Proper 7
In last weeks gospel we were told the names of the 12 Apostles and told how Jesus sent them out into the world. This week Jesus says,"Whoever does not take up the cross and follow me is not worthy of me. Those who find their life will lose it, and those who lose their life for my sake will find it.” Which leads me to the song we introduced at the 9:00 offertory last Sunday, "Sing Hey For the Carpenter". Written by John Bell, this song entreats us not only to follow Jesus, but to be with him. This week we will sing it at the prelude.
Hymnwriter John Bell is a Church of Scotland minister and a member of the Iona Community.
Come with me, come wander,
Come welcome the world,
Where strangers might smile
Or where stones may be hurled;
Come leave what you cling to,
Lay down what you clutch
And find, with hands empty,
That hearts can hold much.
Sing Hey for the carpenter
Leaving his tools!
Sing Hey for the Pharisees
Leaving their rules!
Sing Hey for the fishermen
Leaving their nets!
Sing Hey for the people
Who leave their regrets!
At the 11:00 offertory, we will sing a requested favorite, "Hallelujah, Praise the Lord" from Robert Ray's Gospel Mass. Written 40 years ago as an experiment, the Gospel Mass was initially meant to be performed only once.
In a 2009 interview with the Houston Chronicle, Ray explained that the Gospel Mass is a direct result of the Second Vatican Council in the mid-’60s and its decision to hold Masses in the language of the host country rather than in traditional Latin. That opened up the mass to other changes. The Rev. Clarence Rivers, a musician and the first black Catholic priest in the archdiocese of Cincinnati, was an advocate for the use of African-American spirituals in the Catholic liturgy. Ray, a graduate of Northwestern University in music and piano performance, was asked to be on Rivers’s liturgical team. “We went around the country, advocating the use of jazz and African-American music in the liturgy,” Ray recalled. “We pretty much talked to black Catholics and got a mixed reaction. Some people had joined the Catholic church because they wanted to get away from that traditional music.” From the beginning, Gospel Mass was wildly successful.
The official premiere was in 1979 at the University of Illinois-Urbana, with a chorus of Ray’s students. “There was an incredible response,” Ray recalls. “We performed to jam-packed houses. I was very, very excited. To have that kind of response to the first work you have ever written was very gratifying. Like I said: ‘It was the hand of the Almighty.’ ”
Even so, Ray never expected Gospel Mass to be performed again. He packed the music in storage and went on with his life. Several years later a friend asked to use Gospel Mass in a high school concert. The piece, he believes, struck an ecumenical chord that “allowed people of all denominations or faith to embrace the style.” The music for the Mass, like other pieces Ray later composed, was based on his own musical experience, growing up in the African Methodist Episcopal Church.
Some of you may recall that the Trinity Choir sang the Gospel Mass 3 years ago to a grooving house! As it is summer, if you would like to sing this wonderful anthem with us, we welcome all that would like to participate in Summer Choir! We meet in the music suite at 10:10. Hope to see you!
"Hallelujah, Praise the Lord" takes the text from Psalm 150.
Hallelujah, praise the Lord
Praise Him with stringed instruments
Praise Him with dance
Praise Him with the psaltery and harp
Everything that hath breath ought to praise Him!
9:00
Prelude
- Sing Hey For the Carpenter
Processional
- Come People of the Risen King
Sequence
- Celtic Alleluia
Offertory
- Come As You Are
Communion
- I
Have Decided to Follow Jesus, Humble
Thyself in the Sight of the Lord
Recessional
Oh How Good It Is
11:00
Fugue
Louis
Nicolas Clerambault
Processional
- 372 Praise to the Living God
Sequence
- 675 Take Up Your Cross, the Savior Said
Offertory
- Hallelujah! Praise the Lord Robert Ray
Communion
- 655 O Jesus I Have Promised
676
There Is A Balm In Gilead
679
Surely It Is God Who Saves Me
Recessional
- 535 Ye Servants of God, Your Master Proclaim
5:00
Processional - 372 Praise to the Living God
Sequence - 675 Take Up Your Cross, the Savior Said
Recessional - 535 Ye Servants of God, Your Master Proclaim
