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In this episode, I have invited back as my guest Dr. C. Michael Hawn. Michael is University Distinguished Professor Emeritus of Church Music and Adjunct Professor and Director of the Doctor of Pastoral Music Program in the Perkins School of Theology at Southern Methodist University in Dallas, TX and was one of my professors during my church music training at The Southern Baptist Theological Seminary in Louisville, Ky.
In the book he compiled, edited, and co-authored with a team of outstanding church music scholars (James Abbington, Emily R. Brink, Kathleen Harmon, Lim Swee Hong, Deborah Carlton Loftis, David W. Music, and Greg Scheer), New Songs of Celebration Render, Michael begins his Introduction by asking the question, “Are hymns relevant to Christians today? (p. xxv)” He goes on to say the book is an effort to address that question (p. xxvi).
The reason I think this question and this book are important is that both the question and the book are a part of a vital reckoning taking place. Christianity is struggling with its complicity in the evils of European colonial imperialism and male white supremacy that have so shaped all aspects of the cultures of Europe and the United States and the work of global Christian missions.
In the 1960s, due to the impact of secularism, it was becoming apparent Christendom was losing its influence and power and denominational Christianity was declining. Theologians were declaring God is dead and pastors were decrying the relevance of the hymns in the hymnbooks available to them for their worship planning because those hymns either did not speak to the situations in which the pastors were ministering or the theology expressed in those hymns was inadequate or false.
It wasn’t that God was not and isn’t still at work, or that the Church and congregational song were dying due to irrelevance. Rather, Christianity was and still is going through a transition of loosing itself from a dominant and questionable legacy. As Christians and their congregations began to do this, congregational song blossomed in immensely creative ways into new, what Michael calls, ‘streams.’
What we discuss in this episode is the fruit of this blossoming, especially since the 1960s and the impact of Vatican II. The book focuses on seven streams in this creative outpouring and flow. In doing so, we will get a better picture of how God is still active with, in, and through the Church and how congregational song is one of the integral means by which the Church is continuing to thrive.
The music for this episode is from a clip of a song called ‘Father Let Your Kingdom Come’ which is found on The Porter’s Gate Worship Project Work Songs album and is used by permission by The Porter’s Gate Worship Project. You can learn more about the album and the Worship Project at theportersgate.com.