The worst aspect of writing hymns is, for me, the business of advertising the same.  The rest is sheer joy - well joy with periods of hard work and discipline, which I'm not all that good at - but advertising is, as they say, the pits.  Anyway, in the months that led up to Maarten and myself publishing our hymns on the internet, I would occasionally hand copies of one or two of our hymns to people who, I thought, might be interested.  Then I would usually have an insecure panic attack (What if they think they are just bad songs?), so I would then say carefully, "Now, you understand they are hymns, not songs?"  Whereupon they would quickly glance at the first stanza, stiffen in surprise, look up, and say, "...er...Yes, Don... I think I see what you mean."

 I imagine that in so speaking of hymns and songs, I am using a distinction which, these days, many Christian people, at least in the Uniting Church, actually make for themselves; but I am trying to use it with a difference, or clarify it, or something.  The distinction is quite often made in the stylistic sense of "O yes; songs are contemporary hymns, in contrast with older, traditional hymns."  It is easy to see how this kind of distinction came to be, but I actually do not consider it particularly useful now.  So I sometimes add to the above conversation, "Yes.  They're new traditional hymns" (and, yes, this is how our website got its name; I didn't put new and traditional in juxtaposition just to be a tease).  Talk about hymns and songs tends to happen rather instinctively, even vaguely, as if it were just a matter of poetic or musical style - an artistic choice - whereas I want to maintain that, to be useful for understanding the place of hymns and songs in worship, the distinction needs to be made, not just with literary discernment, but with theological clarity.  What is the theological distinction that needs to be made then?  I see the distinction between song and hymn as basically that between interpretation on one hand and liturgy on the other.  So it goes without saying, of course, that this is not artistically to dismiss the modern movement of Christian song-writing (I've got a few mates who are song writers!).  It has, I think, a significant role in the modern church, as I hope will become apparent.

       By songs, then, I mean pieces that emphasize interpretation - preaching and teaching elements, in the broadest theological sense of these words.  And songs so understood may be useful in worship, and in a variety of other group situations.  It is the popularizing aim of many songs which is significant here.  In public worship, songs may be particularly useful in that part of a service where we hear the Word, and solo or small group singing may well be appropriate for this, as well as, sometimes, but perhaps not always, communal singing.  Songs, in the sense of interpretation, have contemporary bite.  They provoke thought, even disagreement.  They bring immediacy to the hearing of the Word: "This is a faith we need to live now."  Song writers seek to waken us to new insight through the Word, and thus, perhaps, open us through the Spirit to new life. Songs are a significant recent development, yet perhaps they are not entirely new: the nineteenth century gospel hymns were often songs to my understanding, as were perhaps some earlier carols with their tendency to narrative.  However - and this is an important reservation - songs will be more useful if we do not expect the wrong things from them: they do not substitute for liturgy, nor should we be surprised if they have a short shelf life, especially in a time of rapid change.
      
       By hymns, on the other hand, I mean pieces that emphasize liturgy, referring to worship (as does the Greek, of course) as the work of the people.  In an Anglican context, Daniel Stevick declares that liturgy is essentially pre-theological, laying out the church's story - the Christian economy - before the work of theological interpretation is done on it.  In addition, it has often been remarked that, in non-Anglican protestant worship, our hymns are our liturgy, and there is certainly truth in this remark: hymns are liturgy in the sense that they celebrate, in worship, what Christians can reliably hold as common ground: "This is what we can all believe as Christians; we can sing this together without reservation - with integrity, and with joy."  It is this quality of common ground which makes it possible still to sing the great hymns of past ages, and it is no criticism of songs to say that hymns can quite naturally have a longer shelf life.  However it is also true that the same great hymns will start to appear more like museum pieces, the less we try to write hymns in our own time.  If we are not growing the tradition we could lose the tradition.  And hymn singing is too precious.  It helps us to treasure in our hearts - as Owen Dowling says.  For that is what music can contribute to our mere words.

