As a member of a community choir, I can’t be alone in finding O Little Town of Bethlehem very difficult to sing this year (Letters, 13 December). The line “How still we see thee lie”, in the midst of horrific news from the West Bank and Gaza, brings me to tears. As we sing on Tuesday 19 December in Truro Cathedral for the ShelterBox carol service, I will have to hope that the beauty of the sound of hundreds of voices will help to counteract the despair we all feel at seeing so many lying so still.
Sally Smith
Redruth, Cornwall
• I nodded in agreement with Paul McGilchrist’s letter that the carol O Little Town of Bethlehem has a lovely first verse. Alas, for the second line, “How still we see thee lie”: I heard a BBC radio report that Christmas has been cancelled in the town, with no public celebrations. I wonder how many school or church nativity plays have gone ahead despite the conditions in the place where “The hopes and fears of all the years are met…”
Rev John Midgley
Skipton, North Yorkshire
