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I suspect this piece doesn’t get used much in our congregations.

The reason is probably that it’s in Spanish and is unfamiliar. And that’s too bad. I’d rather the reason be that we don’t often preach on Oscar Romero and liberation theology, or that we don’t often use any part of a Catholic mass in Unitarian Universalist services.

Because that’s what this is – a Sanctus from a Catholic mass. In this case, it’s the Misa Salvadoreña by Guillermo Cuéllar, which blends the folk music of Central America with the traditional words and a heavy dose of liberation – not surprising, as it was commissioned by Archbishop Oscar Romero, who was assassinated while conducting mass, for his anti-poverty and human rights work that criticized an oppressive government. (Quick memory: I attended a service at Union honoring Romero, where Dr. Daisy Machado purposely stood with her back to the door as she preached and officiated communion, evoking Romero’s final moments.)

In the 1990s, Cuéllar described the political context in a letter to the Rev. Gary Campbell, a Presbyterian minister:

“I know what peace is; I can enjoy it now with all my being after a long drawn-out war that I suffered in my own flesh, in my time and my country. . . . I saw babies thrown into the air and caught on military bayonets. I had to bear the howling of women machine-gunned en masse; the roaring of rockets launched by human beings at other human beings. And I stood and watched while entire towns were swept away by showers of bombs; starving old men blown to pieces by the explosions.

“ . . . For thirteen long years I lived with my bitterness and consternation. It seems a miracle to me that I am alive now, sharing my sufferings with you. But now the warm sun of peace comforts me again, and I know that I could not be different for anything in the world. I rediscovered peace, not only because the arms fell silent, but because in my heart I renounced hatred and vengeance. That peace that springs up inside of each of us is the peace that our Lord Jesus promised to all people of good will.”

Wow.

Here are the lyrics:

Santo, Santo, Santo, Santo,
Santo, Santo es nuestro Dios.
Señor de toda la tierra, Santo,
Santo es nuestro Dios.

Santo, Santo, Santo, Santo,
Santo, Santo es nuestro Dios.
Señor de toda la historia,
Santo, Santo es nuestro Dios.

Que acompa ña a nuestro pueblo,
que vive en nuestras luchas,
el universo entero, el único Señor.

Benditos los que en su nombre
el Evangelio anuncian,
ta Buena y gran noticia de la liberación.

And the lyrics in English:

Holy, Holy, Holy, Holy,
Holy, Holy is our God.
Ruler of the earth and heavens.
Holy, Holy is our God.

Holy, Holy, Holy, Holy,
Holy, Holy is our God.
In our present, past and future,
Holy, Holy is our God.

Who companions all the people,
who lives within our struggles,
the universal Sov’reign, One God leading us on.

Blessed are those who, in God’s name
give witness to the Gospel,
the news of liberation, for all peoples of earth.

You see, it’s pretty much your standard Sanctus. If it were translated into Spanish. With an eye toward liberation. And written by a San Salvadoran.

And it’s a song we shouldn’t shy away from. Because we should be preaching liberation. And really, it’s a joyful and easy song to sing once you learn it. Here’s a YouTube video to help:

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Happy Christmas Eve – let’s sing an Alleluia!

A number of years ago, Tom Benjamin (whose work graces many pages of both hymnals) put out a collection of 62 Responses, Benedictions, Introits, and Chalice Lighting Songs, which add music to many elements we think of as spoken. Some are short, some are longer. Some are easy for congregations to pick up, some are great for choirs or soloists. Much like the hymnals, in fact.

There are a number of alleluias by Tom in his collection (although my favorite piece of his is a complex choral Alleluia); some, like this one, is written to be a round or canon. Tom offers us many different rhythms from a wide range of musical genres – like this Calypso one, which has nothing to do with the Greek goddess and everything to do with the blending of African and South American sounds throughout the Caribbean islands.

Now I’ll be honest: this one isn’t my favorite of the short congregational alleluias, but is the favorite of many, and I often hear it used. With its syncopated rhythms evocative of the Afro-Caribbean sound, it begs you to sway and dance – especially if you add the suggested drum, claves, and shaker. (In my dreams, there’s enough money to issue every congregation a decent box of hand drums, steel drums, and other percussion instruments. And maybe some kazoos for good measure.)

Alleluia, sing alleluia!
Sing Alleluia, alleluia, alleluia.
Sing alleluia, sing alleluia.

