Hymns No Longer Recommended: A Conversation
The Rev. Susan Lukey, Editor of Gathering and the Rev. Dr. Catherine Faith MacLean, Education, Justice, and Ethos Team Lead for Then Let Us Sing!
Susan: I have enjoyed working with the hymn selections for Then Let Us Sing!, creating the Liturgical Use, Topics, and Categories Index and entering all the TLUS hymns into the Gathering website (gatheringworship.ca). It’s given me a chance to get to know the collection. And I’m grateful for the work the team has done on reviewing Voices United, More Voices, and Nos voix unis in order to create one large digital United Church of Canada music collection. The digital format is going to be helpful in so many ways. It was something like what the Voices United team, of which I was a member, dreamed of back in the early 1990s, but at the time, the technology just wasn’t there to make it happen. So, for me, it feels like a vision coming to fruition.
But one of the things I’ve noticed is the short list of hymns from VU, MV, and NVU that are not going to be included in the digital collection. I have to say that my first reaction when I saw the list was a sigh of sadness. I really love singing some of those pieces. “Blest are they” (VU p. 896) and “Jesus, you have come to the lakeshore” (VU 563) are two that have been very precious to me in my faith journey. They sing so beautifully and allow my spirit to soar. It’s hard to let them go.
About these two hymns, the TLUS team has said, “We do not knowingly publish works produced by perpetrators of sexual misconduct.” Tell me more about that statement.
Catherine: Susan, I appreciate the indexing you and Tammy-Jo did. It helps worship leaders get acquainted with the new hymn resource. The work you did on our entire collection is a huge help for liturgical planning.
The Sing 2025 Project Committee determined that we would “not knowingly publish works produced by perpetrators of sexual violence, sexual harassment, or sexual abuse. We do not wish to cause further suffering to those who are survivors.”
I, too, am sad at the loss of those pieces. I grieve them. They continue, of course, to be in the paper books. We are not producing them in the digital versions.
When we began thinking about what the church would need to sing as the Holy Spirit leads us in the present and in the future, we drew up a rubric, the key component of which is “faithful song is antidote to fear.” That’s a brave and strong statement. Much of Christian theology is brave: That’s discipleship.
Choosing hymns is a privilege. It’s a weekly responsibility with a lot of thought about how a certain hymn may interact with the Holy Spirit. And it is a privilege to carry the responsibility of choosing hymns for a congregation. We don’t take that privilege lightly: A musical selection will lift spirits or deepen thought or produce lament. Music is powerful. We know the power of music to heal, and we know the power of music to harm. We know which hearts in the congregation will soar when we choose “Precious Lord” (VU 670) and who will remember a tragic funeral when we choose “In the bulb” (VU 703) or crimond. When you know, you know. Congregants trust us to look out for their well-being. Worship leaders have authority to select hymns; I use the word authority intentionally because that is the privilege and responsibility. If we know that a piece of music has been written by a perpetrator of sexual violence, it’s possible somebody else knows, too. If we choose that piece of music, we put at risk the other person’s vulnerabilities. That’s not fair. That’s not right. That’s not kind. And if the person doesn’t happen to know the background of the composer or the lyricist, it’s still not right. The power of the evils that have been put upon us needs to be met and defeated by the power of compassion. When we are aware that a member of the congregation has suffered sexual abuse, we have a duty to make the worshipping space and experience as safe as possible. We do that for one another, don’t we? Also, we don’t know everyone’s stories. Chances are someone in the congregation has endured abuse. The first priority, then, is the care for the singer in the congregation.
The second thing is that people who show up at worship have entrusted the authority of choosing the music to someone else. They don’t know what will be chosen. It’s different than going to a concert where they have access to a playbill and can choose to listen to a composer. But when they come to worship, they come through the door and then discover whose music has been chosen.
My third point is that we have choices about which musicians we support. We choose to support the ones who compose and write from a place of compassion and care, not a practice of abuse or violence.
When you know, you know. Knowing something carries responsibility.
