SENTINEL WATCH December 22, 2003 Issue

Simple gifts

By Kim Shippey

At 3:00 p.m. local time on Christmas Eve, the annual Festival of Nine Lessons and Carols from King's College Chapel, Cambridge, England, will be broadcast to an audience of millions across the world. This service, which has been held since 1918, is carried live on many radio stations, including public radio stations in the United States.

Wherever you're listening, it's hard not to feel a real tug at the heartstrings. The universal message of Christmas filters through the service like sunlight through the chapel's 16th-century stained-glass windows. Nothing changes on this special afternoon, not even while everything else in the world outside seems to change. Thought stays focused on the stable and the shepherds and the music so loved by Christians everywhere.

I last visited King's College on one of those late November days when every drop of sunlight, no matter how rare or damp or blurred, is a blessing, an apologetic smile from cloaked gray skies. That morning, rose, mauve, and lemon tints gathered softly across the shoulders of the members of the choir—16 choristers and 16 choral and organ scholars—and later, as the sun moved, the light settled in the carved stalls.

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