The Mudcat Café TM
Thread #52175 Message #797580
Posted By: Joe Offer
05-Oct-02 - 10:33 PM
Thread Name: Hymns vs. 'Praise Music'
Subject: Hymns vs. 'Praise Music'
This article was in today's paper in Sacramento. I'm so glad somebody agrees with me about the poor quality of "praise music," which I think is the Christian equivalent of bubblegum music.Yummy, yummy, yummy,
I've got God in my tummy...
I thought that as a Catholic, I wouldn't be subjected to that stuff - but even many Catholic churches have picked up "praise music" in recent years. they think it speaks to tody's young people, but it sounds like bad country music to me.
-Joe Offer, irreverently-
Old-time hymns get an altar call
"There is music in my soul today, for when the Lord is near,
The dove of peace sings in my heart, the flow'rs of grace appear
—From the gospel song "Sunshine in My Soul," written in 1887 by Eliza E. Hewitt
By Eric Gorski
KNIGHT RIDDER NEWSPAPERS (5 October 2002)
Other than the occasional "Amazing Grace," the hymn is dead at many Protestant churches these days.
As church music evolved to fit the times, the hymn book has been tucked away in favor of pop-influenced praise songs whose lyrics are projected on big screens.
A 64-year-old music minister picked up a microphone at Radiant Church in Colorado Springs, Colorado, and brought the old songs back to life on a recent Friday night, if only for two hours.
The Rev. Paul Ferrin began holding these "Old-Fashioned Hymn Sings" three years ago. Now he has quit his job as national music director for the Assemblies of God denomination to stage the revivals across the nation.
The churches aren't always equipped. At Radiant Church, there is no organ. So Ferrin and his wife, Marjorie, borrowed an old Hammond in town.
The 500 people who took up hymn books that Friday shouted out requests for "Blessed Assurance," "Kneel at the Cross" and "I'll Fly Away," songs about sin and salvation, grace and the Gospel, pearly gates and blood- stained crosses.
Does this mean hymns are making a comeback? Will hymn sings become a retro phenomenon? Probably not, experts say..
The audience, after all, was "almost all white hair," as one participant put it. But the success of Ferrin's roadshow speaks to a desire to at least preserve a few traditional favorites in the new church music canon.
"We miss singing the old hymns," said Ruth Kenyon, 68. "I feel more worshipful singing them. It just seems they have more of a message."
To many people of faith, music is more than a soundtrack to their spiritual lives. It can remind them of family, teach them about church beliefs or make them feel closer to God. Music has been called "the vocabulary of American religion."
The early evangelical Protestant hymns, penned in the 18th and 19th centuries, typically run three to several verses, sometimes with no refrain. Often written by pastors, they are heavy on church doctrine.
That style gave way in the mid-1800s to gospel hymns with multipart harmonies and testimonial lyrics about Jesus' power to transform.
"Praise music" became popular in evangelical and Pentecostal churches in the 1970s. This is church music stripped down to the chorus. The lyrics are repeated over and over to soft rock played on guitar backed by drums and bass.
"The pattern is very clear: The music keeps up with popular music tastes or it doesn't work," said Stephen Marini, chairman of the religion department at Wellesley College and author of the forthcoming book "Sacred Song in America: Religion, Music and Public Culture."
To many evangelicals, praise music is the only church music they've known. Many mainline Protestant churches, from Methodists to Lutherans, have adopted praise songs in an effort to reverse declining membership rolls. Some churches mix hymns and praise songs.
Ferrin, who grew up a Baptist, staged his first hymn sing at Radiant when the interim pastor invited him to plan a Thanksgiving service. He will have 20 nationwide this year.
He doesn't expect hymns to replace praise music, but doesn't see why the two can't co-exist.
"We have a tendency to do this in life in general the new things come in, and we don't retain the old," Ferrin said. "I just feel like a balance is so very important."
Brandan Vargo, 25, a college student and one of the few young people at the sing, sees hymns as a way to unite people of different ages and faiths.
"I personally like the contemporary music, but if you have A mix of the contemporary and the old hymns, it's a church everyone can go to," Vargo said.
The biggest challenge to hymn loyalists is winning over people such as Vargo.
Praise music lyrics are easier to grasp, said Barry Liesch, a music professor at Biola University and author of "The New Worship: Straight Talk on Music and the Church."
On a practical side, the hymns' frequent chord changes don't lend themselves to guitar, today's preferred instrument.
Liesch fears the church is "losing some richness here, and intellectua depth" in abandoning hymns. But he doesn't see them making a comeback.
At Radiant Church, hymns were the rule, not the exception. Before closing with "Like a River Glorious," Ferrin took a moment to reflect.
"Isn't this marvelous?" he said. "this has got to be a glimpse of what heaven is going to be."