Susan: It might be a surprise to some people that these hymns were composed by perpetrators of sexual misconduct. I don’t know how many of us note the author/composer of the hymns we sing in worship or research their background.
You say, “When you know, you know.” So it sounds like it is about more than just a rumour or one accusation. There is some proof or a number of accusations that leads to us questioning whether we want to use a hymn.
But what harm is there if I decide to use the hymn in my worship service, even if I know that the author/composer has been accused and/or found guilty of sexual misconduct?
Catherine: God created us in love, and to love and care for one another. “Sexual abuse is self-gratification by exploitation. It makes an impersonal object of the other person, abusing both the person and sexuality itself.” That’s the definition we use. When one person abuses another and I know it, it’s blithe and cruel of me to pretend I don’t know. Just because I love a hymn doesn’t mean the hurt isn’t there.
“Faithful song is antidote to fear.” Worshippers should rest assured they are offered songs of faith that heal, not hurt.
The United Church of Canada is in solidarity with survivors of sexual misconduct. There are many in our churches. Statistics are that one in three females and one in seven males have experienced some form of sexual violence, with the statistic being higher for people who are trans, 2S, LGBQIA+, Indigenous, and those with disabilities. Look out into the congregation—that’s a lot of people.
Susan: One could argue that if the people in the congregation don’t know, it won’t harm them, but we can’t assume that they don’t know. As worship leaders, we have a responsibility to create a safe worship space for everyone in our community of faith. And once we know, we know!
It brings to mind one of my pet peeves—the use of Leonard Cohen’s “Hallelujah” in sermons and worship services. The verse with its twisted reference to the story of David and Bathsheba gives me uncomfortable shivers. It is about sexual violence and picks up the old trope of blaming the woman for what happens to her. Yet people sing the song with gusto. I give Cohen full credit for the amazing music. But reading about how Cohen is reported to have treated the women he used as muses, I can’t join in the adoration of Cohen. I wonder why we would use this in any form in worship.
There are other authors, composers, musicians, preachers, and teachers that we venerate, in spite of knowing how they have treated others. We seem to excuse them for their behaviour, just so we can happily go along and use what they have created.
But it seems to me that as followers of the Way of Jesus, we need to take the narrow gate (Matthew 7:14), the more difficult path, one that goes against the flow of society.
Catherine: Yes, it’s discipleship, the faithful response we choose as disciples of Jesus.
Susan: This brings us to a few of the other hymns that will not be included in the digital collection because the tune is a misappropriation of the music of another culture or faith group, the hymn has been used to support White colonial Christianity, or the words reflect antisemitism and supersessionism. Other hymns will have edits included that rectify some of these problems. Yet, these hymns will still appear in the hymn books the way they were originally published. Through GatheringWorship.ca, worship leaders will be able to find the information about why a hymn is no longer recommended or the suggested edits.
It seems to me that any worship leader involved in choosing the hymns for use in worship has a great responsibility. We are putting words into the hearts and mouths of the worshippers, and they may not even have an opportunity to consider the words before they sing them. How would you describe the responsibility of worship leaders in choosing music?
Catherine: I’d say it’s the best gig in the known universe. The privilege of choosing music that will make people’s heart soar, the power of designing liturgy so that people can feel lament and then be brought home to the Spirit, the trust with which we use the authority given to us to lead worship: It is profound. As well as profound, though, the responsibility of choosing music is like handling fire. It can warm a cold heart—and it can burn. It’s powerful: God changes our lives—changes our lives!—in worship. Listen to this from A Song of Faith:
Through word, music, art, and sacrament,
in community and in solitude,
God changes our lives, our relationships, and our world.
We sing with trust.
We held fire in our hands as we sifted the hymn collection in the four books of The United Church of Canada. We understood that “faithful song is antidote to fear.” And we know how brave, prophetic, and pastoral our worship leaders are. We want them to be as well prepared as possible for the life-changing opportunities God brings in worship.
