Fr. Joncas has a very nice accompaniment for this piece; Wind Quintet, String ensemble, harp, organ, SATB. Much of his newer music I find tasteful and certainly much better than the 1980's music. I use this piece only if it can be done with organ and some accompaniment. With the full accompaniment, this piece is very prayerful and beautiful. With the full accompaniment in mind, it certainly would fit the aesthetic of my parish's worship and worship space. We ought to strive to bring what the composer had in mind to life before we pass judgement on the quality of the piece. If you start with the original score you can tastefully cut back on the instruments or vocal forces and make a prudent decision of how to maintain the aesthetic qualities the compliament the texts. The words are a translation/paraphrase of Ubi Caritas.

In my opinion, this piece would be a good stepping stone to get folks singing traditional music again. This piece, sung well, is better than a latin chant, sung poorly...

I wrote On Eagles Wings, but if you can give me a moment to explain. It was the '70s and I was young...

I heard from a priest friend who met him that he indeed regrets how OEW has taken on a life of its own.

Similar as above, I find his later music to be slightly more palatable than his original works.

Perhaps so. I do not like paraphrased scripture. If you are going to use it, use the approved translation. That is one of the issues I have with OEW. I haven't heard much of his later work, but I did attend a mass where a version of the Magnificat by Joncas was used. It would have made a good silent movie accompaniment for one of the Valentino "sheik" movies. I thought the camel caravan was going to arrive at any moment.

We do have an authorized and approved version of scripture to use.