It’s a morning not unlike many others. The kitchen is blowing off steam from the rush of the breakfast routine, and I’m twisting the blinds open to let the sun stream across the carpet where I’m playing cars with my two-year-old son. A vinyl recording of the original 1951 live NBC broadcast of Gian Carlo Menotti’s nativity opera, Amahl and the Night Visitors, plays on the record player in the background while I loosely follow along in the libretto booklet next to me. I happened upon the record at a thrift store in the hills and hollers of eastern Kentucky about a year ago but hadn’t yet listened to it.

It called to me today, and its beautifully imagined world hasn’t left me since. What is so special about this forty-five-minute opera?

Both opera and Jesus have a long history of political subversion, and Amahl, intentionally or not, plays right into that narrative. With World War II still visible in America’s rearview mirror, a new war in Korea, and nuclear testing moving from islands in the Pacific to the deserts of Nevada, tensions were high in 1951. At any moment, the world could end. NBC decided they needed something extra special for a Christmas Eve broadcast, something they had never done before: an opera performed live on national television, and Gian Carlo Menotti was their unusual pick.

Although he’d recently received a Pulitzer Prize, in 1950, for his tragic opera The Consul, Menotti was not necessarily a household name. An Italian immigrant who had moved to Philadelphia to study composition at the Curtis Institute of Music when he was seventeen years old, Menotti had the keen ability to embed modern concerns into traditionally Italian styles of opera, preferring not to obstruct the heart of his message with the avant-garde compositional styles of the early twentieth century.

His relatable music and poetic sensibilities paid off in the sweet fable of Amahl, which was partly inspired by his childhood experiences of the Three Kings, from whom Italian children at that time received their gifts (not from Santa Claus). For the two decades following its premiere, it was the most performed opera in America, broadcasting annually on national television. A 2007 review by the New York Times titled “A Young Shepherd’s Ageless Trek” estimated that between churches, local music organizations, schools, and theater companies, the “modern equivalent of a medieval mystery play” has been performed over 2,500 times.

While it’s no longer broadcast on national television, Amahl still gets regular play during Christmastide because of its unique take on the Three Kings’ journey to bring their magnificent gifts to Jesus and its centering of marginalized voices.

Along their route, the Three Kings seek shelter at the house of a poor widow and her physically disabled son, Amahl. The boy and his mother (never named, simply called “Mother”) have not heard about Jesus and do not understand why a child would merit such fine gifts, gifts that could provide for them in unprecedented ways. Right before bed, Amahl asks one of the kings if he has any magic stones that can “cure a cripple.” The kings say no, and Amahl goes to sleep.

Because he needs the assistance of a crutch to walk, Amahl’s prospects are not bright.

While everyone beds down for the night, the mother lingers by the fantastic gifts of gold, then guts the audience with a powerful aria, “All That Gold,” naming the disparities between the privileged and underprivileged, asking, “I wonder if rich people know what to do with their gold?” The aria is brief, just enough to show us the world Mother inhabits – the fears she has, the worry that she will not be able to keep her child warm and properly fed.

In my quiet, twenty-first-century living room in rural Ohio, I am transfixed by this mother’s litany of questions, by the pain of a woman whose longings are met with only more longings – her fire will always need more coal. No wonder she feels indignant, like her needs are mocked by the exorbitant gifts on their way to some kid in Bethlehem. It’s not fair.

A mother’s cry for justice never loses its relevance.

I love this aria, having encountered it both in the opera and as a vocal performance major. I sing it regularly during personal practice sessions, even dream of performing the role one day, but it’s not the part of the opera that makes my hair stand on end. That part comes next. In nearly a whisper, “Oh what I could do for my child with that gold,” Amahl’s mother decides to steal some. “They’ll never miss it,” she sings (and we the audience can’t help but agree), but she’s caught when the page wakes up and cries, “Thief, Thief!” after seeing her take some treasure. The house erupts into chaos. Amahl pleads with the Three Kings to leave his mother alone, then collapses into her lap sobbing.

