I often post a version of ‘Veni, Veni, Emmanuel’ for Christmas. This year I have chosen one that pleads, with awed splendor, for a consolation beyond any other to enter and lighten our world. For some of us – fearful of the future – such beauty counters the sense that life holds little other than dread.

If this music lets you feel comfort, hope and peace, revel freely, not trying to justify or rationalize them. Comfort, hope and peace are often less of the mind than the heart, which must at times prevail, lest it shrivel; and us with it.

For example, the initial refrain of ‘Gaude,’ ‘Rejoice,’ here is a chord of piercing beauty, but trying to dissect that would defeat the purpose of artistry. A desire to understand how things work can be hugely beneficial, but the arranger, Kodaly, wanted to summon uplift and inspiration, not provide a cognitive exercise.

For most of us experiencing wonder, joy, etc. – sensations that make life feel worth living – their underlying mechanics are irrelevant. Instead of trying to capture wonder, we should let it, peacefully, capture us. It is unnecessary to understand exactly why this happens, and can even be another case of ‘defeating the purpose’ – here, of personal peace.

As to the message of the lyrics, ‘Emmanuel’ translates as ‘God with us,’ but may also imply ‘God in us.’ If we are watchful, we may recognize echoes of divinity in our midst; Angels, not in the guise of winged men. That is, any of us may transcend our Self to act, without consideration, for the benefit, comfort or rescue of an Other, and thus be revealed – even to our Selves – as agents of benevolence surpassing our apprehension.

So perhaps, we are not a lost cause after all. Indeed, Christmas commemorates a supreme instance – in need of no validation beyond the sustaining hope it affords – of love, incarnate, offering grace greater than the fallen state of Humankind.

We must not be blind to the harshness of the world, but neither should we blind ourselves to marvels it may present. That can become a self-fulfilling prophecy in which darkness is all we ever perceive, depriving us of the full spectrum of our personhood.  

We do not all share the same advantages and burdens, but may all share in the same wonders; as well as the same dreads. In a world of dispiriting facts, it is a mark of being human – imperfect, vulnerable and constrained – to need, feel, and embrace respite such as this majestic, melodic invitation to Hope holds out, luminous, before us.

‘Veni, gaude’; Come, rejoice.