The Christmas Cantata (The Liturgical Mysteries)

by Schweizer, Mark

  Michael Baum, the organ builder, had thoughtfully provided me with a secret drawer in the organ bench where I hid my Glock 9. In the old days, I kept it handy for the choir rats that were always chewing on the wires. Now, since we had a brand-new, apparently rodent-proof church, I kept it for the tenors.

  Bev Greene, Georgia Wester, and Meg came up the stairs and into the loft, one behind the other.

  "Well," announced Georgia, "the sopranos are here." Georgia owned Eden Books and generally didn't sing with the choir except during the Advent/Christmas season.

  "The good ones are here, anyway," grumbled Bev, just loud enough for me to hear. I assumed that Bev was referring not to all the missing sopranos, but to one in particular. Muffy LeMieux.

  Muffy was a soprano whose vocal stylings, as well as her dress, tended toward the Nashvillian. She was determined to become a country star, and her signature look—stretch pants, cowboy boots, and tight angora sweaters in various colors—lent credence to her dream. She had dark red hair and pale, flawless skin. At least, that's how the men in the choir described it: flawless. The BRAs (back row altos) were less kind, characterizing her complexion as "well-camouflaged." Muffy was always followed, at not quite arm's length, by her husband Varmit. Varmit LeMieux ostensibly sang in the bass section, but everyone knew he was there to keep an eye on Muffy. There was some history there that we weren't privy to, and no one asked.

  "I didn't mean Elaine," muttered Bev, obviously feeling a twinge of remorse. Bev Greene was our church administrator and had her hands full, what with our part-time supply priest beginning to give her grief about his wife's insurance benefits, and trying to keep tabs on Kimberly Walnut, our Director of Christian Formation. Kimberly Walnut had decided that Advent wasn't really fun for children, and had invited them to sing a Christian version of Jingle Bells in church on the Sunday after Thanksgiving during the Children's Moment. Preferring to take advantage of the Walmart Liturgical Calendar rather than the one we currently used, Kimberly Walnut had lined all the kids across the steps of the chancel, pointed at her Sunday School accompanist, Heather Frampton, and started the song. The first and second graders howled like banshees.

  Christ is born, Christ is born, Christ is born today!

  He was sent from heav'n above,

  to take your sins away...HEY!

  Angels sing, church bells ring, children laughing, too.

  Celebrate the greatest gift,

  from God straight down to you!

  I noticed that the children especially enjoyed the HEY! part, emphasizing the word with "jazz hands" just as they'd been taught.

  "Kimberly Walnut didn't say anything about this during the worship meeting," Bev growled, seated right behind me in the soprano section. "I asked her specifically what she was going to do at the Children's Moment. For heaven's sake! It's not even the first Sunday of Advent yet."

  "I wouldn't know," I said. "As you remember, I skipped that meeting."

  "Yes, I do remember!"

  Kimberly Walnut took the solo verse, holding our state-of-the-art wireless microphone.

  Long, long time ago, while we were still in sin,

  God, He had a plan, to get His people in.

  He sent a baby boy, and Jesus was His name.

  And all that choose to welcome Him

  Will never be the same!...OH!

  "Christ is born, Christ is born, Christ is born today!" the children screamed over the piano.

  "Oy veh!" said Bev, her head dropping into her hands.

  "Take solace in the fact that you may be able to use this against her," I said. "Maybe."

  The kids finished to polite applause and raced, pell-mell, back down the center aisle and out the back door to Children's Church. They'd be back for communion.

  "I can't fire her," said Bev. "You know what the vestry said. No changes in staff until we get a full-time priest. And now, she's gaining support. Not with the parents so much. Mostly with the little old ladies."

  "Well, you have to admit there are a whole lot more kids in Sunday School since she took over."

  Bev nodded glumly. "Yeah. But I don't know if it's because of her or in spite of her. If she'd just check with me once in awhile..."

  * * *

  Meg followed Georgia and Bev across the loft to the soprano section, picked up her copy of the cantata, and sat down. "So," she said, "you decided to do it."

  "Yep. It's Sydney or the bush."

  "Huh?" said Georgia.

  "You know...Sydney or the bush. Hollywood or bust. Banjo or the buzzard."

  "I never understand a word you're saying," said Marjorie, reappearing from behind the pipe case with her flask.

  "Never mind," I said. "We're doing it."

