With Gusto
WHEN HYMN-SINGING IS COMMUNITY-
BUILDING...AND FUN!
Peter Burns
Youth parishioner
Every summer I go to Camp Dudley in Westport,
New York. And every Sunday night, every single
camper, counselor, and staff member gathers in
the theater for Hymn Sing. Hymn Sing isn’t a quiet
time for reflection but rather a time for more than
370 boys, ranging in age from 10 years to 22 years,
to belt out Hymns at the top of their lungs.
Some of our favorite hymns are Study War
No More, Battle Hymn of the Republic, and God
of Our Fathers Whose Almighty Hand. During the
beginning of each verse of Study War No More,
two counselors stand up and scream at the top
of their lungs the beginning of the verse they
were assigned — in their own funny, quirky ways!
Everyone enjoys this. It’s amusing to laugh at how
each pair sings the verse (it’s also funny to watch
a sophomore in college lose his voice). During the
Battle Hymn of the Republic, each cabin gets into
a circle and marches in place. And during God
of Our Fathers Whose Almighty Hand, everyone
enjoys clapping and singing the absent trumpet
part. Because of Dudley Hymn Sings, I have no
choice but to gain a love for hymns (and to sing
them at the top of my lungs, of course!). That is
what made me want to go to the St. James’ Hymn
Sing this summer: To enjoy some really cool music!
I personally like hymns better when belted out with
gusto!
Art & Worship: Corita’s Call
Juanita Dugdale
Parishioner
Growing up here in the 1960s was a blessing and a curse. The
normalcy of high school was constantly interrupted by news of
social and political unrest while popular culture throbbed in
the background. St. James’ offered sanctuary, but my teenage
attempts to grasp faith were undermined by a pervasive sense
of uneasiness. To escape malaise, many classmates devoured
music or poetry or fiction. Being more visually inclined, I gravitated
to artworks and typographic wordplay, the bolder the better.
At that time, no artist expressed spirituality more boldly or
colorfully for me than Sister Corita, a Catholic nun from California.
Her silkscreen prints delivered messages of joy, love, and social
responsibility in technicolor hues. Corita evangelized to secular
audiences by exploiting the popular billboard esthetic; emerging
in the wake of Vatican II, she became a Pop Art-era icon.
Some might complain that Corita’s brash designs hardly
inspire the appropriate reverence that Christ deserves. I would
argue that by commanding attention and delivering the truth, she
achieved exactly what Christ expects of us. In this centennial year
of her birth, Corita still rocks.
Thanks to a generous donation from Juanita, several of Sister Corita’s prints will
hang in the Fifth Floor Meeting Room.
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