Anglo-Lutheran worship

For the first time since they processed away from their building, today I attended Holy Trinity (ACNA) in San Diego, which now worships at the LCMS parish next door to their longtime sanctuary.

As it happens, it was also the observance of feast of Pentecost, so I was able to witness their high feast worship style. It was nothing but “bells and smells” (as my choir buddies used to call it) with full incense at the most Anglo-Catholic of the Schism II parishes in San Diego. I estimate about 75 people were in the sanctuary for the 8 a.m. service.

The choice of the opening and closing hymns were about as Anglican as you can get — both with Vaughan Williams tunes from The English Hymnal: “Hail thee festival day!” (Pentecost edition) and “Come down, O love divine.”

However, the “Hail thee” was rendered in an unusual format by the Lutheran hymnals that Holy Trinity is using while temporarily meeting at Bethany Lutheran in OB. One unusual quirk is that the Lutherans decided that RVW only gets one hymn for three feast days — Easter, Ascension and Pentecost — with 3 variants specified for the chorus, verse 1 and verse 2. Without having the hymnal in front of me, it was impossible to say what damage this did to the CoE conception of the hymn.

The other change was more obvious. Instead of the PECUSA (1940, 1982):

Hail thee, festival day! blest day that are hallowed for ever;
Day whereon God from heav’n shone in† the world with his grace.

the Lutheran Book of Worship (and also the other Bethany parish hymnal, the Lutheran Service Book) render the refrain as

Hail thee, festival day! blest day to be hallowed forever;
Day when the Holy Ghost shone in the world with his grace.

(† The English Hymnal (#630) says “shown on the world” but the refrain is otherwise the same.)

The translation of the Fortunatus was attributed to the LBW, a ELCA hymnal that was rejected by the LCMS due to doctrinal errors. But the LSB translation is no better.

As far as I could tell, the other RVW hymn was divine (with words similar to those of H40 #376).

In the middle, Holy Trinity sang as its second communion hymn “O Lord, we praise you” which was unfamiliar to these Anglican ears but with a pedigree about as Lutheran as they get: verse 1 from 15th century Germany, verses 2-3 from 16th century Martin Luther hymself, and a 1524 tune from a German hymnbook.

So in the end, this was an English-American-Lutheran blended worship service — a bit unfamiliar but better than a rock band playing 19th century hymns.

PECUSA hymnals: first 130 years

In reading about the American prayer book, I found interesting snippets of history regarding the PECUSA hymnals of the 19th and early 20th century. The source was William Sydnor, The Real Prayer Book: 1954 to the Present (1978).

The end of Chapter VII (on the 1892 BCP) and beginning of Chapter VIII (on the 1928) summarize American hymnals up to that date. (No mention is made of Hymnal 1940.) According to the book, the American church distributed hymns as follows:

• 1786: 51 hymns, 8 pages of tunes, appended to end of proposed prayer book
• 1789: 27 hymns (no tunes) as an appendix
• 1826: 212 hymns (no tunes) appended to the prayer book
• 1828: tune book published by Rev. Jonathan Mayhew Wainwright
• 1871: 502 hymns in first stand-alone hymnal
• 1896: 679 hymns
• 1916: 559 hymns, adding 126 and dropping 200. Sydnor favorable quotes a contemporaneous account that praises Hymnal 1916 as “a visible demonstration of the liberality of the [General] Convention to new devotional demands.”

Of course, regular readers know that PECUSA has since published two main hymnals, Hymnal 1940 and Hymnal 1982.

It turns out that this history came from the preface to the Hymnal 1940 Companion, a must have book for any Anglican musician. (By now I would also own the companion to Hymnal 1982, except that it’s multiple books totaling hundreds of dollars, which I am acquiring as I can find them available used.)

Although it’s the only book I’ve found about the history of the American prayer book, I can’t say I care for the book overall. It was written as an apologia for the 1979 prayer book and in the sort of temporo-centrist conceit common to that century, claims that the vast transformation of industrial society justifies new approaches to worship and theology. As with Oremus, it also justifies modernist revisionism with the claim “things were always changing anyway.”

Actually the Brits managed just fine with one prayer book for 300 years. The late Peter Toon argued that if you changed the thees and thous, it would make a fine prayer book for 21st century Americans.