Blessed be, sing blessed be!
Sing blessed be, blessed be, blessed be.
Sing blessed be, sing blessed be.

And I love that the lyrics are expansive – not just alleluia, but blessed be, words that expand our theological praises.

It’s certainly not a song I’d have expected to sing on Christmas Eve, but then when has anything in this practice gone according to the calendar?

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There are days when I am sure my ability to come up with the perfect search terms are to blame for my not finding what I seek.

Other days, I know I have the right terms, but nothing comes up easily and I either have to dig deeper into the rabbit hole, or assume there is no there there.

Welcome to my world this morning. And I don’t have a lot of time this morning to dig deep into the underground tunnels and hidden rooms of the internet to find a morsel of information about today’s song. Which is frustrating, because there’s not much I can say otherwise.

What I do know is that everyone, including STJ, attributes this as a Swahili folk hymn. I have found scores of scores – arrangements for voices, bands, handbells, drum ensembles. I even found the arrangement we use, from Gather, a Roman Catholic hymnal.

Bwana awabariki,
Bwana awabariki,
Bwana awabariki, milele.
Ukimcha Bwana.
Bwana awabariki.

May God grant you a blessing,
may God grant you a blessing,
may God grant you a blessing ever more.
*Revere the Lord.
May God grant you a blessing.

*insert personal words, i.e. “Thanks to our teachers,” “Peace to all nations,” etc.

What I can’t find is any evidence of it outside of a fairly comprehensive high school (and maybe church choir) market. I wish I had some links to its original form, some native Swahili speakers/singers, some history of the song as passed down and passed around. There isn’t even a note on the UUA Song Information page, which I’d been counting on.

So I guess, given that my time is short and I have nothing, really, I will offer my own two cents about use. First, while it is quite simple, it’s unexpected in its last phrase, and so will perhaps benefit best from having a choir sing it the first time used, then have a strong song leader teach it the next time it’s used. Also, percussion seems key to giving the song life. Finally, remember that is a folk song, so bring less formality and more joy.

Because at the end of it, it’s a joyful song, asking for blessings from that which some call God.

—

By the way, the image has no specific meaning – I searched under “Kenya” to see what came up, and I found these great meerkats, who made me giggle.

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Some songs just get into your whole body.

The rhythm pulses in your blood, the melody lines hum in your muscles, the lyrics rest deep in your bones. The song feels as natural to you and as naturally yours as if it had emerged from your own mind and soul.

That’s how this one is for me. From the moment I first heard it, it made sense to me – from the 5/4 rhythm to the rolling musical phrases and the vibrant lyrical metaphors. I think I had this memorized before I realized I wanted to learn it.

I realize that not everyone has this experience with this song, by Jason Shelton and Mary Katherine Morn. Some, because it can be overused. Some, because their accompanists never got the hang of the 6/8+2/4 that is this particular 5/4 meter. Some, because the chorus goes high on the word ‘fire,’ a word that can be weird to sing because of its dipthong.

But for me, this song, written for the celebration of First Unitarian Universalist Nashville’s 50th anniversary in 2002, is practically perfect.

From the light of days remembered burns a beacon bright and clear
Guiding hands and hearts and spirits Into faith set free from fear.

Chorus:
When the fire of commitment sets our mind and soul a blaze
When our hunger and our passion meet to call us on our way
When we live with deep assurance of the flame that burns within,
Then our promise finds fulfillment and our future can begin.

From the stories of our living rings a song both brave and free,
Calling pilgrims still to witness to the life of liberty.

Chorus

From the dreams of youthful vision comes a new, prophetic voice,
Which demands a deeper justice built by our courageous choice

Chorus

I think it’s so strong in so many ways. Morn’s lyrics are expansive, hopeful, and to me, theologically sound. Shelton’s music is alive with joy, energy, and anticipation. I haven’t studied music composition, but as a singer I know that just as there are keys that evoke certain mood, there are also certain feelings that you get from different time signatures; my experience with songs written in 5/4 is that there’s an anticipatory feel to them, like something is not quite finished – and that’s either a good thing or a bad thing, depending on the song.

Anyway. If you haven’t had a chance to really hear the song the way it should be, check out the recording from Jason’s album – you can hear the addition of percussion helps keep rhythm; additionally, playing the accompaniment with the emphases in the right hand also keeps it driving forward.

I love this song deep in my bones, and I am grateful to Jason, Mary Katherine, and all who worked to bring this song to the fore and plant it in our living tradition.

