelchair who was admiring the sunrise on Christmas morning.
"I have special hand controls in my car. Only about a 150 feet away, and it got knocked in a wall," Post said.
Post, who's missing both of his legs, says he was stuck in his home for two weeks because Sandy washed away the ramp to his front door and his car which was outfitted with special hand controls so he could drive it.
"Volunteers came, they built me a ramp in a half-hour with a railing," Post said.
Post says he is grateful for the help he got.
On the Christmas bulletin there's an essay called, "New year, new beginnings." It's the theme for everywhere here.
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