While Christmas is primarily a Christian/Catholic observance, every religion observes some rites during this darkest time of the year. Hanukkah, for instance, almost always falls in the two week period preceding December 25. Nearly as old is the Solstice celebration of the Druids and those of other natural beliefs. The Eastern religions celebrate various festivals including harvest, and as we become more familiar with the traditions of the African nations and their peoples, Kwanzaa has become a part of many family commemorations. Nearly all combine a religious aspect with a family oriented feature.
Many of the earliest Carols, for instance, were not only secular; they were, in fact, dance music. The word "carol" is derived from the Italian "Carolare" - to sing, and thence "Carola" meaning a ring-dance. The Italians, however, borrowed the old French world "querole" or "carole" to describe the tunes used to accompany the early celebratory dances. In some cases, these new carols were a mixture of old tunes with new words, and sometimes, the reverse. Whatever their origin, they were not sung inside the church. In the early Middle Ages, dancing and joyous singing were not welcome in the Church service. The Church was serious business in those days, when the Pope was the most powerful person in the known world.
Adoremus Te is an old Latin hymn which clearly demonstrates this difference between a hymn and a carol. St. Augustine explained the difference very succinctly when he said, "If you praise God and do not sing, you utter no hymn. If you sing and praise not God you utter no hymn. If you praise anything which does not pertain to the praise of God, though in singing you praise, you utter no hymn." A little repetitious, but you get the idea. Carols, you see, were gay and festive and used everyday language. Hymns, on the other hand, were solemn and doctrinal and invariably written in Latin. For many centuries, carols were excluded from all church worship. Giovanni Palestrina set the medieval words of Adoremus Te to the music we know today, in the mid-1500s.