  "Doing what?" asked Rebecca, coming in the stairwell door. She was followed in quick succession by Tiff St. James (my unpaid music intern from Appalachian State) and Elaine Hixon, another soprano. Rebecca and Tiff were altos.

  "This cantata," I answered. "La Chanson d'Adoration. Christmas Eve. It's on your chairs."

  "Huh," said Elaine, picking up the score by the edges and shaking it as if she was trying to extricate spiders from the pages. "I don't mean to sound crabby, but..."

  "No more crabbiness," said Meg. "I proclaim a moratorium on griping."

  "Can she do that?" asked Mark Wells. The basses had come into the loft as well and now there was a steady stream of choristers representing all the sections. We had twenty-two singers on the unofficial choir roster. I was hoping for twenty at rehearsal. I'd be happy with sixteen.

  "Yes," I said. "I'm sure it's in our choir constitution, or bylaws, or whatever. The president may declare a moratorium on whatever she chooses."

  "Yeah," said Rebecca, "but we don't have a president."

  "I'd declare a moratorium on this," grumped Elaine, still holding the score at arm's length. "I don't like the way it feels. And look at how long the dang thing is. It must be a hundred pages."

  "The number of pages is deceiving," I said. "You see, I didn't extract the vocal parts so we all have full scores..."

  "I nominate Meg for choir president," crowed Marjorie. "All in favor?"

  "No...wait..." said Meg.

  "Aye," came the resounding cry.

  "Opposed?" asked Meg hopefully.

  No answer.

  "Oh, that's just great!" she said.

  "Okay, Madame President," said Elaine. "First order of business. If Hayden’s gonna make us sing this thing, let's talk about the Christmas party."

  "Later," I said. "We have to rehearse. Pull out the anthem for Sunday. Veni, Veni Emmanuel by Zoltán Kodály."

  "Zoltán?" said Fred May. "His name is Zoltán?" The rest of the basses—Bob Solomon, Phil Camp, and Steve DeMoss—had taken their seats in the back row. In front of them were the tenors: Marjorie, Randy Hatteberg, and Bert Coley. Bert was the best singer, having been in the Appalachian State Concert Choir when he was a student. Now he was a police officer in Boone, but still came and sang when he wasn't on duty. Randy was good. Marjorie was earnest.

  In addition to Tiff St. James, the altos in attendance included Martha Hatteberg (Randy's wife), Rebecca, Tiff, and Sheila DeMoss. All were good singers and good sight-readers.

  "Zoltán Kodály," I said. "Very famous Hungarian composer and pedagogue. You might remember him from music education. The Kodály Method?"

  "Oh, sure," said Tiff. "I didn't know he wrote choral music, though."

  "Hey, Tiff," said Fred, "where's Ian?"

  "I'm sure I don't know," said Tiff, her color rising slightly.

  As if on cue, Dr. Ian Burch, PhD, came through the stairwell door, looked around the choir and made a beeline for the empty chair next to Tiff. Ian was a countertenor, a fine one actually, and had been supplementing our alto section since he'd become infatuated with Tiff St. James just before Halloween. Now, six weeks later, he was still on the prowl. Unfortunately for Dr. Ian Burch, PhD, Tiff was not interested. This wasn't surprising, really. Ian was twice Tiff's a
ge and possibly one of the most unfortunate looking men in St. Germaine. It wasn't his protruding ears, his small, flat head, or his long, slightly red nose that made him so homely, but rather the cumulative effect of the whole. His dating persona wasn't helped by a rather irritating personality stemming (in Meg's opinion) from a PhD in musicology, a fascination with the unknown music of Guillaume Dufay (1397-1474), and the fashion sense God gave a badger. "For heaven's sake," Meg said. "He wears a cape! A fur-lined cape!"

  "Good evening, Tiff," Ian said, sidling his choir chair three inches closer to Tiff's.

  "Hi," muttered Tiff.

  "Hey," said Marjorie, interrupting any further exchange. "This anthem is in Latin. I don't sing in Latin."

  "Sure you do," said Bob from the bass section. "Think back. The Little Organ Mass? O Vos Omnes? Ave Maris Stella?"

  "Oh, you guys sang in Latin," said Marjorie, "but I was just making words up. If God had wanted us to sing in Latin, he wouldn't have given us uvulas."

