Tim Woodcock writes... Though I had heard the Stevie Wonder song “Someday at Christmas” before, I didn’t really pay it much attention until I heard it on “the Uncle Lanny mix” about 20 years. Let me explain. Uncle Lanny is my wife’s uncle who lives in the Boston area; 20 years back, he gave us a CD, burned from his computer, of Christmas music. In my immediate family, it’s become a tradition of many years standing to start Advent, the countdown to Christmas, by listening to this CD (although nowadays the music is organized as a Spotify playlist).   It starts with Nat King Cole singing about chestnuts roasting over an open fire, then Elvis Presley is experiencing a Blue Christmas – standard stuff but it’s a tastefully curated mix of Christmas hits. The song that always catches my ear, the song that always makes me catch my breath, is Stevie Wonder’s version of “Some Day at Christmas.” The song begins this way: Someday at Christmas men won't be boys Playing with bombs...

Tim Woodcock writes… This is a very striking photo that encountered recently. I received it embedded in an email from an organization called Embrace the Middle East. While its meaning might seem plain, there was no caption, so I put it aside for a few days, assuming that it was a tragic candid photo of a church nativity scene, somewhere in the Palestine/Israel area, in which the church had been badly damaged. But there is more to the story than that... Several days later, it occurred to me that with the wonders of technology, I could do a “reverse image search” online to find out what exactly the photo was portraying. Many companies offer this feature; Google’s search worked best for me. It’s an image from Bethlehem that began to be circulated about 10 days ago. It does not show a recently bombed church at all but is an artistically created creche in the Evangelical Lutheran Christmas Church in Bethlehem. To reflect the warzone around them, the church create the seasonal decoratio...

Tim Woodcock writes: The carol “Hark! The Herald Angels Sing” stirs up very specific memories in me and, perhaps more than any other piece of music, it has the ability to transport me elsewhere. No matter where I am when I hear it, I imagine myself to be in a Methodist chapel in Ketton, a village in England, where my mom’s family is from and where we would typically spend Christmas when I was a child. “Hark! The herald-angels sing / ‘Glory to the newborn king.’” My mom’s voice, my grandma’s voice (recognizably the same timbre yet older), my grandad – a farmer whose hands are a little too large for the keys on the organ – vigorously bashing out the tune. A small crowd singing with great gusto. This is absolutely a chapel not a church, a building that holds no more than 30 people, a good portion of whom I am related to, one way or the other. But beyond that idiosyncratic association for me, there’s something more universal at play. The rising notes of “Join the triumph of the skies...

Barbara Bowyer writes: Many of you have probably never heard of my favorite Christmas song, Nū ʻoli , which translates from the Hawaiian language to Glad Tidings . I first heard it when I was living in Hawaii and it has been a Christmas standard for me ever since. The artists are the Brothers Cazimero, beloved and well known through the islands. Their harmonies are beautiful and whenever I play it, I can’t help but feel a smile in my heart. The chorus is especially uplifting, even if you don’t understand the Hawaiian language.  I’ve included a link in case you want to hear it for yourself. The original Hawaiian lyrics and the English translation are provided below. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=f-8y_xB0kZ0 Nū ʻoli! Nū ʻoli! He nū kamahaʻo! He nū no ke ola mai luna mai nō No kānaka nui, no kamaliʻi nei A ʻoi ka nani i ke gula aʻiaʻi  Hui:    Nū ʻoli! Nū ʻoli!  Nū kamahaʻo, kamahaʻo, kamahaʻo ē!  Nū ʻoli! nū ʻoli!  ...

  Tim Woodcock writes: I am just (re-)reading Marcus Borg and John Dominic Crossan’s book The First Christmas , which seeks to chip away at the sentimentality that surrounds Christmas and to rediscover the nativity stories in Matthew and Luke primarily as stories. Encountering this passage about why December 25 is the date on the calendar has become Christmas Day, I thought it would be worth sharing. Borg and Crossan write: Nobody knows the day, the month, or the season of the year of Jesus’s birth. The date of December 25 was not decided upon until the middle of the 300s. Before then Christians celebrated his birth at different times – including March, April, May and November. But around the year 350 Pope Julius in Rome declared December 25 as the date, thereby integrating it with a Roman winter solstice festival celebrating the “Birthday of the Unconquered Sun.” … To say the obvious, light in the darkness is central to the Christian celebration of Christmas. Jesus is born ...

Marjie Smith shared this mighty impressive video of her daughter Carol Houghton performing the Carol of the Bells. It combines eight different tracks to create this virtuosic performance. Carol - along with Marjie’s other children, Sue, Sally, Kenneth III, Nancy, Joanne, and Patricia – grew up in Second Pres. Marjie notes that Carol was an accompanist of 2PC’s children's choir when Dianne Ladendecker was the director. She is a graduate of Westminster Choir College where she was a member of the famed Bell Choir directed by Allured (composer and arranger).  She works as a librarian at Princeton University and Director of Music at Ewing Covenant Presbyterian Church where she is choir and handbell director and organist.  Carol lives in Titusville, NJ, with her husband Eric Houghton, who teaches piano at Westminster Conservatory and is Director of Music at a Lutheran church near where they live. Eric is a well-known composer whose works include The Victory Songs performed...