First Sunday of Advent/ World AIDS Remembrance Day

With this Sunday we begin Liturgical Year C and a season of expectation for Christ’s coming at Christmas and in our lives. I have come to treasure the season and sounds of Advent and the beautiful imagery that we encounter in each Sunday’s readings and with each new candle on the Advent Wreath.

The Chancel Choir will sing our Call to Worship “While We Are Waiting, Come”from the back of the Church. This simply yet evocative meditation was written by Don Cason, a Baylor Graduate and former president of Word Music Publishers. The text invokes Christ in power and glory, as Emmanu-El, and as the Savior of the world.

Our choir Anthem is a glorious setting of “Lo, He Comes With Clouds Descending” from John Wesley’s collection “Select Hymns with Tunes Annext” from 1765. The last verse of our arrangement is the finest in existence for this tune, and it was written by Christopher Robinson during his directorship of Saint John’s College Choir, Cambridge University. After hearing a recording of it in 1992, I faxed him in England and received a fax copy of his handwritten manuscript with permission to use it at will. The hymn is in our hymnal at #718 with all 4 verses written by Charles Wesley – we will sing just 3, and the last verse petition “O, Come Quickly” rings out so passionately in an almost anguished cry for Christ’s coming at the end of time.

At the Offertory, the Choir will offer a solemn prayer from Sergei Rachmaninoff’s Liturgy of Saint John Chrysostom of 1919 – “To Thee, O Lord, Do I Lift Up My Soul”, a text long-associated with this Advent season of patient expectation for the revelation of God in our world and in our lives. 

At Communion the Choir will be singing a choral gem by Calvin Hampton (1938-1984), “Savior, Like a Shepherd Lead Us" (1983), with a tender pleading for Christ’s guidance and unending love to surround us. I have chosen to include this poignant setting by Calvin Hampton because he was one of the first great American Church Music Composers lost to AIDS when he died in 1984. He was a prolific composer, and much of his music can be a challenge for the player and listener alike, so I include this work for its hauntingly beautiful tune and undulating accompaniment.

The remaining instrumental music I have chosen for this Worship on World AIDS Day was written by Kevin Oldham (1960-1993), a supremely gifted composer of tuneful, lyrical works that I have admired for 30 years. My Opening Voluntary is a selection from the middle movement of his Piano Concerto, “Andante Tranquillo”, transcribed for solo piano after his death in March, 1993. The Concerto was premiered just 2 months before Oldham died, and its plaintive melodies and unexpected harmonies have lingered in my memory since starting to learn the work from an often-indecipherable hand-written manuscript.

As part of our Music at Communion, I will play an excerpt entitled “Hymn” from the 3rd Movement of Oldham’s Symphony for Organ (1985-89), which has optional chimes interspersed throughout.

My Postlude is taken from the “Introduction“ to his Symphony for Organ, with brilliant pageantry which morphs into a hymn-like section – examples of the many styles he grew to love while singing for years in the choir of Marble Collegiate Church in New York.

After Kevin’s AIDS diagnosis at the age of 32, he penned a profound statement: “Whether you stay alive or not seems the trivial part. It is your work itself that must have a life of its own. If I can make sure that my music will continue to have life, that seems to be the most important consideration.” It is an honor to do our part to celebrate the works of all those we lost much too soon. May we all remember that every act of love and work of heart will have a life of its own in all those we are blessed to encounter.

With a Grateful Heart,

Kenton