The last few years, as I’ve fallen more in love with Advent, I’ve had a personal rule about Christmas carols: I don’t play them until the 25th, but I’ll enjoy them if you put them on in the car, or they’re playing somewhere I happen to be. After all it’s my “rule” not yours.

A few weeks back I heard a vocal performance of “O Holy Night” that really moved me, and I’ve been humming it ever since. One particular phrase from it keeps coming back to me: “O’ night divine, o’ night when Christ was born.” We don’t really know what date Christ was born. December 25th is liturgically convenient, not historically accurate. So really… Christ could have been born any night of the year. Wouldn’t it be nice if we could commemorate Christ’s life every day… just in case?