"I’m going to write this for page two,” I kept saying to my friends in Montreal, after I had attended a beautiful and powerful Christmas concert, the last Saturday before Christmas. “What’s page two?” someone asked me. “Hmmm, you don’t know? It’s a simple way for us to share with each other the beautiful and powerful experiences that happen to us. You should subscribe! Now, while I’m writing this, I’m thinking, ‘It’s a simple way to share the mirabilia Dei’, but I didn’t say mirabilia Dei to them.

So here’s the story: I spent the weekend before Christmas in Montreal. On Saturday night I was invited to a Christmas concert performed by the CL Choir at the Grand Seminaire de Montreal. It’s an annual celebration, on the last Saturday of Advent, that attracts more and more people every year. It is also an occasion to collect money for a charitable organization; this year all proceeds went to AVSI, earmarked for the Syrian refugees’ project.
The chapel of the seminary was packed, about 500 people attended. Mark, the Director, put together an interesting journey for us, a combination of readings and music that accompanied each of us as we rediscovered, discovered, or thought about the Christmas event for the first time.

Mark is a surgeon and researcher at Jewish General Hospital in Montreal; among the choristers are other doctors and nurses from the hospital. Since some choristers work at the Jewish hospital, there were also colleagues, patients, and relatives in attendance. De facto the variety of humanity present at the concert reminded me of the same variety I see every morning in the NYC subway.
At the end of the concert Luca told me, “There were probably only 100 CL people here, the other 400 people were new, invited through word of mouth. Did you know that? We were surrounded by: Muslims, communists, gays, drug addicts, single mothers, divorcees, mothers, fathers, kids, parents, grandparents and grandchildren, doctors and patients, relatives of deceased patients...” In other words, a cross section of society, from the mainstream to the periphery.

I was introduced to Lorenzo, an Italian communist who met our friends months ago. I also met Mohammed, a young Muslim medical student from Saudi Arabia who wants to become like Mark, a good doctor and musician. Mohammed brought a friend, another Mohammed from Saudi Arabia. I met Jasmine, also Muslim, who invited another friend to the concert.
I saw Natalina and her family; Natalina is Carla’s sister, a friend who recently died after struggling with cancer for years. It was so evident, just seeing how Natalina was happy to be there, that death is not the last word at all.
Cynthia, invited at the last minute by an oncologist and chorister, wrote back to the him:

“Hello Dr.Ferrario,
On behalf of my mother, Yves and myself, I just wanted to thank you for a wonderful experience last night.
We were so pleased to be able to witness such a special performance. We appreciate the invitation to share in something that is so clearly important to you, and is now important to us.”

What is so clearly important to us and to you, to me and to you? The desire to be happy, the desire to live, to live intensely the desire for beauty.
“Beauty will save the world,” wrote Dostoyevsky. That Saturday a piece of the world was saved. Because in front of beauty nobody can initially resist, no matter what your culture or psychological situation is.

At the end the whole assembly sang “Minuit Chretienne,” like shepherds who want to see Baby Jesus, invited to get a closer look at such beauty. Francesca, a chorister friend of mine later told me: “But I didn’t see you singing?” “Yes, I did, I just skipped the first stanza because I was so moved that I had a lump in my throat.”