The Church gives us the Feast of the Holy Name of Jesus as a quiet jewel after Christmas. The Child has been born. He has been circumcised according to the Law. His Name has been spoken aloud. And now the faithful are invited to linger over it, not as a title, but as a presence. The hymn, "Jesu dulcis," is the beautiful hymn of the Holy Name.

Fr. Scott Haynes A Meditation on History, Theology, and Holy Poverty I. A Carol Born of Winter Silence In the Bleak Midwinter  did not begin as a carol sung by choirs beneath candlelight. It began as a poem. In 1872, Christina Rossetti, one of the great devotional poets of the Victorian era, published a quiet meditation titled A Christmas Carol  in the magazine Scribner’s Monthly . Rossetti was not writing for liturgy or performance. She was writing for the soul. Her verse wa

Gesù Bambino is a beloved Christmas carol.

In dulci jubilo is not merely a Christmas carol. It is a song born on the threshold between heaven and earth, where language falters and joy overflows. From its first notes, it sounds less like a composed hymn and more like praise breaking free from the heart of the Church.

Fr. Scott Haynes The carol known throughout the world as Carol of the Bells  was not born amid Christmas trees or cathedral choirs. Its true name is Shchedryk, and it arose from the deep memory of the Ukrainian countryside. It began not as a Christmas hymn, but as a song of blessing sung at the turning of the year, when winter seemed strongest and hope most fragile. In the original text, a small swallow flies into a household and sings of abundance to come. The fields will fl

Fr. Scott A. Haynes A Carol Meditation Bring a Torch, Jeanette, Isabella bursts into the night with motion. This is no hushed lullaby sung at a distance. It is a summons. Bring a torch.  Run. Hurry. The Child is here, and the darkness must give way. The carol comes to us from Provence, rooted in the old French Noëls  that were sung not in concert halls but in homes, marketplaces, and village streets. Its original refrain, “Guillô, pran ton flambeau,”  called real people by na

Fr. Scott Haynes A Meditation on Light, Lament, and Christmas Blood The Coventry Candle burns in silence, but it stands beside one of the most sorrowful texts ever sung at Christmastime: Coventry Carol. To understand the candle fully, we must listen to the carol’s words, for they are not sung to  the Child, but for  the children who never lived to see Him grow. The carol speaks in the voice of mothers. “Lully, lullay, thou little tiny child…” It sounds at first like a lullaby

Fr. Scott Haynes   There is a moment in prayer when words fall away and only breath remains. Not silence exactly, but something simpler and more intimate: the steady rhythm of being alive before God. Fum, Fum, Fum  belongs to that moment. The refrain does not describe the Nativity. It does not interpret it. It breathes it. Each syllable is shaped by the mouth and released into the air, as breath is. This is fitting, for Christmas is the feast of divine breath made visible. T

Fr. Scott Haynes Meditation for the Sunday within the Octave of Christmas “When a profound stillness compassed everything, and the night in its swift course was half spent, Your all-powerful Word, O Lord, bounded from heaven’s royal throne.” (Introit, Sunday within the Octave of Christmas) Holy Church places these words upon our lips during the sacred hush of the Christmas octave, inviting us to contemplate not noise, but silence; not haste, but divine initiative; not human e

“Joy to the world, the Lord is come.” The words burst forth like a trumpet blast. They do not whisper. They do not hesitate. They announce. This is not a private joy, tucked quietly into the corner of a single heart.

Fr. Scott Haynes A Carol with an Unlikely Beginning The hymn we know as O Holy Night was originally written in French as Cantique de Noël  in 1847. Its lyricist, Placide Cappeau, was a wine merchant and poet, not a cleric. Though baptized Catholic, Cappeau was politically radical and religiously unconventional. When his parish priest in Roquemaure asked him to write a poem for the newly renovated church organ, Cappeau accepted the task more as an artistic commission than an a

One of Healey Willan's most treasured carol arrangements.

Fr. Scott Haynes When the first clear notes of harp and treble voices rise in Ceremony of Carols , something ancient awakens. This is not Christmas music meant merely to charm or decorate a season. It is music that processes , prays , ponders , and finally kneels . Britten’s work feels less like a concert piece and more like a liturgical act offered in sound. Its Remarkable Birth Ceremony of Carols  was composed in 1942, during one of the darkest moments of the twentieth cent

Among the "O" Antiphons, one of the most beautiful is "O Root of Jesse". Healey Willan's setting is evocative and mysterious.

The 4th Sunday of Advent begins with the Introit from the book of the Prophet Isaiah: Rorate Caeli. Learn here the meaning and history.

Enjoy this recording by Harpa Dei of the O Antiphons of Advent.

Robert White (c. 1538 – 1574) was an English composer whose liturgical music is considered on par with Taverner and Byrd.

Alessandro Scarlatti's Messa di Santa Cecilia was written in 1720 and dedicated to cardinal Francesco Acquaviva of Aragona.

St. John Henry Newman teaches that the worst pain of purgatory is the working-out of its psychological conflicts.

The Concert Choir of the University of Wisconsin - Eau Claire - sings Delgado's "Prayer of St. Francis."