Special Report
The Bell Ringers’ Christmas Present
A Christmas message of freedom from a Pennsylvania minister and Paul Revere.
The story begins just as you would imagine.
There’s the minister. The bell ringers. And that iconic piece of Americana called The Mall.
In this case the minister is the Reverend Phil Cockrell, the minister of music and worship at Country and Town Baptist Church. The bell ringers are the handbell choir from Country and Town. And the part of The Mall is played by Capital City Mall, a piece of American malldom that sprawls over a piece of suburban acreage over the river and through the still occasional woods of the Pennsylvania state capital of Harrisburg.
You know what’s coming here, don’t you?
Reverend Cockrell and his musical flock have spent Christmas Past spellbinding shoppers with surefire controversial pieces like Silent Night and Joy to the World. For years. But as the Season approached and the chimes were warming up there was something different about Christmas Present. Explained the Reverend to the Harrisburg Patriot-News: “This year, we were asked to sign an addendum to the contract that we would only perform secular music.”
Ahhh yes. The Addendum. But of course. To borrow a phrase, here we go again.
But wait! This time the story gets better!
Reverend Cockrell, displaying a wonderful American commitment to freedom, the telltale American trait called individuality and the stubbornly American refusal to do the popular thing simply — refused.
“Our handbell choir has played traditional Christmas carols like ‘Silent Night’ and ‘Joy to the World’ at the mall for years,” he said. And his response? “We said we couldn’t abide by that.”
Word spread. The story made the local news. One could feel the blood pressure of an entire community begin to rise. The Reverend stood his ground. And then…
“It has always been our policy and remains our policy to allow community organizations to perform the music of their choice in our center,” said a mall spokeswoman who doubtless was surprised, as were her employers, to find the mall on the front page of the local paper. This was just a “simple error” in what the paper described as “interpreting the mall performance policy.”
And? “We apologize for the confusion this has caused.”
And?
At last report the mall is working with Reverend Cockrell to re-schedule the bell ringing choir’s performance. There will be Joy to the World, or at least in this particular American slice of it.
What’s to learn from this small episode of American life this Christmas season of 2009?
About the Author
Jeffrey Lord is a former Reagan White House political director and author. He writes from Pennsylvania at jlpa1@aol.com.
Letter to the Editor View all comments (40) | Leave a comment
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Pingback| 12.22.09 @ 7:17AM
Twitter Trackbacks for The American Spectator : The Bell Ringers' Christmas Present links to this page. Here’s an excerpt:
Louis Jenkins| 12.22.09 @ 9:01AM
Reverend Phil Cockrell had the bells to tell the mall officials they were out of line. That needs to happen more often. It is befitting that this incident was in Boston, the cradle of the American Revolution.
A modern day Paul Revere like figure is not needed. The country side has been informed, we know what is coming, and what is required. We will soon need to assemble on the town's green. God be with us.
Tim| 12.22.09 @ 10:11AM
Obviously the dollars of grateful atheists were not as attractive to the Mall merchants as those of benighted christian families.
Stephanie| 12.22.09 @ 3:10PM
That's because there are more Christians than atheists.
Merry CHRISTmas Tim.
Ken (Old Texican)| 12.22.09 @ 11:33AM
Mr. Lord, thank you for that.
Louis, Amen, but the editors and writers here at AmSpec have fulfilled that Ride quite admirably.
...and Merry Christmas to all of you editors and authors at Amspec.
Margie| 12.22.09 @ 12:15PM
Rev. Cockrell's is a wonderful example of how we all ought to be!
What an encouragement he is!
Praise God for him!
Merry Christmas and thank you Mr. Lord for sharing his story, the story of freedom and how it's lived.
Liberal Reader| 12.22.09 @ 1:45PM
Mr Lord,
This is a sad story. I urge everyone to fight against the secularization of Christmas in all its forms. You said it best when you pointed out that this holiday is not, like July 4th, a secular holiday. It is a Christian holiday, and there is no reason why displays of Christian faith should not take place in the public sphere.
Let's be very clear, however, what happened in the narrative you relate.
The Scrooge in this story (as in the original) is an agent of the FREE MARKET.
The MALL wants to purge itself of faith.
I wonder why?
Could it be unrestrained consumerism -- the gaping, greedy maw of capitalism -- is threatened by the message of Christianity?
I've always thought that the culture a "free market" craves is one devoid of what once was called "communitas," seasons of fellowship and good will that once popped up on the western calander every other month or so but are now confined maybe to two or three single holidays.
Consumerism has been unfriendly to the festive, beginning in the late sixteenth century in England where protestants began stripping the people of their treasured holidays in order to "free" them to work harder on the behalf of the wealthy. Long live freedom!
SoCon| 12.29.09 @ 9:53PM
Godless fascist liberals like yourself, LibReader, are at the core of shallow, materialistic selfishness in our country.
You and others like you crave power and control and will use the iron fist of oppressive government to get it.
You are the enemy.
JimE| 12.22.09 @ 5:04PM
LB,
You remain a textbook example of a shithead. It wasn't capitalism that caused the problem, it was PC lefist shitheads like yourself at the root cause.
Liberal Reader| 12.22.09 @ 7:44PM
Jim E --
The rise of the free market coincided with the neutralization of the public sphere, the secularization of public life. This story represents the secular imperative of consumerism: it has nothing to do with people like me.
