New Hymnal

[James]

HBC may be looking for a new hymnal soon. Any suggestions. Our current hymnal is the 1991 SBC hymnal which is a little dated and does not adequately express our moderate view point. Closer to the point, our new minister and our minister of music just do not like it.

It would probably be best if it was a Baptist Hymnal of some pedigree.

[Dave Roberts]

Mercer University Press released one about two years ago, but I can't remember the name. It has gotten good reviews in congregations that have chosen it, except that people say the book is too heavy.

[Ed Pettibone]

[Neil Heath]

"Celebrating Grace" is definitely moderate Baptist in its origins. It became such a big project that it was spun off as a separate entity at some point in the process of creating and publishing it. I think it began with Mercer Press, however.

It does seem heavier and thicker at first. I'm told there is only a 2 ounce difference in weight. Part of the thickness is due to using a higher quality paper, I believe they said.

[Haruo]

Yes, it is Celebrating Grace. I don't think there is a better anglophone Baptist hymnal out there that is newer than the 1991 Baptist Hymnal. As with any change in hymnals, there will be some hymns left out of the new one that at least some of the congregation consider indispensable. Also, since in many ways CG is in the line of the 1991 BH, if your minister and music minister don't like the one, they may not like the other either. What is it about '91 BH that they don't like? Find out and check those issues against CG before making a recommendation. I would also strongly recommend some opinion polling of the congregation.

Or do your own. It can be done. Look at what First Congregational of Houston did in producing the 1996 Hymns of Truth and Light, for example. And read their (and other hymnal compilers'/committees') prefaces.

[James]

Thanks Y'all.

I'm glad the Celebrating Grace Hymnal, for which I found the website, is in the moderate Baptist Tradition. I have not found any from Mercer Press or S&H. FBC Greenville, SC did their own hymnal. It is impressive. And I am aware of at least one church that found a publisher that will give a church a pretty standard non-denominational hymnal with a set list of hymns and then give the church their choice of 50 or so other hymns (out of a list of 200 or so) which makes it their hymnal. Of course cost will be a factor. The ancient bldg. is sucking all the spare change out of our pockets.

[Haruo]

I think there's another Baptist church in Asheville, NC, if I recall correctly, that did their own; I haven't seen it (nor the Greenville one). Or maybe it's the same one and I just invented the Asheville part...

A couple of our Evergreen churches use the DOC's 1995 Chalice Hymnal, now sadly out of print. Some others use the UCC's . Hope's is worth looking at, I think. Sample copy only $7.50. It's nondenominational, but I'm not clear on what makes a Baptist hymnal Baptist anyway, perhaps because we ABC folks haven't had our own hymnal for almost a century. (The last two denominational hymnals we had were joint ABC-DOC jobs: Christian Worship (1941), which was what I grew up on, and Hymnbook for Christian Worship (1970), which never gained much traction that I was aware of though perhaps more among the DOC than us undisciplinable Baptists.)

You also have to look at your congregation's preferences in matters of inclusive language and of modernization-vs-retention of archaic language, and possibly also other language issues (e.g. names for God). The New Century Hymnal, especially, is strongly antimonarchical and antidominical, with lots and lots of references to Jesus/God as "Lord" or "King" replaced with "God" or "Sovereign", that sort of thing.

[Dave Roberts]

To be a Baptist hymnal, it must include at least five B B McKinney hymns

[Ed Pettibone]

[Tim Bonney]

I wonder what the market is like for hymnals right now with all the projection screens going up in sanctuaries?

[Haruo]

[Tim Bonney]

[James]

We have had an interesting recent history on bouncing ball hymnology. We have a few in the church who would like to have more contemporary Christian music, and a few have left us to seek it. Most of that few have returned to us, because they would rather be deacons (women) than sing to canned music.

We have made a serious commitment to a traditional worship style. Which for us means, among other things, singing traditional hymns or new hymns in traditional style from real hymnals, listening to the choir or soloists singing real anthems accompanied by a real pipe organ. The congregation sings four part harmony as written. The soprano section of the choir often sings a descant on the forth verse of hymns.

