Call for peace will be carol service's key message

A call for peace will be the central message of a famous carol service to be screened on TV later.

Carols from King's, recorded at King's College Chapel, Cambridge, has been an institution since it was first televised in 1954, and was watched by nearly two million viewers in the UK last year.

Rather than the traditional blessing, this year's service will end with the words of Howard Thurman, a 20th-Century American civil rights leader and mentor of Martin Luther King Jr.

The Reverend Dr Stephen Cherry, the Dean of King's, said it would "send us out to do God's work in the world".

For Dr Cherry, in his final year at King's, the service, recorded earlier this month for broadcast on Christmas Eve, will be particularly special.

"We have gone for – and people will feel this – a peace emphasis," he said.

"I am hugely conscious of the suffering of people in conflict zones in Europe, in Ukraine, in the Middle East, and in Africa as well.

"The more you spend your time listening to people in places of conflict, the more you feel that's connected to the fundamental spirit of Christianity; that spirit of God with us, but also God with them, as well."

While the annual live BBC radio broadcast from King's follows the traditional structure ofNine Lessons and Carols, for Dr Cherry the televised service is an opportunity to intersperse scripture with poetry and even politics.

As the service draws to a close, a student will read from Thurman's The Work of Christmas.

"He [Thurman] really believed that Christianity wasn't something only to celebrate, but something to be lived out," said Dr Cherry.

"He's got this lovely little poem prayer. It is a kind of dismissal, sending us out to do God's work in the world and to be active for peace and justice."

In an increasingly secular world, Dr Cherry is also keen to emphasise that Carols from King's is a service, not a concert.

"I think it really matters that those of us responsible for the shape of it, particularly the clergy here, are bringing to it a deep sense of mature, slightly mystical and profound Christianity," he said.

"But then, as far as everyone else is concerned, it's really up to them to take it on whatever level they like.

"I'm really aware that you can't prescribe anything as a necessary condition for getting something deep out of a Christmas service."

Carols from King's airs on BBC Two at 17:45 GMT on Christmas Eve, and again on Christmas Day at 08:45.

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