Good Good Friday hymn

Tonight I ended Lent the same way it began — by worshiping at the local LCMS parish that I once attended. (Due to a schedule mixup, we missed the service at our Anglican parish.)

It reminded me of my days in their choir, particularly the good days when we got to sing Bach and other traditional four part harmonies. Out of The Lutheran Hymnal, we sang “Jesus, I will ponder now” — something I’ve never heard in a ECUSA/Anglican service but was very familiar from my LCMS period.

My former section partner drafted me to the choir to help him with another local favorite — “God so loved the world” by John Stainer.

However, the musical highlight of the Tenebrae service was the hymn I consider the quintessential Good Friday hymn: “O sacred head now wounded.” It was sung in between passion lessons as the candles were extinguished.

The original 12th century Latin text (Salve caput cruentatum) is attributed to St. Bernard of Clairvaux, but the hymn owes its origins to the German Lutheran reformers: a German adaptation by Paul Gerhardt, the melody (Passion Chorale) by Hans Leo Hassler (1601).

Despite its Lutheran bonafides, it’s also a familiar tune among Anglicans. Oremus lists the hymn as being in all the major Anglican hymnals: Hymns Ancient and Modern, The English Hymnal, Songs of Praise and New English Hymnal in England, Hymnal 1916, Hymnal 1940 and Hymnal 1982 in the US, as well as hymnals from Ireland, Canada and Australia.

The Lutheran Hymnal (1941) uses their own harmonization while ironically the Anglicans seem to use the Bach harmonization (with many more passing notes). The Lutheran Service Book (2006) lists both harmonization.

The other major difference is in the German to English translation. Hymnal 1940 (#75) and Hymnal 1982 (#168) use an English translation by Robert Seymour Bridges that begins:

O sacred head, sore wounded
Defined and put to scorn.
O kingly head, surrounded,
with mocking crown of thorn.

while the American Lutherans use an unattributed translation from the TLH that’s slightly different:

O sacred Head, now wounded,
With grief and shame weighed down.
How scornfully surrounded
With thorns, Thine only crown.

I’ve sung both so at this point both seem OK. A more serious difference is that the Lutherans keep all 10 verses, while the ECUSA hymnals only keep 4 and 5 respectively (a rare example of where H82 is an improvement). Alas, the LSB drops down to 4 verses for Bach and 7 verses for the TLH harmonization.

Still, it’s hard to imagine a hymn more appropriate for Good Friday. It would be a “must sing” hymn for Good Friday if I were a Continuing Anglican music director, just as it is at this LCMS parish. The only other hymn that comes to mind is the Negro spiritual “Were you there when they crucified my Lord?” (H40: #80) which we used as an anthem one year at this LCMS parish.

Update Saturday 3:30 p.m.: Catching up on Issues Etc., I found that on Friday it broadcast an interview with Pastor Will Weedon on this very hymn. Quoting Dr. C. Matthew Philips of Concordia U Nebraska, Pastor Weedon attributes the Latin text to Arnulf of Louvain, a 13th century poet and abbot.

A quick search on Google Scholar reveals a 2005 article that says:

Gerhardt could still use medieval models for his hymnody, including Arnulf of Louvain, whose 'Salve caput cruentatum' lies behind the well-known 'O Haupt voll Blut und Wunden' ('O sacred head surrounded').

Bono's Amazing Grace

A 2005 book — Bono: In Conversation with Michka Assayas — includes long interviews with the U2 frontman. The Anglican blog “Baby Blue Online” (quoting the blog “The Poached Egg”) excerpts passages about his Christian faith, including his personal relationship with Christ, his occasional suspicion of organized religion, giving his famous shades to Pope John Paul II, and how he sees “the Old Testament as more of an action movie.”

Any doubts about Bono being a Christian — rather than yet another New Age rock star — is dispelled by his impassioned explication of my favorite Scripture passage (John 14:6):

Look, the secular response to the Christ story always goes like this: he was a great prophet, obviously a very interesting guy, had a lot to say along the lines of other great prophets, be they Elijah, Muhammad, Buddha, or Confucius. But actually Christ doesn't allow you that. He doesn't let you off that hook. Christ says: No. I'm not saying I'm a teacher, don't call me teacher. I'm not saying I'm a prophet. I'm saying: "I'm the Messiah." I'm saying: "I am God incarnate." And people say: No, no, please, just be a prophet. A prophet, we can take. You're a bit eccentric. We've had John the Baptist eating locusts and wild honey, we can handle that. But don't mention the "M" word!

