Christmas Songs and Carols: The Stories Behind the Music

Christmas Songs and Carols: The Stories Behind the Music
Some of these compositions are more than 1,000 years old, while others have popped up in just the last decade. SolStock/Getty
Jeff Minick
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Christmas delivers more traditions, festivities, and entertainments than all other American holidays combined.

Worshippers sing traditional carols and hymns, and light Advent candles. In their churches and homes, they set up nativity scenes, a practice created in 1223 by St. Francis of Assisi.

Jeff Minick
Jeff Minick
Author
Jeff Minick has four children and a growing platoon of grandchildren. For 20 years, he taught history, literature, and Latin to seminars of homeschooling students in Asheville, N.C. He is the author of two novels, “Amanda Bell” and “Dust on Their Wings,” and two works of nonfiction, “Learning as I Go” and “Movies Make the Man.” Today, he lives and writes in Front Royal, Va.
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