A Palestinian nativity scene. Life is particularly difficult for the small Christian community in the West Bank, let us remember them in our prayers.
At our lovely Christmas Eve service, I had a strong reaction to the contrasting words of two of the carols that we sang. Both carols were inspired by passages of scripture, but conjured rather different images of God and perspectives on the incarnation.
The first was Lo! he comes with clouds descending to which I had an instinctively negative reaction. Partly I think this is because of the emphasis on a triumphal return of Christ to earth at some indeterminate time in the future, rather than on his presence with us now, and partly because the language of thrones, power and glory sounds too much like a human idea of what the reign of God will be like. Also, while I appreciate the mourning over the crucifixion in verse 2, I struggle to get on board with verse 3’s rapturous gazing upon the scars of Christ.
The second was Of the Father’s love begotten, which is apparently based on the poem, Corde natus ex parentis by Marcus Aurelius C. Prudentius, who was born in Northern Spain in 348 AD. It appealed to me because of its cosmic vision, it talks of the Alpha and the Omega – that sense of Christ encompassing the beginning and the end. It speaks of the creation, and the beautiful words:
All that grows beneath the shining
Of the moon and burning sun
I realise that this is all very subjective, we can all find things to get annoyed about if we are in the mood. The final words of even this carol, for example, which talk about something we all want – the ultimate victory of goodness over the forces of evil – come loaded with associations that are difficult to set aside.
Honour, glory, and dominion,
And eternal victory—
Evermore and evermore.
Which carols do you love/hate, and why?