Programming Note: If you are going to be at SUUSI, drop me a note – I’d love to sing and talk about hymns with you!

—

Please tell me I’m not the only one who thinks of this when flipping past this page of the hymnal:

But silliness aside, I never really looked at this hymn until today – in part because I am not a huge fan of modern pieces that forego time signatures when there’s nothing unusual about it, and in part because I’ve not ever really done a service on silence.

But then, that’s not really what this one is about, is it.

I started singing the song, by Jim Reilly (“a musician,” as Between the Lines says succinctly)… and the first verse is pretty good. I could have used it for my sermon last week on prayer. 

A core of silence breathes beyond all words,
or else the words have little worth;
to “Heart” or “Soul” or “Spirit” it comes forth
(the words we name them matter not).

Second verse – ah, yes, the artistic verse, and yes, pauses is where the music happens, white space is where the words speak. Good. Okay, maybe I shouldn’t have been bypassing this hymn all these years.

And half the music lies within the pause
between the arches of the heart;
the print upon the page means less than ink
unless the white and black both speak.

And so now, with some renewed interest, the third verse:

The “True Religion” gathers up its text:
“In the beginning was the Word.”
But I seek quietness behind that start
and name it nothing, much less “God.”

All the Nopes in Nopeland.

Are you kidding me? No wonder UU Christians felt like they had to hide in the back corners at coffee hour, tentatively confessing even an appreciation of the teachings of Jesus in hushed tones.

I am shocked to find scare quotes in our hymnal.

I am shocked to find disdain aimed at a word many of us use to describe the mystery.

And yet I’m kinda not – I am certain that the Hymnal Commission included this one in good faith, making more space for atheists in our hymnody. But ugh, this third verse takes a perfectly good song and ruins it for me.

Here’s what I would love to see happen:

First, everyone take black sharpies and mark out that verse.

Second, some of our poets get together and write a third verse that expresses how much bigger the Word is than the words without insulting Christians.

Third, we acknowledge that, true to our assertion that revelation is not sealed, that in the past 25 years our understanding of our theologies has changed and grown, and that while all UU atheists are humanists, not all UU humanists are atheists.

Fourth, we get some time signatures and bars up in that score. (Seriously, was that some sort of theological statement too? It makes not-very-musical people not very likely to even give it a second glance.)

Anyway. An odd and strange experience this morning.

At least I got you to watch a bit of Get Smart.