Moved by compassion, King Melchior enters the chaos and announces that the mother may keep the gold because the Christ Child doesn’t need it. He then sings an arioso, a minisong detailing the kind of kingdom the holy child will usher in:

On love, on love alone
He will build his kingdom.
His pierced hand will hold no scepter.
His haloed head will wear no crown.
His might will not be built on your toil.
Swifter than lightning he will soon walk among us.
He will bring us new life and receive our death,
and the keys to his city belong to the poor.

The antidote to self-seeking power has arrived.

In response to this moving prophecy, the mother stumbles to her knees crying out, “Oh, for such a king I have waited all my life!” The gold she took spills from her apron, and she tells the kings to take it back.

Amahl is also caught up in wonder and love for this baby king. “Mother, let me send him my crutch. Who knows, he may need one, and this I made myself,” he says, raising the crutch towards the kings.

“No, you can’t!” Mother shouts, attempting to stop him.

As soon as the crutch leaves his hands, he takes a step. “I can walk,” Amahl stammers.

The household is stunned and takes turn singing, “He walks.”

In an act of selflessness and devotion, Amahl’s disability is healed. He receives a miracle; his faith has made him well. Understanding this miracle to be the work of Jesus, he begs to accompany the Three Kings so that he can thank the Christ Child himself – “Look, Mother, I can fight, I can work, I can play! Oh Mother, let me go with the kings!”

It is decided that Amahl can go, and after saying goodbye to his mother, he joins the Three Kings’ procession, playing his pipe as “the soft colors of dawn are brightening the sky.” The curtain falls as Amahl turns one last time to wave goodbye to his mother standing alone in the doorway of their cottage, relinquishing her son to his calling.

Amahl’s pipe playing winds off into the distance as the record in my living room comes to a stop.

Cue the waterworks. I am fully tuned in to all that I long for and hope will find its fulfillment in my own little world and the world at large. I am reminded in such a simple way that Jesus’ arrival was and is good news for everyone under the thumb of unjust empires. I pray for the Middle East to experience a miracle.

As noted above, opera and Jesus have a long history of political subversion. Just as civilians in Gaza and refugees worldwide could use a reminder that their lives are precious, I am reminded of another group who cried out for consolation and justice in the wake of citywide destruction: first-century Jews.

In Luke’s narrative of Jesus’ birth, the poor and powerless are given a front-row seat to the revealing of the long-awaited Messiah. One such person is a man named Simeon.

Luke does not introduce Simeon as a priest or government associate or businessman or craftsman. He is simply “a man.” But this man is “devout and righteous,” and the Holy Spirit has “rested” on him and reveals things to him.

Simeon is on his way to the temple, guided by the Holy Spirit and cognizant of a personal promise that he will not see death before he sees the Messiah. He arrives and he waits. For how long? Luke does not say, but at some point, Simeon sees Mary and Joseph arriving with Jesus and rushes over to them, taking Jesus into his arms.

When the Son of God meets Simeon’s hands, his mouth erupts into speech about a light for revelation and for glory (Luke 2:29–34). Ecstatic praise pours forth in response to the sight of God’s fulfilled promise, much like the shepherds praised God when they saw Jesus in the manger — those angels pointing out the star over Bethlehem were right.

Simeon’s praise contains strong, mythical language about Jesus being a “light for revelation to the Gentiles” and that he is “destined for the falling and the rising of many in Israel.” What a curious and chilling prophecy for a child. Were Mary and Joseph shocked that someone else knew who Jesus was, and did it scare them? It is one thing to privately believe something, another thing entirely to have someone you do not know name those beliefs because he espouses them too.

How bold and trusting of Mary to let this stranger in the temple seize her child. Had they experienced Simeon’s presence in the temple before? Or maybe the Holy Spirit had already told her earlier, the smell of daily bread baking on the fire while she dressed Jesus and soothed his cries with a song.

Simeon beholds a stunned Mary and Joseph and blesses them too, but something in Mary’s gaze won’t let him go. For a moment, he sees the wound in her heart, and Simeon names the “sword that will pierce her own soul too.”

Relinquishing her son to his calling will be unbearably costly. A love this large will require great sacrifice.