  * * *

  Meg and I drove back to the house listening to John Rutter carols, a CD that had magically appeared in her car stereo. If we'd been in my old Chevy pickup, we'd be listening to my Leon Redbone Christmas Island album, since Meg had banned it from the house for the duration of the holidays. I'd left my truck parked in front of the police station. I'd hitch a ride with Meg back into town tomorrow morning in her Lexus. The heated leather seats made a big difference. The only thing that was heated in the '62 pickup was the exhaust pipe.

  "You fixed supper?" Meg asked. "I haven't been home since I left this morning and I'm starved."

  "Yes. Yes, I did."

  "Well?" she asked.

  "Hasenpfeffer," I said. "I got the recipe from Anka Hoffman at the Heidelberg Haus when I was there last week. Delicious! She gave me a couple of rabbits, too. They've been in the freezer."

  "Rabbits?" said Meg, the color draining from her face. "I thought those things in the freezer were for Archimedes."

  Archimedes was a barn owl that shared our home, but was definitely not what you'd call "tame." He came and went as he pleased, thanks to an electronic window in the kitchen, but spent much of the winter settled either on the head of the stuffed buffalo or on a perch that I'd fashioned above the fireplace in the living room. I supplemented his diet during the cold months, either with baby squirrels or chipmunks that I got from my friend Kent Murphee, the medical examiner in Boone. In the summer, I switched Archimedes' complementary comestibles to mice. No sense in spoiling him too much. Besides, he could always eat bats and feast on the fledglings in August.

  "Well, they were hares, actually. Hasenpfeffer is sort of a stew. Very tasty. I left it simmering, so if Baxter hasn't climbed onto the stove, removed the lid and eaten the whole thing, it should be ready when we get home." Baxter was a large dog, but not prone to climbing on stoves. I figured we were safe on that count.

  "Hasenpfeffer?" said Meg again. "Really?"

  "You'll love it," I said. "Just don't ask what's in it."

  "Well, thanks a lot. Now I have to know."

  "Hmm. Well, there's the rabbit. Onions, a lot of pepper." I thought for a moment. "Garlic, lemon, thyme, rosemary...a bunch of spices like that. Oh, yeah. Juniper berries and cloves. And wine. A whole bottle."

  "I've never had rabbit, but that doesn't sound too bad. Anything else?"

  "I can't remember," I lied, choosing not to tell Meg about the part of the recipe that included braising the pieces of meat in a marinade thickened with the poor bunny's blood. Instead, I changed the subject.

  "I thought the cantata went okay considering that it was our first time through it."

  "You're dreaming," said Meg. "It's hard to read. It's hard to sing. The harmonies make no sense."

  "They do, though," I argued. "They just don't go where you want them to. It is different, I'll give you that much. I will admit that the hand-written manuscript is not what we're used to. It may take a little time."

  Meg just shook her head. "Two weeks left. I hope you know what you're doing. Hey! I just thought of something. 'Waiter, there's a hare in my stew!'"

  "Yuk yuk. Wasn't funny when I tried it on the waitress at the Heidelberg Haus, either."

  "Joy to the world," warbled the stereo, "the Lord is come!"

  Chapter 5

  The Great Christmas Tree Debate at St. Barnabas had raged for almost fifty years. In 1957, Mrs. Frances Kipps Spenser, a fashion coordinator at Herman's Department Store in Danville, Virginia, thought that the usual brightly colored Christmas ornaments were just not appropriate for a setting of worship, and so began researching and looking for something that would better reflect the Christian faith. What she came up with were Christian symbols made of Styrofoam, gold plastic beads and pearls. The Protestant community immediately clutched these Styrofoam ornaments (but gently...oh so gently) to their collective bosoms so fervently that Mrs. Spenser decided to trademark the term Chrismon™ (a combination of the words "Christ" and "monogram"), lest some unscrupulous entrepreneur do it later and try to make a buck. She then deeded the trademark to the local Lutheran church, henceforth and forever more to be known as Chrismon Central. There are now rules about how to hang the Chrismons, rules governing acceptable symbols, special gloves required, and so on.

  In the 1970s, St. Barnabas got on board the Chrismon train and the Daughters of the King chapter spent one summer working their fingers to the bone making the Chrismons that would be diligently used for the next fifty years. There are only two or three of those Daughters left in the congregation, but they wield considerable influence, and so the specter of the Chrismon tree looms large every Advent.

