"Christmas always stands out. Of course, it's the second highest feast in the Christian calendar, but, still more, it's the head of all feasts for any kid's calendar.
"As the product (and survivor) of the New York City Public School System, I saw this in a very particular way. I was blessed with a very good education, but also, unsurprisingly, a very secular one. Lessons mentioning religion and culture at P.S. 173 were pretty distinct from the daily grind. And so, I learned (and remembered) the Twelve Days of Christmas, which, I learned later, marks the days from Christmas itself through Epiphany, twelve days later, on January 6th.
"Granted, it's Easter, not Christmas, but the connection will soon become apparent.
"However well you remember this hymn (which, despite the beautiful parallels, probably wasn't a secret catechetical device), no doubt you will remember this line: Five. Golden. Rings.
"As catchy as the carol is, it's also very unusual. No 4th-grader I knew ever asked Santa for anything mentioned, whether for day one's partridge, or the eleven lords a leaping. And yet, if the video above is any indication, children everyone loves to belt out five golden rings! on day five.
"Now, tomorrow marks the fifth day of the Easter Octave, and our stockings remain empty. Sure, I snagged a Cadbury egg and a nice glass of wine at the Easter meal, but the goodies petered out after that. As any fellow New Yorker could say: what gives? This Easter, I'm not even close to matching the twelve things I was promised at Christmas. Nor is this anything new. By my (cursory) examination, it seems that all the apostles received at the Resurrection were Christ's old burial garments (head and body cloths), a free breakfast (Jn 21:12), and a charge to preach to the ends of the earth (until the end of the earth). And the giving went both ways: on one occasion, Our Lord even asks the disciples for a fish to eat, to prove He is not a ghost.
"If Easter is the height of the Church’s year (above even Christmas), why do Christmas carols come to us more easily than Easter hymns? Why do they seem to promise us more?"
In a recent commentary, Brother Leo Camurati, O.P., reflected on the parallels and the differences between the celebrations of the Octaves of Easter and Christmas.
To access Br. Michael Mary's complete reflection, please visit:
Dominicana: Giftedness (8 APR 15)
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