Silent Night; Holy Night . . .

"Whatcha Doing?", a photo by d_wooden on Flickr.

Last year about this time, I posted a blog, about this same subject of looking out into the Church Congregation and seeing children singing along with the carols. In light of how close it is to Christmas and also the terrible tragedy at Sandy Hook Elementary School in Newtown, Connecticut, it is time to talk about little children again. 

Same carol as last year, about the same spot in church. Up in the Choir Loft, I can see these little children singing along. They all know Silent Night. They put their young elbows up on the pew - just like this girl has hers - and they sing right along. They all know the words to Silent Night. 

For 20 children, it was a very silent night and they met the man they have all learned about in Sunday School. If you believe, and so many of us do, all these children met Jesus last Friday. 

Suffer the little children to come unto me. . . 

Jesus loves the little children . . . 

One family went into see their little girl in her white casket and they took many colors of Sharpie pens with them. They drew colorful objects on that casket . . . butterflies and balloons and things their little girl liked.

Another family ordered many birds fashioned as brooches for people to wear at the funeral for their child who loved birds. 

I remember only too well the tiny white casket and I still think how awful it was not just for her father and me when Carrie Jane died, but for all our friends who came to be with us at her funeral. 

There is nothing so somber, so sad, so unfair, so bad . . . as losing a child. 

I lost a boy, Robbie at three and a half weeks and a girl, Carrie Jane, at six months. Both were born micro-cephalic which means their brains stopped developing at about three months into the pregnancy.

I recall the minister saying, "We do not know if she suffered." 

"Suffer" has two meanings at least. Last week's children probably did not feel pain because it likely was very quick. But perhaps they felt fear and panic.

The other suffer we know is when Jesus said one of the first things a child learns in Sunday School:

"Suffer the little children to come unto me." That takes the meaning of "allow" or "let". 

Little children are innocent and sweet. There is no pain like the death of a child. 

I still feel that pain today; it has never gone away. I feel the pain of all those parents in that community. 

God be with all the parents, grandparents, siblings and all the people who try to comfort each other. 

Lord, thank you for letting me, a humble soprano, look out each year to see beautiful children singing along with our so special Christmas carols. And, Lord, please take care of not just my children but all the children taken so young. 

Lord, please be with all the parents - all those left behind. 

And Lord . . . I know after all those years that there is no answer to the question, "Why?"