 It can be seen, then, that the more useful distinction between songs and hymns is not primarily a matter of artistic style, but of theological intention.  This does not mean that artistic quality does not matter.  Of course it matters.  But it does mean that to choose to write either hymn or song involves a theological choice before any artistic choice, and poet and composer need to become clear at some point about which theological choice they are making.  I think it is pretty clear that Maarten and I have made our choice for hymns, though the most common choice these days seems to be for songs.  It must be admitted that it is not a hard and fast choice: the distinction between liturgy and teaching/preaching can become blurred - and perhaps often does, with elements of both occurring in one piece - as indeed it sometimes does for Wesley and, though perhaps less noticeably, Watts.  It is a matter of where the main emphasis lies, especially for hymns.  The preaching/teaching songwriter can easily intrude on the hymn writer's liturgical territory, and if there is not some restraint, the liturgical quality of hymn can be lost.  Thus it is a useful distinction for the poet to have in the back of his or her mind.  For it needs to be said that a hymn fails as liturgy if the people are reluctant to sing it - which suggests lack of common ground.  Similarly, of course, it fails if the people, or only some of them, are unable to sing it - which suggests that words and/or music are too unapproachable for communal singing.  Furthermore, if we do not make the distinction between hymn and song thoughtfully, and we happen to focus mainly on songs (with their short shelf life), the church could end up in another fifty years losing interest in songs, perhaps because of social or theological change, and then wondering later where the hymn tradition went. And thus could come to pass Peter Blackwood's serious warning that "by our carelessness it could get lost."

       It also needs to be said that we should not underestimate what people can make of a new hymn.  I am sometimes advised by good friends to keep it simple, and that is fine up to a point.  However the maxim for writers of pop, that one has three minutes to get one's message across, is altogether too limiting for hymns, though it may have something to say about the immediacy of songs.  Some things are more important than simplicity, and one of them is the church's common ground.  The function of hymns is not to teach the common ground of the church's faith, but to recall it - to recall it and celebrate it.  And to challenge people's intelligence?  Well why not?  Ordinary people are experts at using our very human gift of language, and they don't require insulting, linguistic mollycoddling.  The old dictum for preachers has some point here, which says that a preacher should neither overestimate the knowledge of the people, nor underestimate their intelligence.  There is something in that for hymn writers.  Hymns are a great artistic form for affirming meanings: their taut musical and poetic structures make meanings memorable, especially because they are likely to be used a good number of times.  It is no wonder that it has been observed that, for good or ill, people learn their faith from hymns - a sobering thought indeed.  However this does not mean that hymns are written to teach: the learning is a side-effect of hymn-singing.  Hymns are not some kind of educational showpiece to the world.  They are a communal act of worship for the faithful to recall and celebrate the common ground of the church's faith.  I think it is true to say, both for Maarten and myself, that our aim is to write hymns with a simple but tight structure which people can approach easily, but in which they may discover more meaning over time (something like Paul Green's word/music icon).  For this reason we both greatly respect, for example, the taut discipline imposed on us by the old four-line verse forms - common metre and the like - and there are a few of these in our collection, as well as one or two with six-line stanzas; and you will also see that we have experimented with other stanzas as well - it is part of my little plot to encourage Maarten's inventiveness, which is subtle, understated, and more than immediately meets the eye.  Despite my rather naive musical awareness, I always find greatly satisfying his ability to take a new verse form and find a strangely new yet singable music - or take an old verse form and make it do something new.  It does a verse writer good, actually.

 Finally, some months ago, during a panic period such as the one I mentioned at the beginning of this piece, I showed my hymns to my M.A. supervisor of some years ago, Graham Tulloch, now Professor of English at Flinders University.  He was more affirming than I had dared hope, and naturally I was delighted.  However one comment which he made seems important to share: "I really like the hymns, Don; but, of course, that doesn't mean they are what the church will want at this time" - a warning about personal disappointment, I supposed, and I think I said that I was a bit too old to be dewy-eyed about these things.  But I think he was also sharing my concern about the language of the church at worship, for they are indeed difficult times to create a good liturgical language style.  So months later I was delighted, when Graham agreed, with immediate warmth, to write the Foreword for our website.  Many thanks, Graham.

