Saint Peter's Selsey
Diocese of Chichester
D ear Friends,
We are such a blessed congregation at St Peter's, and recently it was a joy to introduce our brand new hymnbook, the Complete Anglican Hymns Old & New, an all-embracing collection balancing the best of traditional and modern. The majority of the cost has very kindly been borne by the Wheeler family in memory of their mother Olive, and the remaining books given by many other generous members of the church family.
I was deeply impressed by the instant and spontaneous response to our decision to invest in new hymnbooks. There was no cajoling, no need for fund-raising. The people of God opened their hearts, a sure confirmation that this was the right thing to do at the right time. . And how bright and cheerful are the rows of orange covers, illuminating a shadowy corner, a sign to visitor and seeker: come in and welcome! No musty, yellowed pages speaking of times gone by. Instead a symbol of a living faith that is ready to embrace the future.
Hymns are so important to a congregation and form such a vital part of worship. They are an expression of praise, adoration and thankfulness to God and for that reason everyone in a congregation needs to be able to participate. A hymn is also a powerful tool of communication from which Christians learn much of their theology. Therefore the message in them must be clear and easily understood. St Paul writes in 1 Cor. 14:15 "I will sing with the spirit and I shall sing with the mind also." If the language is so dated that people don't understand what is being sung, the message is of no use to them or to God.
The church press occasionally has complaints about the text of traditional hymns being changed. Sometimes the change is for good reason, sometimes not. The formal language of thee and thou is still understandable, and helps us to realise the person we address is not our human equal. But most archaic forms can be. a real stumbling block. Sometimes we forget that altering texts is not new. Many hymns are translations from the Latin, while others are translations from the great body of German hymnody and alterations become necessary within this. They also need to be updated to keep pace with language changes.
Hymns originally were written solely from the Psalms. Later composers, who wanted to make the hymns more accessible and easier to sing, created their own. This caused much division in the church at the time, as some claimed these hymns were inspired by the devil.
Even before the Wesleyan movement began, Isaac Watts's songs were influencing people's thinking and emotions. He used hymns as a way of portraying his theological beliefs on Calvinism. In order to reach the people, the Wesleys created a compendium of hymns that were simple and memorable, and these made an astounding impact on those who heard and sang them. Charles Wesley wrote over 5000 hymns in his lifetime, but of course, only a fraction are sung today.
Just because a hymn is old doesn't mean that it is good. It's all too easy to fall into the trap of wrapping up our faith in period costume and archaic expression and making it unapproachable to the world in general. That must be an argument for encouraging the use of new hymns in modern language, and allowing the best of them to supplant the weaker hymns of previous generations. Popular hymns answer a deep spiritual need in people that the church's liturgy sometimes fails to reach - as is often evident from the faces and comments of the congregation.
Christians frequently argue about what kinds of hymns are best for worship: are contemporary hymns irreverent or shallow? Are older hymns, well, too old? Feelings can run high. There has never been, in the history of the church, a period in which these disagreements did not occur. Our times are not unique and in many respects they are quite tame. The ironic thing about controversy over "contemporary worship" is that every old song or style was once new.
You would think that the most common reason for conflicts about church music lies in the generation gap, but results of the SSe's survey of the nation's favourite hymns from Songs of Praise show this is not the case. Viewers are mostly the older generation who might be expected to vote almost exclusively for older hymns, so it's interesting to see a high number of modern songs in the Top Twenty. Regular favourites include How great thou art, Be still for the presence of the Lord, Make me a channel of your peace, Dear Lord and Father of mankind, Guide me 0 thou great redeemer, Shine, Jesus, shine, Amazing Grace, And did those feet in ancient time, Thine be the glory and Great is thy faithfulness.
The number one, How Great Thou Art, a 20th century composition based on a Swedish poem, has regularly topped surveys after Billy Graham named it as his favourite in his crusades of the 1950s. Not that I think that's the reason for its enduring popularity. Surely it's because its qualities of humility and the grandeur of God touch the very heart and soul of the millions across the world who love this inspired hymn, and whose released spirits sing out in adoration, giving God all praise, glory and honour for who he is - the Creator of this universe.
In the end, most of it boils down to an expression of personal taste. But worship is not about personal preferences. It is about the God who has acted in history on our behalf - and who is active still. The arguments over worship preferences in so many of our churches are only symptoms of the greater issue: self-centredness. They indicate how easily we miss the point about worship. Whether we're pushing for changes or resisting everyone of them, the problem is often the same. Music is never an end in itself and should function only as a channel to God, and God looks at the heart and not at the talent or sound of our music.
We are what we sing and the need for the church to renew material for its celebrations is a healthy one, because it is a sign of the church's vitality. The Lord never forces us to grow, we can remain trapped in the trenches, as many clearly do. But I thank God for our faithful benefactors and rejoice that here, at least, is a desire to preserve our musical heritage and "sing to God a new song".
Fr John
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