The Hopes and Fears of All the Years (Christmas 2012)
The hopes and fears of all the years are met in thee tonight. What a burden to put on a small town—perhaps, at the time of Christ, no more than a village. The hopes and fears of all the years . . . Not just the hopes and fears of those who had waited since the fall of Adam and Eve for redemption from our ancestral sin, but all the hopes and fears of those in the 2,000 years since, and the hopes and fears of all those yet to be born, between now and the Second Coming of Christ. Read more...
O Little Town of Bethlehem (Christmas 2011)
In the choral program before Midnight Mass at our church, Saint Mary's Oratory, we sang one of my favorite Christmas hymns, "O Little Town of Bethlehem." The quiet, unassuming melody allows us to concentrate on the words we are singing—words that are deceptively unassuming as well. And yet they carry a powerful message, a message not just of a God Who became Man, but of a God Who became Man in a particular place, at a particular time, as the Son of a particular woman. Read more...
Eternal God: Bethlehem's Child (Christmas 2010)
Christmas Eve found us, as it usually does, at Saint Michael's Byzantine Catholic Church in Flushing, Michigan. We always arrive early for the half-hour of caroling before the Divine Liturgy, and I never fail to be struck by a certain contrast between the Eastern European koledy and the Anglo-American carols that Saint Michael's cantors intersperse between them. Read more...
Glory to the Newborn King! (Christmas 2009)
There are many great Christmas carols and hymns, but few have the theological richness of "Hark! the Herald Angels Sing." Written by Charles Wesley, brother of the founder of Methodism, "Hark! the Herald Angels Sing" reminds us of two important truths. Christ is the God-made-Man, Whose Incarnation is the singular event in human history, toward which all of mankind once struggled, and in the shadow of which all of mankind now lives. Read more...
Wondrous News to All the Earth (Christmas 2008)
Christ is born! Glorify Him! Those words rang out, over and over again, on Christmas Eve at St. Michael's Byzantine Catholic Church in Flushing, Michigan, and at other Byzantine Catholic churches around the world. When we're in Flint on Christmas Eve, my family and I always go to St. Michael's for Divine Liturgy, which is proceeded by a half-hour of koledy, Christmas carols, both the standards of the Anglo-American world and traditional Eastern European ones. Read more...
Christ Is Born! Glorify Him! (Christmas 2007)
Christmas Day 2007 is upon us, and at Midnight Masses across the country, Catholics are singing "Joy to the world / the Lord is come!" In Eastern Rite Catholic churches, the refrain is a little different, and yet still the same: "Christ is born! Glorify Him!" Read more...
