On Creation’s Day, the beginning of time,
The Word became flesh and thence dwelt for nine
A’cloistered within the Virgin Mary,
Though Joseph and Eliz’beth were privy.
Yet, as human and divine was he then
As he was Christmas morn and always is
Ev’ry Childermas and Day of the Wren,
The latter for hunting fox and pheasant –
Stephen’s festival in the Two and Ten.
A ‘Merry Christmas’ to the Community of the Sisters of Saint Mary, East – the stained glass in your chapel being the inspiration for the verse penned.
(Presented at Christmas Eve Lauds, 2025)
Notes
(1) Refer to Romans 1:1-7 as the proof text.
(2) Creation’s Day is synonymous with the Feast of the Annunciation, March 25th, which commemorates the conception of Jesus when God and man were joined (the Incarnation) coincident with the visit of the archangel Gabriel and the Virgin Mary’s acceptance. Tradition holds that the event occurred on March 25th because, in the Second Temple era, it was believed that was the day the World was created and Jesus is the New Creation.
(3) Childermas is the alternative appellation of the Feast of the Holy Innocents, December 28th (the fourth day of Christmastide), which is a memorial to the male children two years and younger in the vicinity of Bethlehem who were executed by Herod the Great.
(4) Day of the Wren (or Wren Day) is the colloquial term in Ireland for Saint Stephen’s Day, December 26th (the second day of Christmastide), which commemorates Stephen, who was one of the original seven deacons and subsequently became the first Christian martyr. In Ireland, according to folklore, Stephen was betrayed by a wren. It is for this reason that a wren is hunted on Saint Stephen’s Day, after which its carcass is paraded – held high on a staff with holly, ivy, and ribbon – by ‘Wren Boys’ who, in turn, receive coins from neighbors. At the very end, the wren is given a funeral. Yet throughout the British Isles, Saint Stephen’s Day is celebrated most notably by the staging of fox hunts, preceded with processions of hunters and hounds through village streets, and of driven pheasant hunts.
(5) Two and Ten – It’s arithmetically synonymous with the twelve days of Christmastide.
(6) Regarding A Christmastide Epigraph as a whole, two distinct (though related) arguments are in play, one explicit and the other implicit. Yet with either, Creation’s Day and Christmas morn reference specific moments in the life of Jesus whereas the others reference liturgical celebrations.
