A Christmas greeting

Fred Kelly Grant, an Idaho consultant and noted Sagebrush rebel, recently sent out Christmas greetings to tea party folks, including the Redding area's own Erin Ryan. He said he was about ready to "fly apart into a million pieces" after a day of conflict and regained perspective by going to a local church to pray.

He concludes:

I hope that God blesses you with some such sign of peace during this season. I offer my prayers for all you, my friends and family, that you may enjoy His peace as we celebrate the birth of His only Son. Whether in good or bad health, whether in a solid or estranged relationship, whether facing work problems or high success, we can have His peace if we only let it in.

Sad though it is that we have lost loved ones through the years, I still get peace from remembering the old songs that they sang. Sometimes I can imagine that I am still at New Market Methodist Church just up the road from Pond Hollow, South Carolina, as I was on one Christmas Eve when I remember my mother and grandmother and my great aunt Genie singing together their favorite carol, “O Holy Night”. I can still hear the lyrics and the tune, just as I did many years later in Corpus Christi Catholic church in Baltimore as Lodice held my first born son Andrew at his first Christmas and sang with his Godparents Peg and Foxie Winchester:

O Holy Night,
The stars are brightly shining
It is the night of the dear Savior’s birth!
Long lay the world in sin and error pining
Til he appear’d and the soul felt its worth
A thrill of hope the weary world rejoices
For yonder breaks a new and glorious morn!

Fall on your knees
Oh hear the angel voices
Oh night divine
Oh night when Christ was born
Oh night divine
Oh night divine

God bless you and keep you! Merry Christmas!

I concur. As another Tim says in a famous story, God bless us, everyone!