When you consider the meaning of Christmas, what comes to mind? Family traditions such as shared meals or cutting a tree? A time for your favorite holiday movie or classic TV specials? Maybe you have a young child and you wrestle with their question, “Is there really a Santa Claus?”
How about a worship service or sacred choral event? When I was growing up in the 1960s, we always had to go to midnight Mass late on Christmas Eve. That was what Christmas meant to me. I was often an acolyte or sang in the choir. We gathered to celebrate that God came down to earth and took human form to save us all.
Later in life, having moved away from home and to a community with a much larger Episcopal congregation, I spent many years looking forward to the service of Nine Lessons and Carols, which we typically held at our church on the Sunday evening before Christmas. We had a fantastic organist/choir director who added string accompaniment to the organ, extra voices from other choirs, a handbell choir, and a number of wonderful soloists.
