By Laura Wallace

Like many UUs, I came from a religious background that one day no longer made sense for me. Disillusionment sent me searching, and finally to hovering nervously on a back pew nearly 40 years ago, scared but relieved to have blundered into a community that wouldn’t tell me what to believe. Bruised, agnostic, and processing religious sexism and trauma, I dragged my baggage in the door with scraps of hope still stuck to it like the decals on old steamer trunks.

But I couldn’t bring along the terminology. I seldom use the G-word (patriarchy vibrates in my mind whenever I hear it, despite the best-intended disclaimers). Other words that comfort many people often make me squirm: divine, holy, sacred and such. I finally accepted that mine had evolved from a trusting, innocent childhood faith into a jumpy, ambivalent but honest version in which some religious vocabulary still hits me like arrows. I decided, too, that this is okay. Sometimes flinching or dodging, I evade the archers most of the time.

Except in December. Somehow, the simplicity and trust of my earliest faith come back to me every December. Maybe it’s the dark, or the implicit deep stillness of cold or snow. And then — a star. One candle lit. Timeless choral music that rises with beauty and reverence from millions of throats, singing to millions of hopeful souls.

Each December, a shaky video I ran across years back and have treasured since brings me grateful tears. I’m grateful for the memory of a child’s uncomplicated awe. Maybe this year, a singer’s joy might comfort you, too.

With love.