Where did Christmas Carols and Hymns Come From?
Most of us know by heart at least a few Christmas songs, and have heard many others, both secular and religious. From Thanksgiving (and often even earlier) until Christmas we are inundated with them in stores, on the radio, at Christmas concerts, and once the secular world is putting away their Christmas decorations, Catholics get to continue to hear Christmas hymns and carols at Mass for another couple of weeks. Just listening to one of these any time during the year can conjure up visions of Christmas pageants, nativities, red and green decorations, Christmas trees, and stockings hung by the fireplace. But the holiday has not always been so inextricably linked with these songs. Hymns written specifically for the feast of Christmas have been around, it seems, almost as long as the feast itself. Many of these early hymns were created for and added to the Divine Office, and weren’t widely known. Some of these early hymn-writers included St. Ambrose, Prudentius, and Venantius Fortunatus,
