Metrical Tract for Ash Wednesday
  • Adam WoodAdam Wood
    Posts: 6,471
    I imagine this of use to precisely no one, but...

    Backstory:
    One of the few actual "changes" I insisted on at the Episcopal parish I work at (other than, you know, programming better music than previously) was singing an Alleluia before the Gospel, instead of some hymn from the hymnal. (Which they called a Gradual, but whatever.) Apparently, this is a fairly common practice among Episcopalians, even though it isn't what is described in the BCP, and is clearly not what is envisioned by the compilers (based on the commentaries and instructions from Marion Hatchet).

    Anywho... For practical reasons (one less hymn to pick out each week), liturgical reasons (why are we singing some text written in the last 100 years in the middle of the Liturgy of the Word?) and aesthetic reasons (it's weird, yo), we moved to singing an Alleluia. During Lent, we have generally taken the common RC-OF practice of singing an alternate acclamation ("Praise to You Lord Jesus Christ, King of endless glory.")
    But last year, as an experiment, I tried a "combined" approach to the Gospel Procession during Lent and wrote a metrical hymn setting of the proper Tract.

    It worked out all right, but we're not doing it this year. (We're singing Proulx's Missa Oecumenica for the Ordinary, and are using the Lenten Gosp. Accl. from that).


    And so...

    I'll try to dig up the ones from last year, but I just wrote one for Ash Wednesday (another long story...).
    The original Proper Tract is here:
    http://www.ccwatershed.org/pdfs/8981-ash-wednesday-tract-pdf/

    My version is currently omitting the first verse (which is from a different psalm than the later two-thirds). I may correct that, but I may not.


    Tract Psalm verse from BCP Psalter (Ps 79:8-9)


    Remember not our past sins;
    let your compassion be swift to meet us;
    for we have been brought very low.

    Help us, O God our Savior, for the glory of your Name;
    deliver us and forgive us our sins, for your Name's sake.


    My adaptation
    8686 -- I suggest ST FLAVIAN (Lord, who throughout these forty days)



    Forget, O Lord, our former sin,
    which brought our spirits low,
    and send your mercy swiftly down,
    your loving-kindness show.

    O save us, savior of the world
    from our own sin and shame.
    Deliver us, atone for us,
    and glorify your name.


    -----
    CC:BY
    Feel free to use, add, adapt, ignore, resell, or needlepoint into a kneeler cushion.
    Thanked by 1MarkThompson
  • O save us, savior of the world
    from our own sin and shame.
    Deliver us, atone for us,
    and glorify your name.


    Oh, haven't you heard, Adam? The blockheads in your congregation will be utterly unable to pronounce or understand this nonsensical line. The result? Comical, at best.
  • Doesn't everyone take elocution lessons?

    Following that same line of logic, all instances of "You who" should be stricken from the hymnal.
  • CHGiffenCHGiffen
    Posts: 5,187
    Don't forget "Lead us not into tempation" (Lead a snot into temptation).
    Thanked by 2Ben MarkThompson