I don’t know if Bono has read C.S. Lewis, but he ends up at the exact same conclusion as Mere Christianity: “either Christ was who He said He was – the Messiah — or a complete nutcase.”

More directly relevant to this blog, another answer by Bono reminded me of the old devotional “Amazing Grace”:

I really believe we've moved out of the realm of Karma into one of Grace. … at the center of all religions is the idea of Karma. You know, what you put out comes back to you: an eye for an eye, a tooth for a tooth, or in physics; in physical laws every action is met by an equal or an opposite one. It's clear to me that Karma is at the very heart of the universe. I'm absolutely sure of it.

And yet, along comes this idea called Grace to upend all that "as you reap, so you will sow" stuff. Grace defies reason and logic. Love interrupts, if you like, the consequences of your actions, which in my case is very good news indeed, because I've done a lot of stupid stuff.

However, the hymn by John Newton takes the implication of grace one step further. The second and third verses (H82: #671) also emphasize the transformational nature of our salvation through faith:

’Twas grace that taught my heart to fear,
And grace my fears relieved;
How precious did that grace appear
The hour I first believed!

Through many dangers, toils and snares,
I have already come;
’Tis grace hath brought me safe thus far,
And grace will lead me home.

Given all Bono has genuinely done to comfort the afflicted, perhaps we can take his actions (rather than his words) as a testimony to the transformational power of God’s saving grace.

Wonderful hymnology resource

I’ve previously quoted from John Julian’s 1892 Dictionary of Hymnology, because it is available in PDF form on Google Books.

However, now the formatted, searchable text is available on Hymnary.org. For example, here is a listing of hymn compilations from the entry for the late great John Mason Neale:

(1) Hymns for Children. Intended chiefly for Village Schools. London, Masters, 1842. (2) Hymns for the Sick. London, Masters, 1843, improved ed. 1849.
(3) Hymns for the Young. A Second Series of Hymns for Children. London, Masters, 1844.
(4) Songs and Ballads for Manufacturers. London, Masters, 1844.
(5) Hymns for Children. A Third Series. London, Masters, 1846.
(6) Mediaeval Hymns and Sequences. London, Masters. 1851; 2nd ed. 1861; 3rd. ed. 1863.
(7) Hymnal Noted. London, Masters & Novello, 1852: enlarged 1854. Several of the translations were by other hands. Musical editions edited by the Rev. T. Helmore. It is from this work that a large number of Dr. Neale's translations from the Latin are taken.
(8) Carols for Christmas and Eastertide. 1853.
(9) Songs and Ballads for the People. 1855.
(10) The Rhythm of Bernard de Morlaix, Monk of Cluny, on the Celestial Country. London, Hayes, 1st ed. 1858: 3rd ed., with revision of text, 1861. It contains both the Latin and the English translation.
(11) Hymns of The Eastern Church, Translated with Notes and an Introduction. London, Hayes, 1862: 2nd ed. 1862: 3rd ed. 1866 : 4th ed., with Music and additional notes, edited by The Very Rev. S. G. Hatherly, Mus. B., Archpriest of the Patriarchal (Ecumenical Throne. London, Hayes, 1882. Several of these translations and notes appeared in The Ecclesiastic and Theologian, in 1853.
(12) Hymns, Chiefly Mediaeval, on the Joys and Glories of Paradise. London, Hayes, 1865. This work contains notes on the hymns, and the Latin texts of the older amongst them.
(13) Original Sequences, Hymns, and other Ecclesiastical Verses. London, Hayes, 1866. This collection of Original verse was published posthumously by Dr. Littledale.

The online, indexed, searchable version of the Dictionary of Hymnology is a great resource for those tracking the origins and authorship of the great hymns of the past centuries. The coverage obviously stops at the end of the 19th century — but except for Ralph Vaughan Williams or perhaps Healey Willan, that’s no great loss.