Happy Holidays to You and Yours (A Little Vacation Here for Family)

I am planning to remove myself completely from the Internet until Tuesday, to spend time with my wife and children in the run up to Christmas and the day itself. While there are many things I would like to comment upon, I would rather let the idiocy, criminality, and insanity of the world slide off my shoulders for a long weekend as I and we celebrate the birth of Jesus. Three days (four really, because I am limiting myself to this longer-than-I-intended post) will create quite a back-up, so expect all sorts of interesting things, including a year-end round-up (God, I hate those things, but I feel obligated) at the end of next week. For now, though, take a moment to remember that, for Christians around the world, we are lighting candles to celebrate the coming into the world of Light, in the midst of the darkness and death that surrounds us.

Charles Wesley is the poet-laureate of the Methodist movement. He wrote over 6,000 hymns and poems, and even the great Isaac Watts (among Watts' compositions are "Joy to the World", sung to a variation of Handel's "Lift Up Your Heads, O Ye Gates" from The Messiah) was impressed by some of those that appeared during Watts' lifetime. The first publication Wesley produced was 1734's Hymns and Poems on the Nativity of Our Lord. A shorter version of one of those hymns (Wesley was famous, or perhaps infamous for the length of his poems; ten or eleven verses was not uncommon, and some could have close to twenty) is among the best-loved Christmas hymns:

Hark! the herald angels sing
"Glory to the new-born king;
Peace on earh, and mercy mild,
God and sinners reconciled!"
Joyful, all ye nations rise,
Join the triumph of the skies;
woth th'angelic host proclaim,
"Christ is born in Bethlehem!"
--
Hail the heaven-born Prince of Peace!
Hail the Sun of Righteousness!
Light and life to all he brings,
Risen with healing in his wings.
Mild he lays his glory by,
Born that we no more may die,
Born to raise us from the earth,
Born to give us second birth.
--
Christ, by highest heaven adored;
Christ the everlasting Lord;
late in time behold him come,
Off-spring of a virgin's womb.
Veiled in flesh the Godhead see;
Hail th'incarnate Deity,
Pleased with us in flesh to dwell,
Jesus, our Emmanuel.