—

“Fire Chalice” by PeacePeg – see this and more of her beautiful work at http://peacepeg.tripod.com/index.html

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I woke up this morning with white women on my mind.

Specifically, white women who exist in a different paradigm than I (also a white woman) do, one that says a woman is made for a man and made to support and please him. A paradigm that says feminism is evil and that suffrage was a terrible thing. A paradigm that says the only reason to use this tool of evil (voting) is to support your husband’s opinion. A paradigm that says abortion is worse than murder, war, and sexual abuse.

It’s hard to wrap our theologically progressive minds around, no less our politically progressive minds. Where they see strict rules and hierarchies, we see many truths and equanimity. Where they see clear lines of right and wrong, we see many shades of gray. Where they see a world order set up the day Adam and Eve entered the garden, we see a world eager to shift and change and grow.

The women who voted for Roy Moore cannot understand for a moment why anyone would support a pro-choice, pro-LGBTQ Democrat, just as we struggle to understand why they would support someone who is a known sexual predator of teenaged girls and who refutes the rule of law in favor of a singular interpretation of a sacred text. They do not understand us, and we don’t understand them.

And yet, if we are, as yesterday’s song suggested, build bridges between our divisions, we must find ways to listen to one another, to be willing to listen to one another.

Which brings me to today’s song, a beautiful, simple, two part canon that is my favorite thing Nick Page has written.

Now I know it was written as “a reaction to the buildup of the invasion of Iraq” but I can’t help bring this song into this moment in our history, when the country is so strongly and deeply divided, so much so that we’re not even getting the same news, no less having the same ideologies. We are fighting with one another in a different kind of civil war (although ideologically connected to the war in 1861-65) in ways that widen the chasm between us. We are not living in peace in this country, and haven’t for a long time. And it’s getting worse.

So what will it take for our love to break boundaries?

When will the fighting cease?
When will we live in peace?
When our love breaks boundaries.

Da pacem Domine,
Do pacem Domine,
in diebus nostris.

(translation: “Give peace, Lord, in our time.”)

And so the work now is to figure out how to do this in ways that don’t demonize but rather hold those who are on the other side of the chasm. It’s hard, this progressive Universalism, and it calls us to do things that seem anathema; it calls us to love those who perpetrate evil – and to figure out what love looks like in those situations; it calls us to work tirelessly in the face of hate; it calls us to extend a hand to those who would bite it. But most of all, it does, as our pithy tshirts say, call us to love the Hell out of this world. The more we do that, the smaller the chasm becomes.

May we always use the tools of love – open hearts, open ears, open minds – to reach out and break boundaries.

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I feel like I have fallen down a strange rabbit hole this morning.

I have to begin by assuring you all that I have no doubt about the excellent work our STJ hymnal commission did in gathering, researching, and arranging the 75 songs in this hymnal supplement. I recognize that we are always learning more, always finding more resources, and of course always expanding our theological and ethical understanding.

But because singing these songs often leads me to curiosity about its origins or uses, I jump in the rabbit hole of the internet…. and today, this rabbit hole is leading not to comfortable underground warren but to something Lewis Carroll’s Alice might have encountered, were she a minister looking for information on the internet.

According to the hymnal, this is an African American spiritual from the civil rights period. When I go to the UUA Song Information page, I find that

This was one of the songs that was used during the Civil Rights Era at virtually every demonstration, mass meeting of activists, and march in the late 1950s and early 1960s. Singing songs helped give the activists strength and a sense of self. For more detailed information, you may explore the book, When the Spirit Says Sing!: The Role of Freedom Songs in the Civil Rights Movement, written by Kerran L. Sanger.

Now I’d like to explore the book, but on this snowy Tuesday I have no access to a library, nor do I have an extra $48 to plunk down for this book (current list price on Amazon – even for the Kindle version). So I decide to hunt for other online resources about the song…. and what I find is that there are a number of different songs that have the same sort of structure but with various lyrics and melodies, like this one from Hymnary, and this one by Sweet Honey in the Rock. They are variations, and to be sure, I’m fairly certain some of them were used in the civil rights movement and some of them come out of an older spiritual tradition. It makes sense.

