O come even the not so faithful

The last strains of the O Come all ye Faithful had finished bouncing off the ceiling of St. Agnes church in Lake Placid and the ever smiling Divine Mrs.  M was bidding farewell to her fellow singers at the end of a long season of weekly rehearsals.  The Northern Adirondack vocal Ensemble had just finished a presentation of Nine Lessons and Carols for the Christmas season.   All across America, singing groups have presented everything Christmas, from the majestic strains of Handel's Messiah to the more mundane "It's Beginning to look a lot like Christmas".  Most of the performers are unpaid amateurs who do it for the love of singing and the season.  It is a convivial tradition which seems to survive despite the mounting tensions Christmas seems to exacerbate.  In an increasingly multicultural nation, the obligatory celebration of a Christian holiday would seem to be at best a mild insult to non-Christians.  But Christmas somehow seems to overcome its parochial origins and invites everyone to partake of the religious or the secular side of the holiday.  Much as it appropriated ancient pagan festivals celebrating the winter solstice, Christianity overwhelms all other religions in the western world for a short time at the end of the year with a feeling of goodwill.  As have many others, I lament the sentiments expressed so eloquently by choirs around the country cannot carry through the year.