Calvary Church in Pittsburgh, an Episcopal church in an affluent neighborhood known before that diocese divided as one of its bastions of liberalism, recently presented its people with A Seusscharist , “based on the works of Theodore Seuss Geisel.”
Yes. Exactly. It begins:
Celebrant Father, Son, and Spirit Holy. Blessed be God:
People Of you and your works are we always awed. Amen.
All Almighty God
to you all hearts are open wide,
All of our want-wanting in you we confide
and from you our secrets we just can not hide:
Clean the thinks of our thumpers
And we shall be happy jump-jumpers.
So, by the help of your Holy Ghost,
Your Name we may deservingly boast;
through Christ our Lord. Amen.
The red is on the original. It gets better, or worse, depending on your point of view, though even the writers, I am pleased to see, didn’t dare mess with the Lord’s Prayer. They did rewrite the whole eucharistic prayer, including Jesus’ words, which is nearly as disconcerting.
The imitation-Seuss does suggest that writing like that is harder than it looks.