Boy in the Bands
I mentioned the Esperanto hymnal I just got. Don’t laugh. This means you.
I realized that if you take the translated-from-English hymns in this collection, plus the Consultation on Ecumenical Hymnody’s 150 and you get a really good working set for a moderate to liberal Protestant church. Particularly good since these are mainly in the public domain, which speaks to my “who owns our words of worship” concern.
The Esperanto-only titles I’ve typed out in italics; the translated (from English) hymns are the ones that interest me. For the record, the editors of the Liberala Himnaro esteemed the following enough to include:
- Lord of All Being
- Our Father while our hearts unlearn
- Ho Spiriti Nin Instruu
- Still, still with Thee
- All people that on earth do dwell
- Vivon Al Mi Donas Dio (originally in Esperanto, by F. W. Hipsley)
- The King of Love my shepherd is
- Where is thy God, my soul
- Nearer my God to Thee
- Open my eyes that I may see
- To Mercy, Pity, Peace and Love
- Can I see another’s woe
- We believe in human kindness
- Faith, Hope and Charity
- Thy neighbor
- Rich gifts that heaven delights to see
- Maker of earth and sea and sky
- O Thou by whose creative power
- Almighty Father who dost give
- Love is the Law
- Who will say the world is dying
- Spirit of Faith be Thou my guide
- Make sure of Truth
- Men whose boast it is that ye
- Himno por la paco tutmonda
- The Psalm of Life
- We cannot kindle when we will
- Walk in the Light
- Lead kindly light
- Abide with me
- We bless Thee for Thy peace, O God
- These things shall be
- Sing we of the Golden City
- From Thee all skill and science flow
- Forward through the ages
- To us have distant ages
- One Holy Church
- We limit not the Truth of God
- God of Ages and of nations
- O Beauty old yet ever new
- Wherever through the ages rise
- PreÄo sub la verda standardo (“Prayer beneath the green [Esperantist] banner” by Esperanto founder L. L. Zamenhof)
- La Espero by L. L. Zamenhof
- Kanto de L’ligo
- La TagiÄo
- La Vera Frataro
- Ne Nur El Unu Ras’
- La Vojo by L. L. Zamenhof
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I keep misplacing my copy of Liberala Himnaro (it’s a slight enough volume, it’s easy to do) so it’s nice to have found the contents listed online. Multan dankon!
Leland = Haruo
[...] Sixty-eight of the 150 hymns selected by the late-1970s (perhaps early 80s?) Consultation on Ecumenical Hymnody were present in the 1937 (in print until 1981) joint Unitarian and Universalist Hymns of the Spirit, which despite its age is still used in a number of Unitarian Universalist churches, and especially the Christian ones. There are some odd omissions of common hymns that I well recall having to tip-in the order of service, like “We gather together” and “All honor, laud and glory”. But on the whole it holds up. And with some additions, would be a core of a modern if traditionally minded rational-reformed Christian church. (I’ve written about what some of these additions might be.) [...]