Conservatives very often get this kind of issue wrong -- particularly social conservatives. The nasty, coarse nature of modern culture, the tradition-stomping "creative destruction" of markets, the apathy towards whatever is old and reverend: if these things concern you, your problem is with CAPITALISM.
Read the real conservatives of the 18th and 19th century: Johnson, Burke, Ruskin, Emerson. There's no love for bustle and businesses to be found in their books.
As for you eloquent denunciation of me as a "shithead," all I can say is, there is no such thing as a Silent Night in a strip mall. Now, you are an unimaginative and shallow ass, but I wish you had someone setting a better example for you. You don't and it's a damn shame, so you'll go on being a brazen fool.
SoCon| 12.29.09 @ 10:01PM
So funny, you're such an asshole. Liberal dirt bag hippies were the ones who screwed anything that walked, smoked and injected any substance not tied down and are now trying to take over our country through atheistic, communist force. Good values for sure.
"If it feels good, do it." The motto of scum infested, blame America first Liberals who need to have the crap beaten out of them.
You are a scourge, LibReader; a brain dead communist who doesn't deserve the greatness of our land. We will defeat you.
Liberal Reader| 12.22.09 @ 9:19PM
Erasmus points us back to the "cenobitic" life led by Jesus and his first followers: communistic and simple, the first Christians disdained property and hoarding and believed that money was unclean.
All possessions were kept in common by the Jesus and his followers: there could be no gift giving because nothing was owned so that it might be given. Those who arrived late were assured the same share as those who were along since morning, since need and not worth was considered first.
Should we go back to this? Probably. I have no idea how it'd be done.
But Christmas as a yearly economic stimulus plan, in which the harried and the harassed spend themselves into debt to impose useless plastic crap made in China on others?
Christian communism begins to sound very attractive this time of year. How is it we get it exactly right for Thanksgiving, but so easily miss the mark this time of year?
SoCon| 12.29.09 @ 10:02PM
Communism is atheistic, moron; something you conveniently ignored.
Jeffrey Lord| 12.22.09 @ 9:44PM
LR...
Matthew 20 shows Jesus standing up for capitalism. Without doubt.
Liberal Reader| 12.22.09 @ 11:48PM
Mr Lord --
I think there must be just a little tongue and cheek in your post.
That parable has baffled the ages -- like most of Jesus' parables.
I wouldn't claim my reading has any special authority.
However, as you know, there was no such thing as "capitalism" in Jesus's time. Perhaps the lesson Jesus is teaching is amenable to capitalism; perhaps not.
Going to Jesus for permission to be a capitalist is a little like going to Jesus for family values: fact is, he bid men not work and leave their families. The great Kierkegaard had it right: there is absolutely nothing easy about Jesus, nothing safe, nothing pat. He always challenges and upsets everything he gets near. At least we can agree Christians never need be bored! And happy Christmas to you.
Liberal Reader| 12.23.09 @ 12:01AM
To be fair, the issue of Christian communism has been questioned and debated since the middle ages. Augustine thought about it, and many others.
The general idea has been that while Jesus and his followers lived with virtually no property, and while they eschewed acquisitiveness and profit-seeking, there is no reason why Christians cannot engage in these practices. Even Erasmus and later More defended against the more radical notions of communism that were beginning to take hold in their day. Certainly Luther -- though he prattled on about how great the early church was -- had no interest in egalitarian society.
Still -- it's good for you worshipers of the Invisible Hand of the Free Market to be reminded every now and then that our way of conceiving a free market is not necessarily the only just way of thinking about economics, and the way the early Christians lived does present an alternative.
Margie| 12.23.09 @ 7:25PM
Liberal Reader.. My oh my.
The early Christians (for those who don't know) shared all things and had all things in common by CHOICE, and as Christians, united in Him. This is not what you are calling Communism, but living communally. Nothing to do with an oppressive GOVERNMENT with Government thugs telling them how to live. They lived as God intended them to live.
Now..when did a free people ever CHOOSE Communism willingly? Never. It's always been imposed.
LibRead embodies, typifies, and perfectly illustrates the expression "grasping at straws."
When did peopl
Obie Wan| 12.23.09 @ 12:23AM
Ha,ha, yeah bozo, it's capitalists who've been running around the last 25 years or more bitching about separation of church and state everywhere in society they can be heard not liberals. Come on huh, go try sell your bull someplace else !!!
Yosemeti Sam| 12.23.09 @ 2:47AM
" The Bell Ringers' Christmas Present".
Christmas presents for 2009?
Via the democrat party?
Consider:
http://www.bls.gov/news.release/pdf/empsit.pdf
See table A-1.
From Nov 2008 - the year BHO was catapulted
to the Presidency, thanks to the acid anti-GOP
LMSM - to Nov 2009 the stats show an employment elimination of 6,642,000 jobs.
Hmmmm.
Erstwhile, while Bush was in office in Nov 2008, the employment rate was statistically 6,642,000 jobs MORE!
According to BHOs' Rasputin mouthpiece,
America is on the mend economically.
Carville, what do you think - stupid?
Yosemeti Sam| 12.23.09 @ 10:49PM
Hmmmm.
No one fact-checked my 'jobs lost' figure
re Nov 2008 to Nov 2009 !
Off by a cool million. 'Only' really a measly
5,642,00 jobs lost over said time period.
There you go: 1 million jobs instantly 'saved'
by - me. LOL.
Invitational gotcha gambit to liberals - declined.
Didn't want to touch those numbers if they
weren't linked to Bush.
LOL.
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