I would say season can trump. I typically program seasonal hymns for Lent, Easter, Advent, and Christmas and save the Eucharistic hymns for Ordinary Time. Even on feast days such as Pentecost, I'd say the feast themed hymn trumps doing Eucharistic hymns.

Corde natus ex parentis would probably be one of the more appropriate Christmas hymn for communion.

I have this Christmas hymn with a verse about the Eucharist.

https://forum.musicasacra.com/forum/discussion/21912/new-hymn-or-simple-motet-christmas-passion#Item_1

Corde natus ex parentis would probably be one of the more appropriate Christmas hymn for communion.

In the past we have done this. I took the Latin (a mix of the Liber Hymnarius and the PBC) and cleaned up the Gregobase version which had several unfortunate mistakes.

We also have done Puer natus, dividing verses between the days through the Epiphany octave so that it is more appropriate for the given Mass.

My qualm about the carols, for those who can use vernacular texts, is that relatively few lend themselves to communion, but maybe that’s OK. Just let the choir sing.

There's always Let All Mortal Flesh.

Consider the third verse of O Little Town of Bethlehem.

How silently, how silently,
the wondrous gift is giv'n!
So God imparts to human hearts
the blessings of His heav'n.
No ear may hear His coming,
but in this world of sin,
where meek souls will receive Him still,
the dear Christ enters in.

The Communion Antiphons sure seem to have texts closer to Christmas Carols than they do to traditional Communion hymns and songs.

I may be mistaken, but I don't think music during Communion has to BE ABOUT COMMUNION... I think that is a novel concept that emerged with the NO... you know... see me this, say me say this, do this say this... type of attitude... but let me know what you think... everything is so LITERAL, it becomes banal very quickly... I mean, I pray the rosary during the Mass, and that was always an accepted and promoted practice until the NO people started condemning it...

Francis, I agree. Generically, I try to make communion hymns have some link to the Eucharist if I can, but this is not *literally always* possible without strictly limiting ourselves to overtly eucharistic texts which may have little bearing on the liturgical day. It hardly seems inappropriate to me to use texts which are appropriate to the liturgical day and branch out a little bit.

As a [perhaps major] supporting point in this regard, consider the fact that communion antiphons typically are often not overtly "eucharistic" in nature. Christo-centric, perhaps, but eucharistic, not necessarily so. So if the propers themselves, assigned to that moment in the liturgy can be about any number of different things, I fail to see why such a stricture should then be placed on hymnody, an extra / non-essential component. Prudentially, having eucharistic hymns or motets during communion is of course wise. But necessary?

For the solemnity of Mary Mother of God, we sang "Sleep, Holy Babe Upon Thy Mother's Breast" for communion (to a slightly altered version of the Coventry Carol tune). This hymn honors Mary and Her motherhood, whilst also recalling the Passion—the ultimate reason for His birth—which will afflict Her Child in future. It was perfectly lovely and reasonable. For Epiphany, we will sing "What Child is This" during Communionm, a hymn has the advantage of imploring people to "haste to bring Him laud" and refers to our Lord as "Hail! the Word made Flesh". So again, not overtly Eucharistic, but perfectly reasonable both musically and textually during that moment. (And let us not forget the Communion antiphon is, "We have seen His star in the East, and have come with gifts to adore the Lord." This is not overtly Eucharistic, although it is perhaps "Eucharist-adjacent".)