Can a hymn cancel Christmas? Can the lyrics of a song, if true, make Christmas not true — that is to say, un-real? Oh, yes!
Now, it is a given that honorable people may disagree about which piece of music is more suitable to reverence the birth of Christ. (I myself prefer Handel’s Messiah to “The Little Drummer Boy.”) And while there are any number of “secular” Christmas songs that ignore Christ altogether, they are just distractions. What I have in mind is a song that, if taken seriously, makes impossible what Christians celebrate at Christmas. I might even call that song a “hymn” because I once heard it sung in a parish at Christmas Eve Mass. I am writing about it now for that reason, and also because I’ve heard so many Catholics speak so effusively about it, especially when it is sung at Christmas masses. I’m speaking of a song made popular by former American Idol star Clay Aiken: “Mary Did You Know?”
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