‘Thank you for the music’ sing Abba. Numerous people have told me how much they missed congregational singing during the pandemic. St Augustine was spot on when he wrote, ‘he who sings, prays twice’. Advent is my favourite season for praying twice. Its hauntingly beautiful melodies generate within me anticipation, expectation, hope, longing, stillness. The carol O Come, O Come Emmanuel is the best advent calendar ever. Each verse opens a window into a different perspective of the coming Messiah, from the prophesies of Isaiah, Zechariah and Haggai. They form the medieval ‘O antiphons’ which we celebrate on the days leading up to Christmas: O Wisdom (17th December); O Adonai (18th); O Root of Jesse (19th); O Key of David (20th); O Dayspring (21st); O King of the Nations (22nd); O Emmanuel (23rd).

‘Thank you for the music’. Indeed. I was ordained by a bishop who claimed to be tone deaf. One of my jobs as a curate was to stand at his side and intone bits of the service for him. How I’ve gone up in the world. My current boss is, I think, the first bishop to have written a musical setting for the mass since the Reformation. It was a gift to be in Guildford Cathedral for the premiere on the Sunday before Advent - in a year when bishop and cathedral share a significant birthday. The gift is given (free of charge) to any churches in our diocese that would appreciate scores (just email Judy at Willow Grange). No spoilers – but I particularly loved the Sanctus which gave me a picture of the holiness of God as the refiner’s fire and the hosannas shooting out like embers into a cold and dark sky – an appropriate vision for Advent.

From Morning Prayer today: ‘the Lord will save me, and we will sing to stringed instruments [I’m sure brass, woodwind, electronic and others are allowed too!] all the days of our lives’. (Isaiah 38:20). Allow the gift of Advent music to prepare your hearts to sing this Christmas, for the Lord will come to save us.

Archdeacon Paul