Lessons & Carols
West Virginia-Western Maryland Synod

Contents
Introduction

Lessons & Carols (originally known as Nine Lessons with Carols) is borrowed from our Anglican cousins. The basic form includes multiple readings from Holy Scriptures interspersed with hymns, carols, and other music appropriate to the religious observation of the season.

Nine Lessons with Carols - original
                        bulletin
A service bulletin from the first Nine Lessons with Carols held Christmas Eve 1880 in Truro, Cornwall, England. Click here for copyright information.
Lessons & Carols has its roots in late-Victorian England. In 1880, the Bishop of Truro, Edward White Benson, designed the first known Service of Nine Lessons with Carols. He did so at the suggestion of the very junior cleric George Henry Somerset Walpole. Walpole was of the opinion that the church needed to offer an alternative to the local pubs (and all vices pertaining thereunto). To put this in context, Christmas Eve mass was not common in Victorian England. Indeed, it did not become popular in England until after World War II. The typical Victorian Christmas for the faithful featured mass on Christmas Day. Many (though not all) laborers were required to work on Christmas Day. Christmas Eve, therefore, provided an opportunity to go to the local pub and drink without worrying about being functional the following morning. This sort of carousing did not sit well with some Victorian clergy. Since there was not a tradition of mass on Christmas Eve, some sort of event was needed that could compete with the popular entertainment around the corner. A service featuring favorite songs promised to be more attractive than the typical church service. It should also be noted that carols had not been considered appropriate for worship in the Church of England. Only five years before had a significant book of carols been published for church use, and the first use of carols at St. Paul's Cathedral, London, is dated to 1878. The Rev. Dr. Frank Senn adds that Cornish men (Truro is in the heart of Cronwall) loved to sing. So, by bringing the carols of the street into the sanctuary, Benson and Walpole were intentionally reaching out to the not-so-pious public. It may be strange to think of it this way today, but, in 1880, this was entertainment evangelism, even if it was driven by a desire to get the working classes to comport themselves with greater dignity on this holy night. Benson was elevated to the Archbishopric of Canterbury in 1883.With his ascension, the Service of Nine Lessons and Carols began to propagate across England. It's popular appeal even brought it across the Atlantic where it was held at Brown University in 1916.

Most, however, know of Nine Lessons and Carols from King's College, Cambridge. In 1918, Eric Milner-White returned from the Great War and assumed the post of Dean of King's College. As Christmas approached, the former chaplain and veteran of both the Western Front and the Italian Campaign looked for an alternative to evensong on Christmas Eve. Nine Lessons & Carols presented itself as an antidote to the horrors of the war and the tremendous loss of life among the British. With some adaptations, Milner-White inaugurated the Festival of Nine Lessons and Carols tradition at King's College. The post-war Zeitgeist is reflected in Milner-White's bidding prayer that included a petition for "all those who rejoice with us, but upon another shore and in a greater light."

If Lessons & Carols predates Milner-White and King's College by nearly four decades, why should we so closely associate the service with that institution? Radio! In 1928, BBC broadcast Nine Lessons and Carols from King's College. Of course, King's College had fantastic musical resources at its disposal, and the following decade the BBC broadcasted the service world-wide. Since 1979, it has been a regular feature on many public radio stations.

The service continues to change—even in England. Comparing the different iterations over its now 140-year history is a study in world, cultural, and media history as much as it is a study in liturgics.

MBQ L&C 2023
The 2023 Festival of Lessons and Carols held by Mountainside Baroque at Emmanuel Episcopal Church, Cumberland, MD.
Holding a Service of Lessons & Carols

Why?

Lessons & Carols comes to us from the Anglican tradition. In terms of the long history of the Church, it is a relatively recent development (late-19th century). Still, a good devotional service is a good devotional service, and there is little reason to eschew it simply because it lacks a Wittenberg pedigree. Furthermore, there is a place for corporate devotion beyond the mass. Matins, Vespers, and Compline, for example, all have their place within the church, and there is room for other forms. Mere novelty, however, is insufficient justification for the appropriation of this Anglican service. Lessons & Carols has strengths, chief among them is the recounting of salvation history through the lessons. We must also admit that joining in corporate song has its own value, especially when that song is an expression of the Christian faith. So, as a matter of congregational devotion, holding Lessons & Carols is perfectly reasonable and potentially beneficial.

Lessons & Carols also presents an opportunity not afforded by the mass. As it is a non-Eucharistic service, questions related to Eucharistic discipline (i.e., who can receive?) do not apply. Consequently, it provides excellent opportunity for the ecumenical community to gather and also to invite those of different faith or no faith. Two things militate against this opportunity: conflating mass with Lessons & Carols and holding Lessons & Carols on a Sunday morning.

When?

If one wants to gather the ecumenical community, creating competition with other churches (i.e., holding Lessons & Carols on Sunday morning) is less than helpful.

The history of Lesson & Carols firmly situates it as a Christmas Eve service. Christmas Eve is not an unreasonable time for the service, but this may militate against our normative practice of holding mass Christmas Eve. That said, it may make sense to hold Lessons & Carols as an early evening service on Christmas eve and reserve the mass for later in the evening (as would be the case with the so-called midnight mass). A congregation might invest its musical energies in the Lessons & Carols—we might as well be honest about human resources allocation—and hold a late-night mass without the heavy investment of choirs, brass, etc.

Of course, one might well hold Lessons & Carols any time other than Sunday morning. Recognizing that Lessons & Carols was designed as a Christmas service and not an advent service, holding the service during the Christmas Dodekaemeron. makes more sense than doing so in Advent. This may be a hard sell as many consider Christmas over on December 26. Still, a congregation might want to underscore that the celebration of the Nativity continues through January 5. It may also make sense in terms of not competing with everything else that is happening in the run up to Christmas. Indeed, few of the public holiday programs in our pluralistic society had much to do with the story of Christ's incarnation. It might be easier to hear this message after that din has quieted down.

What?

There may be a temptation to conflate Lessons & Carols with the celebration of the Sacrament of the Lords Supper. This temptation should be resisted. Lessons & Carols should never be combined with the Service of Holy Communion (i.e., we should not hold Lessons & Carols and then tack the Sacrament of the Lord's Supper on to it as if Holy Communion were an afterthought). Lessons & Carols and the Service of Holy Communion each have their own liturgical integrity, and each has its proper place within the devotional life of a congregation. If one wants to invite those of different faith or no faith, departing from the traditional form by adding the observance of the Sacrament of the Lord's Supper undermines the very appeal of the service which has made it popular around the world among people who would otherwise be uninterested in participating in Christian worship.

If one wants to consider a service along the lines of the Easter Vigil for Christmas Eve, that is possible, but it should follow the vigil form: lucernarium, office of readings, baptisms (if any, though one may want to hold such baptisms until the Feast of the Baptism of Our Lord), and modified mass.

As to the particular details of the service, orders abound and are readily available from a variety of sources. As with any order of service found on the web, careful theological review should is warranted.

It should be noted that orders that mimic Lessons & Carols for different seasons have been produced by various entities.

Notes & External Resources

Our thanks to The Rev. Scott Moore for his assistance and counsel and also to The Rev. Dr. Frank Senn for his input.

Further reading:

Photo copyright information: The picture of the original service bulletin of Nine Lessons with Carols is used under the Creative Commons Attribution-Share Alike 4.0 International license. The photo is the work of Andrewrabbott. It has been modified by cropping. It is found on Wikimedia Commons. For more information, click here.

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West Virginia-Western Maryland Synod
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