  In direct opposition to the Chrismonites are those who favor the Jesse tree. The Jesse tree has considerably fewer rules than the Chrismon tree, and can be decorated in a variety of ways. The Jessetonians of St. Barnabas—mainly a younger crowd—prefer the "natural" look: bird nests, fruit, stuffed wrens and robins, pine cones, nuts, garlands, and the like. Once, a few years ago, someone snuck a six-foot-long rubber black snake into the branches to represent the serpent in the Garden of Eden. It was quickly removed once Thelma Wingler discovered it. Thelma, then in her seventies, had dropped in early on a Sunday morning and come face to face with the rubber creature while trying to sneak a Chrismon onto the Jesse tree. It was Father Tony who found her sitting next to the tree, her eyes wide and unblinking, a crushed Styrofoam Jesus fish in her twitching hand. Tony had been in the sacristy and heard the wavering scream. The ambulance came and picked her up and Thelma spent the rest of Advent in an assisted living facility, trying to get the dosage of her nerve pills adjusted and shrieking at black extension cords.

  The problem with all of this is that we can't actually have a "Christmas tree" at St. Barnabas. The rules are simple. No vestiges of Christmas before Christmas, and Christmas is legally December 25th at 12:00 AM. We hedge on Christmas Eve and pretend that the five o'clock service is really a Christmas service, but that's as close as we'll come to breaking through the invisible Christmas wall.

  Since we can't have a Christmas tree, a Chrismon tree or a Jesse tree will suffice. Throw a few stuffed birds or a Styrofoam Chi Rho up in the branches and no one seems to know the difference. The vestry finally came to a compromise several years ago, deciding to placate both theological factions by alternating the trees each year. This is the year of the Chrismons, and it may be their last. For the past decade or so, Wendy Bolling has kept the decorations in a large box in her basement, but over the summer a family of possums had gotten in and made a mess of a lot of the decorations. Possums aren't known for eating Styrofoam, but these critters certainly gave it their best shot. Wendy had tried to do some repair work with a hot-glue gun, straight pins, and a whole lot of glitter, but it was clear that if the Chrismonites were to hold their sway, there would have to be some new ornaments constructed. I didn't see it happening. In my opinion, the days of unemployed ladies of a certain age sitting down together and doing crafts have passed.

&
nbsp; The same rules that govern church holiday decorations also govern the singing of Christmas carols and hymns. No Hark the Herald Angels or While Shepherds Watched Their Flocks before Christmas. Sure, I hedge a bit and throw in Lo, How A Rose E'er Blooming and In the Bleak Midwinter, but I justify them with the scriptures appointed for the day. If we're talking full-blown Christmas hymns—angels and shepherds and mangers and such—it just isn't happening. Meg hates this, as does most of the choir, and to tell the truth, I'm not really much of a fan either. Don't get me wrong. I love the twelve days of Christmas as much as the next guy and I'm a big fan of the Liturgical Police, but who really wants to sing Joy to the World in January?

  Unfortunately, on this Sunday, the second Sunday of Advent, there was no getting away from the prophetic, foreboding air of the lectionary. The Book of Malachi: But who can endure the day of his coming, and who can stand when he appears? For he is like a refiner's fire and he will purify the descendants of Levi and refine them like gold and silver, until they present offerings to the LORD in righteousness. The Gospel according to Luke: The word of God came to John son of Zechariah in the wilderness. He went into all the region around the Jordan, proclaiming a baptism of repentance for the forgiveness of sins.

  Those people who wanted to sing The First Nowell were just plain out of luck. Our anthem by Kodály was fine and the tune (O Come, O Come, Emmanuel) was at least familiar and might even be considered "Christmasy" by some. The hymns, however, lacked a certain festive air. It was my fault. I'd picked them back in the fall, not realizing what a blue funk the whole town would be in come December.

  Our interim priest didn't help matters any. Father Howard "Ward" Shavers was newly retired and had come up to the mountains from South Florida. Father Shavers and his wife Gina were more in tune with a "contemporary" service than the traditional worship of St. Barnabas. It wasn't that he came in and tried to save us from ourselves as many priests did, but rather, that he just got lost in the service, had a hard time with the prayer book, didn't know any of the Advent hymns in the hymnal, and really wondered why The First Nowell wasn't an option.