Over the years the choir and the hymn singing are cited as the primary reason people join our church. It is the reason that our young people stay with us. When we have hymn sings on Sunday evenings, a lot of the old folks call for songs like "The Old Rugged Cross." The teenagers call for songs like, "Guide Me O Thou Great Jehovah."

We our new minister came to us in June, She and the Deacon chairperson and personnel committee chairman (on behalf of the congregation) signed a covenant. A big part of that covenant was a commitment to traditional worship. Both parties to the covenant were strongly in favor of this provision. Both parties made this commitment with the expectation that Betty will be our pastor until she retires from ministry in 15 to 20 years.

Thus we look for a new hymnal containing classic and new hymns which reflect our commitment to equality for all of God's Children and to our Social Gospel commitments. Whatever hymnal we choose will get a lot of use and we will sing the English classics, the gospel hymns and the better contemporary crossover material as it fits the theme of the service of the hour.

One of the reasons we want to leave the 91 hymnal is that it was badly bound. The first 16 hymns, making up the first signature of the book were not properly attached to the spine of the book. Given enough use, this signature falls out. Lifeway says they will gladly replace the bad copies at full price.

[Tim Bonney]

The UMC has not printed a new hymnal since the 1980s. So there isn't a new one for us to buy. Are worship is blended leaning traditional. I robe every Sunday. Most Sundays the choir sings. We have a praise group that does light praise, nothing to rock like. We are a college campus church and I find that the higher church traditions sit well here.

I have some boomers that would like us to do more contemporary stuff but I'm not sure it would fit the church.

[Haruo]

[Haruo]

[Haruo]

Serendipitously, today I received my copy of the latest issue of the IAH Bulletin—the is the Continental counterpart of the Hymn Societies (GB/Ireland and USA/Canada)—and the topic of the day (basically this is the proceedings of a conference the IAH held recently in Timişoara, Romania) was "The Future of the Hymnal". I commend much of its contents, the poor English notwithstanding, to your consideration.

[James]

I found out last night that both our pastor and minister of music have copies of Celebrating Grace. It is the leading candidate so far.

[Dave Roberts]

[Haruo]

Baylus Benjamin. Actually, I had to Google it. (I've known it in the past, but when you offered the extra points I tried to remember and the best I could do was Benjamin Baylor, which I knew wasn't quite right.) I did see your wink, but I'm still seriously interested in knowing if there are any distinctive qualities that make a hymnal "Baptist" aside from being published by a Baptist outfit, in the narrow sense, or being adopted as the pew hymnal of a Baptist church, in the broader sense.

[Ed Pettibone]

Ed: Hauro, I am not sure that being published by "a Baptist outfit' would assure a BAPTIST hymnal. But I would want to be persuaded that the "outfit" was comprised of a reasonably broad cross section of Baptist life. Having been personally acquainted with several of the people involved in the development of Celebrating Grace , I am persuaded that it meets that criteria. Three in particular stand out for me. They are Milburn Price and Raymond Baily who co-taught a course titled The Worshiping Church that I had at SBTS prior to the Mohler era. Dr. Price was the Dean of the School of Music and Dr. Baily was a professor of Preaching in the school of theology and pastor of a local Louisville church, As well as Dr. Emanuel McCall an adjunct professor and pastor at Fellowship Group Baptist Church in East Point, Georgia, former Director of black church relations for the SBC, former professor at SBTS and Past Moderator of the Cooperative Baptist Fellowship. Unfortunately, I do not recognize any ABC folk. I am not sure if that was their over-site or my limited acquaintance with nationally known ABC leaders.

[Chris]

[Chris]

[Haruo]

It is quite possible to project the full four-part harmony on the screen. I wish it were done more often. I believe the Churches of Christ folks (probably the Abilene Christian University Press variety) have a projectable hymnal with full music; you will recall that that is a largely a cappella denomination, so vocal harmonies are more central to their musical praxis than they are to most present-day, largely musically illiterate Protestants. However, I doubt if the ACU hymnal would meet the moderate Baptist needs of HBC. I think Celebrating Grace probably has a projectable component, but whether it includes a full-score option I don't know and am inclined to doubt. Virtually all new hymnals these days come with an electronic version, usually in part to facilitate projection. I think it adds greatly to the cost, however, where copyrighted content is involved.

[Ed Pettibone]