Hush the noise – and hear these angels sing!

CHRISTMAS is loud, isn’t it? So much expectation. So many voices. Telling us how to celebrate, what to wear, what to eat and drink, what to watch and what to buy.

Instead, the Methodist Church in Britain is inviting everyone to ‘Hush the Noise: Join the love song this Christmas‘. The church’s annual campaign for Advent and Christmas this year has taken inspiration from a phrase in the carol It Came Upon The Midnight Clear:

Oh hush the noise, ye men of strife, and hear the angels sing!

We’re invited to ‘hush the noise:

To listen for the love song that the angels bring, this and every year.
They sang it for the first time more than 2,000 years ago, on the midnight clear.
They’re just waiting for us to join in.
methodist.org.uk/for-churches/christmasresources

The campaign launched with a short film, titled Hey, I’ve been trying to reach you. It follows someone struggling with the busyness and noise of life at this time of year. We hear a voicemail left on their phone, explaining how pressurised Christmas can be. Slowly, as the voicemail progresses, a way to ‘hush the noise’ and focus in on what is really important at this time of year is revealed:

The Methodist Church has also released two contemporary arrangements of traditional carols: A Midnight Clear (based on It Came Upon the Midnight Clear, and Hark! (based on Hark! The Herald Angels Sing). They follow the success of the Methodist Church’s first Christmas single, Be Born, based on the carol O Little Town of Bethlehem, released in 2023. All three are now on major streaming platforms as individual tracks and as an EP, Christmas Vol. 1, which you can hear on Spotify, Apple Music and Amazon Music. Lyric videos are on the Methodist Church’s YouTube channel, and you can also watch them below, to hear these angels sing!

I LOVE that the Methodist Church has taken this initiative to record Christmas singles with a fresh new approach to traditional carols. It’s just one expression of its mission:

‘to be a growing, inclusive, evangelistic and justice-seeking Church’
methodist.org.uk

The Methodist Church in Britain has made a commitment to justice, dignity and solidarity for everyone, including LGBT+ people.  It’s just one of the reasons I joined the Methodist Church, and am now training for ordination. That’s a sentence I never thought I would write when I reflected on ‘coming out of the church‘ on this blog in 2012!

I ALSO LOVE all three of these recordings, but especially the first to be released, Be Born, from Christmas 2023.

More resources available from the Methodist Church website.