But I’m struggling to find anything about the version – this wonderful, jazzed up version arranged by Mark Freundt, with that one tricky spot that’s only tricky until you learn it. Until I run across this version, by children’s music performer Raffi. It is the only one I found with our melody, although some of the lyrics are different. And when I look for more information about this version, I find this:

Songwriters: KENNETH DAVID WHITELEY, RAFFI CAVOUKIAN
© THE BICYCLE MUSIC COMPANY

Have we got the wrong song in our hymnal? Did we mean to have one of the others but starting singing Raffi instead?  I don’t doubt that the hymnal commission did their due diligence, but was this not the song they thought they were getting?

Like I said, a strange rabbit hole.

I’m not sure what to make of this, gentle readers. I do like this song and when played well has a rousing, almost Pentecostal spirit to it (in fact, it’s a great song for Pentecost). It’s a wonderful send off for services with a strong call to action, too.

Anyway, here are the lyrics – another great example of a zipper song.

You got to do when the spirit says do!
You got to do when the spirit says do!
When the spirit says do, you got to do, oh Lord!
You got to do when the spirit says do!
Spirit says do (6x)

Other verses may include sing, dance, laugh, shout, etc.

I’m feeling a bit at sixes and sevens having gone through this… I almost wish I hadn’t looked for more information now. But I will say I like the cut of the Mad Hatter’s jib…

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For about a dozen years, my mother lived on the Outer Banks of North Carolina – it’s how I got to the state too. Every Thanksgiving and Christmas, I would come in from the Raleigh-Durham area, and the rest of my family would come down from New York to celebrate the holidays. And on Thanksgiving weekend, to help Mom out, we’d decorate the tree.

One year in particular, we wound up listening to some old Allan Sherman records while we decorated – finding branches for Santas and snowmen, while singing “Hello Muddah” and marching around laying the garland to “The Ballad of Harry Lewis.” And adding the finishing touches to a conga line while singing “My Zelda” – a parody of Harry Belefonte’s “Matilda.” Every year since, whether decorating with family or alone, at some point the Allan Sherman shows up, and I usually find myself singing a calypso parody before the final ornament is placed.

It’s not surprising, then, to find myself singing this Sea Islands-inspired calypso-esque piece, on this day when the tree will be decorated.

Here’s what the UUA’s Song Information page has to say:

Composed in 1997 in Cuzzago, Italy, this is the title song of Elise Witt’s 8th recording on the EMWorld Records label. Open the Window was inspired by a Spiritual from the Georgia Sea Islands called Heist the Window, Noah. Though Elise’s version uses only one phrase from the original Spiritual, it keeps the intention of naming situations in our lives, personal and global, that need opening for the dove to fly in, for us to find peace.

Here are the lyrics:

Chorus:
Open the window children,
Open the window now.
Open the window children.
Open the window let the dove fly in.
Open the window let the dove fly in.

Mama and Papa are fighting like snakes
Open the window let the dove fly in.
Baby is a cry in’ like her heart will break
Open the window let the dove fly in.

Chorus

Neighbors lock their doors, Build fences so high.
Open the window let the dove fly in.
Don’t see what’s to discover on the other side.
Open the window let the dove fly in.

Chorus

Borders ‘round countries, borders ‘round the sky.
Open the window let the dove fly in.
The only border close you is the border ‘round your mind.
Open the window let the dove fly in.

Chorus:
Abran la ventana niños,
Abran la ventana ya,
Abran la ventana niños.
Abran la ventana que entre la paloma.
Abran la ventana que entre la paloma.

And here is where I’m supposed to offer some deep thoughts about the music, or the lyrics, or the theology, or even about fair use, appropriation, or singability.

Yet I don’t know what to say. It’s not a song I’ve ever used. And I’m not entirely sure about it. It’s entirely possible that this practice has made me gunshy and oversensitive… or it’s possible that this practice has honed my spidey senses and I’m appropriately more sensitive to subtle issues of appropriation and wonky theologies.

All I know is that on this day, with an unadorned tree awaiting our attention, my sister and I will enjoy both the old Christmas favorites – Ed Ames, The Carpenters, John Denver and the Muppets – and a little Borscht Belt humor.

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Last night, in a text conversation with Michael Tino, we got to talking about our frustrations with some of the arrangements in Singing the Journey, in part because some of the songs come out of popular music and many members have memories of the originals (or of well-known covers). And thus, when we get to the arrangements here, and they don’t go places we expect them to, congregants and songleaders alike stumble and get a little confused. It’s like the day I heard “Stairway to Heaven” on Musak… it was familiar, but weirdly arranged and wildly confusing.