Luke writes this narrative to further affirm the prophesied identity of Jesus – if Jesus is real, hope is not lost, and the last will indeed be first. The Roman Empire will not have the final say. I wonder if Luke is so attentive to demonstrate how Jesus fulfilled promises and prophecies because his audience might still be reeling from the destruction of Jerusalem? Perhaps some were doubting that Jesus was who he said he was. Hope would be a tough candle to keep lit. But Luke can capture the imagination of his hearers and rekindle their hope through his storytelling.

Stories like Menotti’s can indeed be deep incantations forming the hope of the world with their songs. Worlds are built through the careful arrangement of sounds and images. Theologian W. David O. Taylor writes in his book Glimpses of the New Creation: Worship and the Formative Power of the Arts that poets “remind us that words are agents of energy and grace … they help us to feel the truth.”

Opera elevates and expands these ideas further because the poetics become visual and active. They become a collaborative experience between performer and audience. In our modern world bloated with unprecedented entertainment options, opera makes for a sumptuous feast of aesthetics. The words and music together with the silken tones of a practiced voice make a poetry of experience one can feel again and again.

This is part of the enchantment of good stories. From the moment of Jesus’ first arrival long ago to the ways he is re-encountered now through poems, stories, plays, and songs, his presence is a corrective to whatever spiritual and even physical malaise is plaguing a culture.

Although Amahl and the Night Visitors might appear a bit saccharine on the surface, when considering the context within which the story was composed, it offers a subtle corrective to the gross consumerism of postwar America. Three things stand out to me.

First, Santa Claus mania was all over America. It was bold for major network television to circumvent the blockbuster success of prior Christmas exploits centered around Santa and instead feature a poor single mother and a miracle for her disabled son. American imaginations were stirred to care for the poor and needy among them rather than be carried away on the gluttonous whims of clever marketing.

Second, the opera was created by an Italian immigrant from a marginalized community that experienced particular scrutiny in postwar America for its presumed Fascist associations. The commissioning was a public act of peacemaking. Giving “the enemy” a seat of cultural and even spiritual influence (the live broadcast aired on Christmas Eve) was a risky, albeit important, move. Although the story itself is not specifically about Italians, it draws inspiration from Menotti’s childhood growing up in Italy.

In an interview conducted in 2000 by the BBC for their Music Masters series, Menotti shared a story from his Catholic upbringing that informed the crux of the opera. As a toddler, Menotti was lame in one of his legs. He was taken to a “miraculous Madonna” to receive a blessing, and after prayers were offered, his leg was healed. He could walk just like his ten siblings. This experience haunted him through his lifelong struggle with faith and doubt.

Third, the opera emphasizes the humble origins of Jesus. He did not come to earth to wear a crown and rule with a scepter. He came offering solidarity and freedom to all who are poor and experience injustice. He came as comfort to those who languish within their ongoing desperation. Menotti captures some of this mystery about Jesus – one so powerful he can save, but one so humble that he is accessible to all.

For a country that at the close of World War II had soundly established itself as a world superpower not to be trifled with, this was (and is) an important lesson. We are encouraged to make room in our imaginations for a savior who is “gentle and lowly of heart”; born in a barn, not an opulent palace; breaker of bread, not empires; intent on giving life to “the least of these,” not taking it from them. As we meditate on a love that is hospitable to all, we center our minds and hands on the task of pursuing justice for all.

I look at my son, imagining the world he might inhabit, the things he might be asked by God to do, the crutches he might relinquish in service to peacemaking. I hope that I can bless his generosity, bless the risks he might take – “So, my darling, goodbye! I shall miss you very much” – just as Amahl and Mother sing together at their parting.

My son tackles me and I kiss his chubby cheeks, not yet rid of baby fat. Time to make our lunch.

As the songs from Amahl and the Night Visitors follow me back into the kitchen, I am ignited with my own litany of longings: For a king whose miracles aren’t only for those who can afford them. For a king who will shut down hospitals because our healed bodies don’t need them. A king who will stabilize energy grids, food supply, and erratic weather systems. A king whose beauty and bounty dismantle the appeal of terrorist organizations and boundary demarcating. A king under whose rule no innocent would perish. A king whose everlasting peace marks the end of evil.

For such a king, I too have waited all my life.