Hymns stuck in your head decades after you last entered a church

[Bossy Monkey]

Me: Praise to the Lord, the Almighty. Why, I have no idea. As performed at St. Joseph's Catholic Church (they lost the "'s" some time after I left) at least, it was a terrible, dull hymn, but there you go. Apparently, my brain wants me to ponder anew/ what the almighty can do, but I think that train has left the station.

[KG]

1. none.

[ScreamingMeemie]

2. "Be not afraid...I go before you always..."

I find myself singing that tune grocery shopping, mowing, walking.

[Brickbat]

15. Well, thanks a lot.

I'll have that in my head the rest of the day. :rant:

[ScreamingMeemie]

16. Anytime I can be of service...

:hi:

[lost-in-nj]

3. for some reason

The Old Rugged Cross.....




lost

[Heidi]

4. First Baptist Church altar call.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Just_as_I_Am_%28hymn%29

If you want the ear worm, have at it! http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=EYLThuZS008&feature=related

[Rabrrrrrr]

5. It's only been a couple days since being in church, but I get Amazing Grace,

For the Beauty of the Earth, and one another one that I changed words to ages ago and don't even remember what the real words are so can't put it here.

[auntAgonist]

6. Just as I am

I still find myself humming or singing it.

[raccoon]

7. Lots of them do. Old hymns are one thing I hang onto from the religion I grew up with. nt

[blueamy66]

8. Ave Maria

On Eagle's Wings

Joy to the World

[BethCA66]

9. Our God Our Help in Ages Past, Our Hope for Years to Come...

Our refuge from the stormy blast,
And our eternal home.

It made me think about sailors.

Happily atheist now, but I still love that song.

[Generic Other]

10. This one comes to mind...heh heh

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=YvJGs6MhZM0&feature=related

[MissMillie]

11. "How Great Thou Art"... and a lot of the Christmas stuff

"How Great Thou Art" is really a beautiful hymn.

[Blue_In_AK]

20. I love that one, too.

[WolverineDG]

12. Church in the Wildwood

my grandma taught me that song & told me she could always hear her father singing the bass line to it & that the church she attended when she was little was surrounded by woods. we'd sing it together on car trips to pass the time. :)

dg

[burrfoot]

13. I haven't been in years,

but two that stand out are "I Danced in the Morning" (to the Shaker tune "tis a gift") and "Joyful, Joyful We Adore Thee" (to the tune of Ode to Joy by B-money :evilgrin: )

[rurallib]

14. some of the old Latin hymns from the Catholic Church

'O Sanctisima, O Piisima" That runs in my head frequently.

[iris27]

17. Usually doesn't happen to me (my brain gets stuck on all the

pop garbage that's played on the overhead at work). But this past Easter, I couldn't shake a couple of the songs I used to BELT on Easter Sunday, to drown out the tone-deaf-but-loudly-singing members of my family..."I Know that My Redeemer Lives" and "Christ the Lord is Risen Today".

[One_Life_To_Give]

18. The Common Doxology

Probably from hearing/singing it every week. Never saw a Hymn number for it. But everyone knew the words.

[we can do it]

27. Me Too and Ode To Joy

[Manifestor_of_Light]

32. Then there's the unitarian version of the doxology.

Sung to the tune of "Hernando's Hideaway"!!! :evilgrin:

I personally CANNOT STAND Amazing Grace (I am NOT a wretch, and neither is anybody else--quite insulting to humanity in general).

I CANNOT STAND How Great Thou Art, cuz the grand-units made me play it on Grandma's Hammond Organ.

I was the only one of the kids or grandkids (out of ten) with enough musical talent to play it.

I don't like the ones that are bloody and gory like Are you washed in the blood?? Sick stuff.

As you can probably tell, I do not darken the doors of churches anymore.

All the really good stuff was written by guys like Mozart and Berlioz and Schubert and it is in Latin. And they only perform it in concert halls now, because in the 1960s, God started understanding the vernacular, and not just Latin and Greek, according to the Pope.

[Arugula Latte]

19. "Get Me the Hell Out of this Creepy Church"

Nah, thankfully I was never subjected to the torture of going to church as a child.

[The Velveteen Ocelot]

21. This one -- "Down Ampney"

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=6HPKL1wOVXk&feature=related

I'm a lapsed Episcopalian; love the music.

[TK421]

22. I don't know the name of the song, but I remember this one from Catholic grade school

"I've got the joy,joy,joy, of Jesus in my heart...YEAH
"Jesus in my heart, YEAH, Jesus in my heart"!
"And if the devil doesn't like it he can sit on a tack YEAH, sit on a tack, YEAH, sit on a tack!"

I remember this from CCD....still disturbs the shit out of me, to this day

[Shell Beau]

23. This one because we sing it every Sunday for Doxology

Praise God, from whom all blessings flow: praise God, all creatures here below: Alleluia! Alleluia! Praise God, the source of all our gifts! Praise Jesus Christ, whose power up-lifts! Praise the Spirit, Holy Spirit! Alleluia! Alleluia! Alleluia!

[LibDemAlways]

24. There's a really beautiful hymn called "How Beautiful" sung

every May during First Communion Season at the church I take my mom to. I'm generally not big on church music, but that one's a winner.

[alphafemale]

25. "Will the Circle be Unbroken?" nt

[BethCA66]

26. By and by, Lord, by and by...

Yep. This and many freedom songs masked as church music.

Let My People Go...

[GirlAfire]

28. What a Friend n/t

[clyrc]

29. I remember a lot of them

and still like them, too. Once when I was on the way to Dragon Mart, which is the world's largest dragon shaped building, my husband and I started singing random hymns. He grew up Methodist, and I grew up Southern Baptist, so we could only sing some that we both knew. It made my Muslim friend and my kids a little uncomfortable- we aren't all that good at singing- but sometimes you just have to sing, anyway.

I asked my friend how a religion could exist without music, but evidently it just can. I've had a few Christian Indian friends over the years, and they told me that Christians are considered to be musical people in India, which makes sense since music is important in many Christian religions. But I never realized that until I met lots of people from other religions.

I rejected Christianity many years ago, but the old hymns can still make me cry. My mom thinks that is proof that I am just being stubborn when I say I'm not Christian anymore, but I've also cried watching Whirling Dervishes. What they were doing seemed so private and so shared that I found it touching. I cry at a lot of touching things- I cried when Obama was elected, even though I am not his biggest fan. I cry when I see little kids in Halloween costumes, or in recitals. And anyway, the old hymns remind me of my grandma, who loved them and sang them beautifully. Sometimes it makes me sad that those songs really won't be part of my daughters' memories, but I'm not willing to send them to church just so they can hear them.

[abq e streeter]

30. still brings a tear to my eye

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=qh1xHVATwNU&feature=related

[MikeH]

31. A Mighty Fortress Is Our God

Ein' feste Burg ist unser Gott in German. Written by Martin Luther, and the best known of his hymns.

I remember hearing it and singing it at the Lutheran church I went to in my later childhood and as an adolescent. Even though I no longer consider myself to be a Christian (and have not been going to church for years), and no longer accept the theology expressed in the hymn, I consider it to be a great and uplifting piece of music.

I particularly enjoy hearing the tune in the last movement of Felix Mendelssohn's Symphony #5, the "Reformation" Symphony.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=RLWtzRBbN4k&feature=related

[ashling]

33. Just a bowl of butter beans

[jcboon]

34. Abide with Me

The Day Thou Gavest Lord Is Ended
There's sort of a theme there i think. .