In this conversation last night, I said “wait until we get to ‘Lean on Me'”…. and then saw it was coming up today. No need to wait! Here we go… diving headlong into an earnest but terribly confusing arrangement of the Bill Withers classic.

First, let’s get one thing straight here: it’s an amazing song, perfect for our time and all time. We need this message, this reminder – not only that others are there, but that we can be there for others. I love the commitment that this song asks us to make, and the space it makes for us to lean into that commitment, that covenant, that we can lean on each other, we can call on each other to be present for us.

Now before we get too far, let’s listen to Bill Withers (or we’re just gonna be all kinds of distracted by the ear worm):

After the lyrics, I’ll share part of an interview with Withers talking about this song, but first, I need to talk about our arrangement.

Bless his heart, David Moran tried to make this fit a typical hymn form – verses and chorus. Somehow the bridge got tacked on, but the dénouement – “call me” – is omitted. And while the accompaniment is well written, the arrangement of this song that’s emblazoned upon our minds is in conflict with the music on the page. And then we wonder why it doesn’t work to sing it in our congregations.

And the truth is this – except for the “call me” – all the pieces are here, and many accompanists can rearrange the parts on the pages a bit to make it match the songwriter’s intent and our memories. I’ve put the lyrics in as Withers has it in his original recording, but the lyrics (minus “call me”) are as printed in STJ.

Sometimes in our lives
we all have pain,
we all have sorrow.
But if we are wise
we know that there’s
always tomorrow.

Chorus:
Lean on me when you’re not strong
and I’ll be your friend, I’ll help you carry on,
For it won’t be long ‘til I’m gonna need
somebody to lean on.

Please swallow your pride
if I have things
you need to borrow,
For no one can fill
those of your needs
that you won’t let show.

Bridge:
Just call on me brother when you need a hand.
We all need somebody to lean on.
I just might have a problem that you’d understand.
We all need somebody to lean on.

Chorus

Bridge

If there is a load
you have to bear
that you can’t carry,
I’m right up the road,
I’ll share your load
if you just call me.

Call me… call me…

In researching for today’s post, I ran across an amazing interview with Bill Withers at SongFacts, conducted in 2004. He says this about the song:

A lot of time you go back and fill in the blanks. This was my second album, so I could afford to buy myself a little Wurlitzer electric piano. So I bought a little piano and I was sitting there just running my fingers up and down the piano. That’s often the first song that children learn to play because they don’t have to change fingers – you just put your fingers in one position and go up and down the keyboard. In the course of doing the music, that phrase crossed my mind, so then you go back and say, “OK, I like the way this phrase, Lean On Me, sounds with this song.” So you go back and say, “How do I arrive at this as a conclusion to a statement? What would I say that would cause me to say Lean On Me?” Then at that point, it’s between you and your actual feelings, you and your morals and what you’re really like. You probably do more thinking about it after it’s done.

Being from a rural, West Virginia setting, that kind of circumstance would be more accessible to me than it would be to a guy living in New York where people step over you if you’re passed out on the sidewalk, or Los Angeles, where you could die on the side of the freeway and it would probably be 8 days before anyone noticed you were dead. Coming from a place where people were a little more attentive to each other, less afraid, that would cue me to have those considerations than somebody from a different place. I think what we say is influenced by how we are, what’s been our life experiences. Now, I notice young guys writing about shooting each other in the city and stuff like that, well that was not my experience, so I would never have said anything like that because it was not my experience. I’m not from a big city. I think circumstance dictates what people think.

…

I’m from an environment where it was practical to do that. That’s probably why somebody from New York did not write that song, or somebody from London, or somebody from a large city. It’s a rural song that translates probably across demographical lines. Who could argue with the fact that it would be nice to have somebody who really was that way? My experience was, there were people who were that way.

They would help you out. Even in the rural South. There were people who would help you out even across racial lines. Somebody who would probably stand in a mob that might lynch you if you pissed them off, would help you out in another way.

…

So, just like the whole American experience, it’s very complex and it has it’s own little rules and stuff. I thought it was funny when everybody got worked up over Strom Thurmond having this daughter, and I thought, “What else is new?” It depends on your socialization. My socialization was, it was very likely and very practical to expect a “Lean On Me” circumstance to exist. My adjustment was not adjusting to that circumstance probably being real and probable, my experience was trying to adjust to a world where that circumstance was not the rule rather than the exception.

It was powerful to read, knowing we’re not there anymore. And knowing that this song makes space for that kind of world to exist again.

