{"id":82,"date":"2013-11-24T16:35:55","date_gmt":"2013-11-24T16:35:55","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/hwwchurch.org.uk\/wordpress\/?p=82"},"modified":"2013-11-24T16:35:55","modified_gmt":"2013-11-24T16:35:55","slug":"a-merry-little-christmas","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/hwwchurch.org.uk\/wordpress\/2013\/11\/24\/a-merry-little-christmas\/","title":{"rendered":"A Merry Little Christmas"},"content":{"rendered":"

Now that summer has gone (and come back again for one last hurrah, then properly disappeared at the sight of the snowflake symbol flashing on our dashboards), it\u2019s definitely that \u201capproaching Christmas\u201d time of year again.\u00a0 In fact, the TV adverts are already telling me that “It’s Christmas” (not just approaching Christmas!).\u00a0 It surely won’t be long before the radios of the land will be beginning to play the usual festive tunes, and DJs will sound excitable and nostalgic all at the same time.\u00a0 Noddy Holder and Roy Wood can look forward to another bumper royalties pay-out, as can George Michael\u2019s erstwhile musical collaborator, Mr Ridgley, while shops and offices sway to the themes of Last Christmas<\/em>.<\/p>\n

Constant radio-play drills these songs into our heads.\u00a0 Today\u2019s children don\u2019t know the National Anthem, or even some of the best traditional Christmas Carols, but you can be sure they know Rudolf the Red-nosed Reindeer\u2019s special song!\u00a0 Loads of these popular Christmas songs refer to nostalgia, winter weather and to the activities of one red-suited white-bearded gentleman with a supersonic sledge.\u00a0 To find any reference to the Christ of Christ-mas you\u2019d probably have to listen to Cliff Richard.\u00a0 Indeed, very few songs refer to the religious aspects of the Christmas season at all.\u00a0 I find it fascinating, then, that, despite the normal pattern taken by writers to avoid religious motifs of any sort, one of the most popular Christmas songs actually treats us as if we believe in the tales of Greek mythology!<\/p>\n

The song is \u201cHave yourself a merry little Christmas,\u201d popularised by Judy Garland in the 1944 MGM film, \u201cMeet me in St Louis,\u201d and subsequently recorded by notable others including Frank Sinatra and the Muppets (separately!).\u00a0\u00a0Having spoken of \u201cFaithful friends who are dear to us\u201d<\/i> who \u201cgather near to us once more,\u201d<\/i> the song speaks of a hope that, \u201cThrough the years we all will be together, if the Fates allow.\u201d<\/i><\/p>\n

The Fates may sound like a slightly dubious 1960s pop-group, but they are in fact characters from the Greek pantheon: Clotho<\/i> (the spinner) spins the thread of life for each human being; Lachesis<\/i> (the measurer) chooses the lot in life each person will have and measures off how long that life is to be; and Atropos<\/i> (she who cannot be turned) finally cuts the thread of life with her shears, so bringing each person to death.\u00a0 In the world of Greek mythology, everything is subject to them \u2013 even the gods themselves.<\/p>\n

Can there be anything more out of place in a Christmas song than a reference to three hag-like characters who wield such an impersonal and determinative power over the whole universe?\u00a0 I\u2019ll grant you that Rage Against The Machine<\/i>\u2019s Christmas number one of a few years ago was in pretty poor taste, but I reckon this line is probably more unhelpful still.\u00a0 It taps into our society\u2019s materialistic understanding of the world and encourages us to shrug our shoulders along with Doris Day and say, \u201cQue sera, sera!\u201d (or as today\u2019s teenagers might put it, \u201cWhatever!\u201d) as if life doesn\u2019t really matter.<\/p>\n

This is complete madness, since the whole point about Christmas is that we matter immensely to God.\u00a0 He doesn\u2019t stand back, unable to overcome the power of the Fates (who don\u2019t actually exist).\u00a0 Rather, in His great love, He breaks into our world in the person of Jesus to rescue us and make us His children.\u00a0 For those who feel helpless in the face of “fate” or other powers and authorities, He brings hope; the creator of the universe cares enough for us to search us out and bring us back to Himself so that through the years, we will be together.\u00a0 And that’s a story that\u00a0guarantees my celebrations each year\u00a0can be described as “A merry little Christmas”.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Now that summer has gone (and come back again for one last hurrah, then properly disappeared at the sight of the snowflake symbol flashing on our dashboards), it\u2019s definitely that \u201capproaching Christmas\u201d time of year again.\u00a0 In fact, the TV adverts are already telling me that “It’s Christmas” (not just approaching Christmas!).\u00a0 It surely won’t […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[12,18],"tags":[22,21,13],"class_list":["post-82","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-cultural-comment","category-gospel","tag-celebrity","tag-christmas","tag-media"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/hwwchurch.org.uk\/wordpress\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/82","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/hwwchurch.org.uk\/wordpress\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/hwwchurch.org.uk\/wordpress\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/hwwchurch.org.uk\/wordpress\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/hwwchurch.org.uk\/wordpress\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=82"}],"version-history":[{"count":3,"href":"https:\/\/hwwchurch.org.uk\/wordpress\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/82\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":86,"href":"https:\/\/hwwchurch.org.uk\/wordpress\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/82\/revisions\/86"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/hwwchurch.org.uk\/wordpress\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=82"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/hwwchurch.org.uk\/wordpress\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=82"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/hwwchurch.org.uk\/wordpress\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=82"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}