First Things‘ “other” blog, First Thoughts, has editors listing the ten worst hymns and the ten best hymns. Whether this is a useful exercise is up to readers to judge. What is lacking is a set of criteria by which to judge what constitutes good and bad hymns. I note that most of the worst hymns are of recent Catholic origin, while the best have been around for a long time and are mostly of Reformed or Lutheran provenance. Are we perhaps seeing creeping protestant influence in an otherwise Catholic-leaning journal? Or could it be that the protestant hymns are more catholic than the Catholic ones?
Monday, July 12, 2010, 9:21 PM
July 13th, 2010 | 11:12 am | #1
Given how thoroughly protestant churches have embraced the worst of the Catholic praise songs, perhaps it means that these Catholic hymns are more protestant than the protestant ones.
July 13th, 2010 | 12:05 pm | #2
Maybe it means that we should just write hymns out of the reality of life with God and not try to shape them into this or that version of Christianity on any conscious level (although they will be shaped by whatever tradition in which we find ourselves).
This is what happened for centuries, and it may be that the best hymns stem from a life of faith, not from an intentionally apologetic or polemical thrust.
July 13th, 2010 | 8:43 pm | #3
In all fairness, one must admit that Roman Catholics cannot be held responsible for Shine, Jesus, Shine and Lord I Lift Your Name On High.
July 23rd, 2010 | 11:42 am | #4
I think it’s all more simple than that: Protestants don’t call praise songs, “hymns.” Hymns are almost entirely stuff written before about 1930. So we don’t mentally include later stuff in our lists of good and bad hymns, regardless of the fact that there are a whole lot of really bad ones.
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