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STLT#129, Let Love Continue Long
Thank all that is holy for this hymn practice. Because of it, I was finally able to supplant the earworm my colleague Erika Hewitt gave me yesterday. (It was “One Tin Soldier.” No, I am not going to link to it, or sing it in any way. If it becomes your earworm, it wasn’t me.)… Continue reading
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STLT#128, For All That Is Our Life
I have learned that when I particularly like or dislike a contemporary hymn, I stir up some level of controversy, usually on Facebook (although some of it shows up in the comments here too). I don’t like Bring Many Names, but you would have thought I’d killed a basket of puppies when I said so.… Continue reading
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STLT#127, Can I See Another’s Woe?
This one nearly speaks for itself – it asks the question many of us ask of those who seem to take a perverse joy at the suffering of others. Over and over, in the face of laws and judgments that seek to punish the victims, the oppressed, the suffering, we ask of those people: what… Continue reading
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STLT#126, Come, Thou Fount of Every Blessing
It feels a little like cheating that this was our closing hymn yesterday, and I’ve had it as an earworm for 24 hours – and it’s been on my mind since I first chose it for this service weeks ago. And in this case, I don’t even care that only verse one is original, and… Continue reading
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STLT#125, From the Crush of Wealth and Power
This is another hymn I suspect many of us bypass because of the not-really-the-title title; it’s been honestly off-putting to me and I suspect others. But it is an intriguingly appropriate pairing with Nancy McDonald Ladd’s sermon from General Assembly last year. As Kenny Wiley reported in UU World, McDonald Ladd’s sermon lamented the “fake fights we… Continue reading
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STLT#124, Be That Guide
This is a beautiful benediction. A sustaining send-off. An alliterative affirmation. What I love about the lyrics is the acknowledgement that this work is hard, and it’s always been good. Something I’m not entirely certain I noticed until now, as many times as I have sung this. (Another favorite of my former minister’s, plus another… Continue reading
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STLT#123, Spirit of Life
There are some who consider this to be THE UU Hymn – it is perhaps the best well known of the insider songs, used throughout the denomination as an invocation, a sung response to joys and concerns, a hymn of meditation, even a song of welcome to membership (in my home congregation, if someone signed… Continue reading
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STLT#122, Sound Over All Waters
My love/hate relationship with lyricist John Greenleaf Whittier continues. As regular readers may remember, I have loved some of his lyrics; I loved the movement in No Longer Forward or Behind and the call to action hidden under Immortal Love… and I have hated others; I found the ‘people suck’ attitude of The Harp at… Continue reading
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STLT#121, We’ll Build a Land
I want to love this song. Really, I do. It’s certainly a popular one that lots of people know. And here’s the thing: This song should be amazing and inspiring and strong – and I suspect in its original form, as crafted by Carolyn McDade herself, it was. I imagine that on guitar, it has… Continue reading
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STLT#120, Turn Back
I have no cohesive train of thought this morning – the truth is, the Overwhelm strategy of the Bannon White House is dangerously close to sweeping me up in its grasp. And the idea of forming a cohesive set of reflections on this hymn seems a bridge too far for me today. I mean, I couldn’t… Continue reading
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links
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