Wednesday, November 26, 2008

Christmas Tradition

It is almost automatic among Christians to deplore how the culture has watered-down and changed the traditions of Christmas. We rail against the noise and materialism and rush that yank our focus away from the incarnation of God. My particular irritation is at the gradual replacement of Christmas Carols by various holiday songs and winter songs. We sing so seldom in our culture now, and one of the few shared musical experiences was the Christmas Carol. As they are no longer allowed in the schools, and the stores veer increasingly to "White Christmas" and "Rudolph," or worse, few Carols are part of our shared heritage anymore.

Generosity remains part of the holiday, even among entirely secular folk. Even though it is no longer connected to a Christian virtue, it's still a good thing, and I am happy we have preserved that. We are also expected to wish others well, and say so - another worthy custom. The many false gods that swirl around us all seem to have infiltrated Christmas, each biting off a piece to claim as their own. Nothing of this world can maintain purity for very long.

3 comments:

Anonymous said...

You have a point. When I was in elementary school in the 60s, we sang a lot of the tradtional Christmas carols, Silent Night, Away in the Manger etc, and you heard them all on the radio. For years now, all we hear on the radio are what I call secular Christmas carols. Winter Wonderland, Jingle Bells, and Sleigh Ride seem to top the list but none of those songs has anything to do with Christmas.

Anonymous said...

This is the sceond time I have signed a post but it has been delivered as 'anonymous'. Hmmmm....

Kurt said...

True enough. But I've also noticed something else interesting. There are two radio stations near me that play Christmas music from right before Thanksgiving straight through Christmas. Although most of it is of the secular variety, you do hear the occasional traditional carol. The one that gets the most airplay is the one I've taken to calling the power-ballad of the Christmas songs because it has been recorded by Mariah Carey, Celine Dion, Josh Groban, and countless others, and that is "Oh Holy Night." Few of the secular carols call for that sort of dramatic vocalizing, so as long as there are singers who are eager to show off what they can do, that one will continue to get a lot of play.

I've often thought about writing my own blog entry about that phenomenon, but first I'd have to create a blog, something I haven't attempted in five years.