By Kelsey Dallas, Deseret News.
Does a wretch by any other name fit the tune?
Modern hymn writers (in this case, re-writers) seem to think so, and adjustments to the second line of “Amazing Grace” are now relatively common.
“Saved a wretch like me” is traded for “saved someone like me” or “saved and set me free” in newer renditions, as theological concerns drive some singers to leave wretch behind.
“The word … plays into self-hatred,” said Brian McLaren, a Christian pastor, author and hymn writer. “I imagine that people who are familiar with the hymn hardly notice the word, but, for someone coming into a church for the first time, it can have the effect of making them very nervous.”
Churches have been adjusting traditional hymn lyrics for centuries, yet the process remains dramatic. Church members rarely agree whether altering gendered pronouns or the adjectives describing God is warranted.
McLaren knows first-hand the controversy that can erupt when messing with lyrics of a beloved hymn. In a late February interview, he addressed what he saw as problematic war imagery in “Onward, Christian Soldiers” and other hymns. Within a week, prominent evangelical leader Russell Moore responded, criticizing McLaren’s commentary on his website.
Denominations need to be thoughtful about the words members are asked to sing, but it should be religious beliefs, not cultural trends, that inspire lyric changes, according to hymn experts. Otherwise, churches risk getting out of tune with the people in their pews and alienating visitors, said Mary Louise Bringle, a professor of philosophy and religion at Brevard College in Brevard, North Carolina.
Hymns “matter to us deeply and touch our hearts in ways that other music doesn’t,” she said. “People may forget a sermon five minutes after hearing it, but they’ll still be singing the hymns to themselves halfway through the week.”
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It is of some interest to note that Deseret News, in which this article appears, is a Salt Lake City news organization whose parent company is wholly owned and operated by the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter Day Saints. In their early days, the Mormons were well known for taking popular hymns and changing the biblical and orthodox lyrics of those hymns to reflect the Mormon Church’s own particular theological perspectives.
It is not surprising that the Mormons should have done this, as a few modest changes here and there can quickly render an otherwise solidly biblical hymn into one that is perfectly at home with the teachings of the Book of Mormon and the Pearl of Great Price.
It is also not surprising that modern revisionists should do a similar thing to transform a great many of the solidly biblical hymns of the Presbyterian and Reformed tradition into ditties that are perfectly at home with the teachings of Brian McLaren, John Shuck, and others.
New religions require new hymnbooks to express their new beliefs. Christians should understand that the new PCUSA hymnbook, with its increasingly large number of revisions, rewrites and modifications of old hymns, is simply another step in the PCUSA’s continuing move out of historic and biblical Christianity, and into a new and sadly heretical contemporary iteration.
Just more “dumbing” down of the faith or compromising for the wake of worldliness and ease.
*for the “sake”…
If someone doesn’t realize what a “wretch” they are, then they have pretty much missed the point of …going to church….salvation through grace….our own inability to earn God’s love….and much more. Gee whiz, this kind of pablum from supposed adults gets old.
A once large, now declining Presbyterian Church in Des Moines, Ia. bowed to a group of feminists several years ago who protested about pronouns, sexism and ‘other offensive stuff’ in their hymnals. The ad hoc, unsanctioned group nagged until new gender neutral hymnals were ordered. The music director, organist and most the choir quit the church, but the progressives didn’t care. Many longtime regular members didn’t even know what was happening behind the scenes; they were told ‘after much discusion, new improved hymnals were ordered’. It was sad. Only those who dared to ask further questions were given scant details of the wrangling behind the scenes. And other members asked why the music director and organist quit, they were vaguely told (in a whisper tone during after worship coffee) there was ‘a difference of opinion over something’. The new hymnals changed words, and in many cases deleted classic old time favorite hymns.
After many years of observing these kinds of controversies within local churches, I have come to the conclusion that many revisionists are quite pleased when conservatives pack their bags and leave the churches where they have been members for many years.
These revisionists realize that people who are opposed to their radical agenda fall into three groups: (1) those who can be persuaded to switch sides and join them, (2) those who cannot be persuaded to join them, but will quietly acquiesce to their agenda, and (3) those who will not join them and will not quietly acquiesce to their agenda, but will conscientiously oppose them at every turn.
Those in the first group they assiduously seduce, those in the second group they actively manipulate, and those in the third group they passive-aggressively encourage to find a more welcoming church home somewhere else.
Very often revisionists win these local church battles and are able to implement their agenda. But in every case where they do so, the church in question is diminished and its witness is weakened, and the seeds of its own ultimate demise are sown.