       I hope that Maarten's and my approach to hymn writing could be useful for helping the church to seek better liturgical balance in our communal song.  So I hope the church might give our hymns a good trial - a real trial with real people in real congregations.  For that is the best test of any hymn: will it enable people to recall and celebrate, to treasure in their hearts?  Love to the church.  Don.5.  HYMNS AND SONGS

 The worst aspect of writing hymns is, for me, the business of advertising the same.  The rest is sheer joy - well joy with periods of hard work and discipline, which I'm not all that good at - but advertising is, as they say, the pits.  Anyway, in the months that led up to Maarten and myself publishing our hymns on the internet, I would occasionally hand copies of one or two of our hymns to people who, I thought, might be interested.  Then I would usually have an insecure panic attack (What if they think they are just bad songs?), so I would then say carefully, "Now, you understand they are hymns, not songs?"  Whereupon they would quickly glance at the first stanza, stiffen in surprise, look up, and say, "...er...Yes, Don... I think I see what you mean."

 I imagine that in so speaking of hymns and songs, I am using a distinction which, these days, many Christian people, at least in the Uniting Church, actually make for themselves; but I am trying to use it with a difference, or clarify it, or something.  The distinction is quite often made in the stylistic sense of "O yes; songs are contemporary hymns, in contrast with older, traditional hymns."  It is easy to see how this kind of distinction came to be, but I actually do not consider it particularly useful now.  So I sometimes add to the above conversation, "Yes.  They're new traditional hymns" (and, yes, this is how our website got its name; I didn't put new and traditional in juxtaposition just to be a tease).  Talk about hymns and songs tends to happen rather instinctively, even vaguely, as if it were just a matter of poetic or musical style - an artistic choice - whereas I want to maintain that, to be useful for understanding the place of hymns and songs in worship, the distinction needs to be made, not just with literary discernment, but with theological clarity.  What is the theological distinction that needs to be made then?  I see the distinction between song and hymn as basically that between interpretation on one hand and liturgy on the other.  So it goes without saying, of course, that this is not artistically to dismiss the modern movement of Christian song-writing (I've got a few mates who are song writers!).  It has, I think, a significant role in the modern church, as I hope will become apparent.

       By songs, then, I mean pieces that emphasize interpretation - preaching and teaching elements, in the broadest theological sense of these words.  And songs so understood may be useful in worship, and in a variety of other group situations.  It is the popularizing aim of many songs which is significant here.  In public worship, songs may be particularly useful in that part of a service where we hear the Word, and solo or small group singing may well be appropriate for this, as well as, sometimes, but perhaps not always, communal singing.  Songs, in the sense of interpretation, have contemporary bite.  They provoke thought, even disagreement.  They bring immediacy to the hearing of the Word: "This is a faith we need to live now."  Song writers seek to waken us to new insight through the Word, and thus, perhaps, open us through the Spirit to new life. Songs are a significant recent development, yet perhaps they are not entirely new: the nineteenth century gospel hymns were often songs to my understanding, as were perhaps some earlier carols with their tendency to narrative.  However - and this is an important reservation - songs will be more useful if we do not expect the wrong things from them: they do not substitute for liturgy, nor should we be surprised if they have a short shelf life, especially in a time of rapid change.
      
       By hymns, on the other hand, I mean pieces that emphasize liturgy, referring to worship (as does the Greek, of course) as the work of the people.  In an Anglican context, Daniel Stevick declares that liturgy is essentially pre-theological, laying out the church's story - the Christian economy - before the work of theological interpretation is done on it.  In addition, it has often been remarked that, in non-Anglican protestant worship, our hymns are our liturgy, and there is certainly truth in this remark: hymns are liturgy in the sense that they celebrate, in worship, what Christians can reliably hold as common ground: "This is what we can all believe as Christians; we can sing this together without reservation - with integrity, and with joy."  It is this quality of common ground which makes it possible still to sing the great hymns of past ages, and it is no criticism of songs to say that hymns can quite naturally have a longer shelf life.  However it is also true that the same great hymns will start to appear more like museum pieces, the less we try to write hymns in our own time.  If we are not growing the tradition we could lose the tradition.  And hymn singing is too precious.  It helps us to treasure in our hearts - as Owen Dowling says.  For that is what music can contribute to our mere words.

