A few words of advice

You will know fear; you will know pain and then you will die.

These words should have been written in blood on the church door hosting the carol service I was at today. Indeed, adding "Abandon all hope all ye who enter here" would be to err on the side of caution.

First, let me state my position - I am not a Christian. I just have a thing for carols and singing. This means that I actually listen to the music. Today... this was not a good thing. And for the record, I have sung in amateur choirs with pretentions of standards.

First; the music. It is not an exacting standard to expect all the players to keep their instrument in tune; not close to it, near it or in spitting distance. On it.

And, for that matter, asthmatics should not be allowed to play a flute.

Second, the singers. Imagine, if you will, the spectrum of female singers who can be termed alto or soprano. There exists a point on this line, above the altos - and from this point every singer is alto. Yes, perhaps they can sing some soprano lines. Indeed, they might even sound nice on occasion.

But this is the same as a scalpel and a sword. Yes, you can behead someone with both - but this does not mean they are interchangeable.

Don't let a high alto pretend to be anything but what she is.

Ever.

Then, there is the choice of music to play...

Carols are beloved of many for a reason - classic tunes, lyrics learnt in the depths of childhood in a time when snow was special and hope lived.

This is why you should restrain any musical director who dreams of re-writing descants for them. Or tweaking the final verses so as to confuse everyone but the choir, who are ignoring everyone else anyway.

And while we're talking, know your limits. This applies to musical directors, alcohol and cake. Don't even dream of doing anything more than "the usual" with 5 rehearsals. With something odd or different, allow 10. If including an orchestra, changes to almost every part and new songs...christmas really does begin in June.

The Right Reverend Irrelevance. Yes, this might be the fullest you've seen your church since...last Christmas. This does not mean you're allowed to sell your Alpha course. Nor should you spend the first 10 minutes running through fire exits, the contents of the program (that we have in our hands), where the money raised in the offering is going, how persecuted christians in general are and how the world is a terrible place.

Talking of terrible places. If you pick out 8 readings, there is no requirement to play Holy Book Roulette. You don't need genesis, revelations, all the gospels and two random books. You can have real structure and meaning. You can have a theme - even, dare, I say, a message. Of the readings I think 3 had a relationship with christmas. If by message you mean mentions something which you later may rely on in court. Sorry, church.

But random quotes?? And, more to the point, if at any point your reading from *any* biblical book just sounds like an eidolon from Maelstrom - then you've really, really picked the wrong quote.

And finally, the choir. Oh the choir. There is much I could say. If your altos over-ride not the rest of the choir but the entire church singing, they need to be told to calm down and listen to themselves.

If your choir can't even stand up at the same time, there's no way they'll start singing at the same time, except at gunpoint.

But I'm going to restrain myself by saying that I believe the entire choir would have been improved by a single, simple addition.

A hand grenade.

/rant