Meanderings, 13 December 2025

Good morning!

Photo by Jonathan Trans on Unsplash (well, those men are Germans, but that’s close to Switzerland)

Perhaps yodeling could become a practice during Advent and Christmas. Which Christmas songs could be yodeled?

GENEVA (AP) — Switzerland’s long-celebrated yodeling has received a response from the U.N. cultural agency: The Alpine tradition of chant and song is indeed worthy of classification in a list of the world’s cultural heritage.

A committee of Paris-based UNESCO, meeting in New Delhi, on Thursday listed yodeling in its list of intangible cultural heritage.

Yodeling was selected among 67 traditions honored by UNESCO in the Indian capital, including Italian cooking, Ghanaian highlife music, the fermented Kyrgyz beverage Maksym and the El Joropo music and dance tradition in Venezuela.

The list is different from the UNESCO World Heritage List, which enshrines protections for physical sites that are considered important to humanity, like the Pyramids of Giza in Egypt.

“Yodeling can be performed by individuals, small groups or choirs, and sometimes with instruments like the accordion,” said UNESCO.

“It features rich harmonics and is often performed at concerts, parties and competitions, with participants typically wearing traditional regional costumes,” the assessment said.

Switzerland’s government pushed the candidacy with UNESCO, and promoters insist it’s far more than the mountain cries of yesteryear by falsetto-bellowing male herders in suspenders on green mountainsides: It’s also a popular form of singing.

The government says at least 12,000 yodelers take part through about 780 groups of the Swiss Yodeling Association.

Olga Dielin reflects on how we speak of the recently dead:

When I asked why many Protestants lamented the death of Pope Francis but scorned MacArthur’s, someone offered a blunt explanation: “Because MacArthur was a misogynist jerk.” Yet Pope Francis held an even more restrictive view on women’s ordination, a stance solidified by last week’s papal commission vote against women deacons. His Holiness was perceived as kind; MacArthur, as harsh. By contrast, John Glass, friend and missionary pastor in Switzerland, posted this tribute: “All I can do is thank the Lord for having allowed me to know John MacArthur, not only as a great and influential expositor, but also as a kind, gracious, and gentle man.

Then, within hours of Dobson’s death, social media filled with voices denouncing his views. To his followers, he was a moral compass; to his critics, a relic of patriarchy’s cruelties. Someone wrote just one