 It can be seen, then, that the more useful distinction between songs and hymns is not primarily a matter of artistic style, but of theological intention.  This does not mean that artistic quality does not matter.  Of course it matters.  But it does mean that to choose to write either hymn or song involves a theological choice before any artistic choice, and poet and composer need to become clear at some point about which theological choice they are making.  I think it is pretty clear that Maarten and I have made our choice for hymns, though the most common choice these days seems to be for songs.  It must be admitted that it is not a hard and fast choice: the distinction between liturgy and teaching/preaching can become blurred - and perhaps often does, with elements of both occurring in one piece - as indeed it sometimes does for Wesley and, though perhaps less noticeably, Watts.  It is a matter of where the main emphasis lies, especially for hymns.  The preaching/teaching songwriter can easily intrude on the hymn writer's liturgical territory, and if there is not some restraint, the liturgical quality of hymn can be lost.  Thus it is a useful distinction for the poet to have in the back of his or her mind.  For it needs to be said that a hymn fails as liturgy if the people are reluctant to sing it - which suggests lack of common ground.  Similarly, of course, it fails if the people, or only some of them, are unable to sing it - which suggests that words and/or music are too unapproachable for communal singing.  Furthermore, if we do not make the distinction between hymn and song thoughtfully, and we happen to focus mainly on songs (with their short shelf life), the church could end up in another fifty years losing interest in songs, perhaps because of social or theological change, and then wondering later where the hymn tradition went. And thus could come to pass Peter Blackwood's serious warning that "by our carelessness it could get lost."

       It also needs to be said that we should not underestimate what people can make of a new hymn.  I am sometimes advised by good friends to keep it simple, and that is fine up to a point.  However the maxim for writers of pop, that one has three minutes to get one's message across, is altogether too limiting for hymns, though it may have something to say about the immediacy of songs.  Some things are more important than simplicity, and one of them is the church's common ground.  The function of hymns is not to teach the common ground of the church's faith, but to recall it - to recall it and celebrate it.  And to challenge people's intelligence?  Well why not?  Ordinary people are experts at using our very human gift of language, and they don't require insulting, linguistic mollycoddling.  The old dictum for preachers has some point here, which says that a preacher should neither overestimate the knowledge of the people, nor underestimate their intelligence.  There is something in that for hymn writers.  Hymns are a great artistic form for affirming meanings: their taut musical and poetic structures make meanings memorable, especially because they are likely to be used a good number of times.  It is no wonder that it has been observed that, for good or ill, people learn their faith from hymns - a sobering thought indeed.  However this does not mean that hymns are written to teach: the learning is a side-effect of hymn-singing.  Hymns are not some kind of educational showpiece to the world.  They are a communal act of worship for the faithful to recall and celebrate the common ground of the church's faith.  I think it is true to say, both for Maarten and myself, that our aim is to write hymns with a simple but tight structure which people can approach easily, but in which they may discover more meaning over time (something like Paul Green's word/music icon).  For this reason we both greatly respect, for example, the taut discipline imposed on us by the old four-line verse forms - common metre and the like - and there are a few of these in our collection, as well as one or two with six-line stanzas; and you will also see that we have experimented with other stanzas as well - it is part of my little plot to encourage Maarten's inventiveness, which is subtle, understated, and more than immediately meets the eye.  Despite my rather naive musical awareness, I always find greatly satisfying his ability to take a new verse form and find a strangely new yet singable music - or take an old verse form and make it do something new.  It does a verse writer good, actually.

 Finally, some months ago, during a panic period such as the one I mentioned at the beginning of this piece, I showed my hymns to my M.A. supervisor of some years ago, Graham Tulloch, now Professor of English at Flinders University.  He was more affirming than I had dared hope, and naturally I was delighted.  However one comment which he made seems important to share: "I really like the hymns, Don; but, of course, that doesn't mean they are what the church will want at this time" - a warning about personal disappointment, I supposed, and I think I said that I was a bit too old to be dewy-eyed about these things.  But I think he was also sharing my concern about the language of the church at worship, for they are indeed difficult times to create a good liturgical language style.  So months later I was delighted, when Graham agreed, with immediate warmth, to write the Foreword for our website.  Many thanks, Graham.

       I hope that Maarten's and my approach to hymn writing could be useful for helping the church to seek better liturgical balance in our communal song.  So I hope the church might give our hymns a good trial - a real trial with real people in real congregations.  For that is the best test of any hymn: will it enable people to recall and celebrate, to treasure in their hearts?  Love to the church.  Don.