May it be so.

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This song has been in the water for me since the late 70s, when somewhere (maybe Girl Scout camp?) I was taught the piece in the style of Art Garfunkel from his 1973 album Angel Clare. Sometime in the early 1990s, I sang a choral version that had the mark of Sweet Honey in the Rock all over it (although I can’t locate sheet music or a recording now).

Thus, I was both delighted and then a little baffled when I got to the version we have here – because there are places where the timing just seems off (specifically, there seems to be a measure missing after “we know we will” at the top of page 2), and there’s a squareness to the arrangement.

The original version, written by the Afro-pop band Osibisa, was first recorded in 1971. The original has a unique sound, a flowing rhythm, and a joyfulness that I don’t hear much in subsequent versions – even in this live version by Osibisa from 1995.

According to the UUA Song Information page,

Written by Ghanaian drummer Sol Amarifio, Woyaya is the title song of a 1971 album by Oisibisa, a musical group of Ghanaian and Caribbean musicians. It was frequently heard in work camps throughout central West Africa in the 1970s and 1980s. The arrangement in Singing the Journey comes from the version by Ysaye Barnwell (of Sweet Honey in the Rock). “Woyaya,” like many other African scat syllables, can have many meanings. According to the song’s composer, it means “We are going.”  This song is frequently used in bridging ceremonies (UU ceremonies of passage from youth to young adulthood).

Yet I wonder if it is used much anymore, because it seems to be, well, overused and thus has moved into a weird insipidness that is the death knell of many good songs.

And yet. Taking a step back from its sing-songy-ness and re-engaging the soulful joy of its Afro-pop roots somehow reclaims it for me. Because this is most assuredly the song we need a lot of days, personally and globally.

We are going,
heaven knows where we are going,
but we know within.

And we will get there,
heaven knows how we will get there,
but we know we will.

It will be hard, we know,
and the road will be muddy and rough,
but we’ll get there,
heaven knows how we will get there,
but we know we will.

Woyaya, Woyaya,
Woyaya, Woyaya,

Woyaya.

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If you open your hymnal, you will see that the song has a different title printed.

Now if you’ve been paying attention, you have also marked up this song’s title and lyrics, as per the composer’s instructions, changing “standing on the side” to the much less ableist and much more active “answering the call.” I won’t rehash Jason Shelton’s commentary on the lyric change – You can see what he’s said about it here. What I will say is that I whole heartedly support the change; it is evidence of a living tradition that is forever responding to new ways to draw the circle of love ever wider.

And it’s been a while since I listened to it, but I think Jason covers the origin story in the linked post/sermon as well.

So what’s left to say?

First – I like this song. I like the lyrics (especially now), I like the melody, I like the general feel of the piece. It moves, too – so many of our hymns are musically static; they establish a melodic phrase and pattern and then just sit there. But as I learned in conversation with Jason this past week, like the great composers, he thinks deeply about the picture the music paints and how the image we begin with changes by the end of it.

And we are the better for it. As I’ve talked about before in this practice, our music is where our theology is writ large – and I’m beginning to conclude that we will be stronger as a faith when most of what we sing from our hymnals is written by Unitarian, Universalist, and Unitarian Universalist composers. Singing the Journey – and songs like this – go a long way toward that goal.

Back to the song: if it’s unfamiliar to the congregation, introduce it with a soloist or a choir, and consider an additional use with a soloist on the verses and the congregation joining in the chorus. Before they know it, they’ll be humming it along with the rest of us.

With the new, authorized lyrics.

(Pardon the weird formatting – typing on my phone today as I left my laptop right near the front door so I wouldn’t forget to bring it with me to Peterborough. You have permission to laugh at me.)

The promise of the Spirit:

faith, hope and love abide.

And so ev’ry soul

is blessed and made whole;

the truth in our hearts is our guide.

.

Chorus:

We are answering the call of love:

hands joined together as hearts beat as one.

Emboldened by faith, we dare to proclaim

we are answering the call of love.

.

Sometimes we build a barrier

to keep love tightly bound.

Corrupted by fear,

unwilling to hear,

denying the beauty we’ve found.

.

Chorus

.

A bright new day is dawning

when love will not divide.

Reflections of grace

in ev’ry embrace,

fulfilling the vision divine.

.

Chorus

Amen.

—

Image comes from Prairie UU – a few of our fellow UUs answering the call of love.