Once in a while something special happens in America culture to bring joy to our country’s vast population of Christians, and especially those who take their Christian faith very seriously.  We are more used to being the butt jokes and ridicule, or the object of libertarian fears, and more often than not just ignored. Just stay in your closets, or churches, and quit bothering us with your absolute standards and exclusive claims on The Truth. It’s just tough for Christians to be popular in a pluralistic culture permeated by relativism.

But even though in many ways Christianity has become an outlier in American culture, the history of the Christian faith’s influence on the development of America cannot be completely ignored, nor can a vibrant sub-culture of conservative Catholic and Protestant Christians. So in some ways this something special I refer to doesn’t surprise me. Despite every effort of our secular cultural elites to ban Christianity to the wasteland, the faith remains in the DNA of America, and out it pops every once in a while.

This event happened in of all places a Macy’s in Center City, as they call it, Philadelphia. Someone had the brilliant idea of getting 650 vocalists to belt out Handel’s “Messiah” in the store. What a great way to start the Christmas season. I kind of think singing Jingle Bells or some other secular carol wouldn’t have had quite the same power as Handle.  The surprise event, involving 28 groups, was organized by the Opera Company of Philadelphia. The video is getting close to 5 million views. It’s so cool to see people looking around kind of dazed initially, like “What’s going on here?” When they realize what’s happening, there are a lot of grins. And all because a bunch of people got together to sing praises to the Lord God Almighty. Take that, you mighty secular elites!