Hymn Series for LGBTQ+ Pride Month

By Zachary Duell

This month at Good Sam, we’re observing Pride Month with a series of hymns and songs that celebrate the love that comes from God and moves through and between all of creation.

Using hymns from The Hymn Society’s publication Songs for the Holy Other, each Sunday will feature one hymn tied both to the readings and liturgy of the day, as well as themes of love, inclusion, and solidarity. In discussing the importance of recognizing and being open to those marked by society as “other”, priest, hymnist, and theologian Rev. Dr. Carl P. Daw, Jr. writes:

Human otherness (of whatever kind) provides a sacramental reminder of the ultimate otherness of God, and openness to human otherness has the potential to enlarge our perception of and receptivity to divine otherness. It is also an essential element of human maturity to recognize otherness, i.e. to know where the self ends and otherness begins, whether that otherness be other people or non-human objects. From a theological perspective, “otherness” is a necessary dimension of the movement from the disappointments of self-sufficiency to the assurances of trust in God.

Expanding on Rev. Dr. Daw’s words, The Hymn Society includes in the preface to Songs for the Holy Other:

The gifts God has given us are not in spite of our otherness, our queerness, our LGBTQIA2S+ identities, but rather our identities are inextricably tied up in our God-given gifts, and are, in and of themselves, a gift to the church, as we reflect the rainbow diversity of God’s creation.

Hymn #379 in our hymnal (God Is Love, Let Heaven Adore Him), which we sang at the 10:30 Eucharist on June 2nd, reminds us that the same God who “laid the earth’s foundation”, who “spread the heavens above”, who “breathes through all creation”, this same God of infinite, incomprehensible power is simultaneously the very embodiment of infinite, incomprehensible Love. And, as Fr. Marshall reminded us in his sermon on that same Sunday (available to watch on YouTube under the “Sermons” playlist!), the way we follow Christ’s commandment to love the Lord our God with all our heart, soul, strength, and mind is by loving our neighbor as ourselves.

“God Is Love, let heaven adore Him; God Is Love, let earth rejoice!” and at Good Sam this Pride Month, we’ll rejoice in songs celebrating the strength and diversity of our love for one another: the Love that Is God.