Today’s post is a little more personal because it revolves around Jean Sibelius.  Bear with me while I try to explain.

Today is the birthday of Jean Sibelius, born on this date in 1865. Sibelius wrote seven symphonies and many other great pieces of music, but perhaps none are as familiar as his tone poem “Finlandia.”  Below is a simple acoustic guitar rendition of “Finlandia.”  The Christian hymn “Be Still, My Soul” is set to this music, as is the less well-known “This Is My Song.”  It was this latter hymn that was instrumental (pardon the pun) in my decision to attend the Theological School at Drew University and pursue my Master of Divinity degree there.

It was Spring Break at Eastern Kentucky University in the year 1985, and a fellow student and I were considering pastoral ministry.  Drew was having a convocation for prospective new students and Mark Girard, the minister at the Wesley Foundation at EKU, and our mentor, allowed us to use the center’s van to travel from Kentucky to Madison, NJ, where Drew is located.  We had $80.00 between us and a gas card that was only good in Ohio and Kentucky.

Leaving on a Wednesday afternoon, we drove all through the night to get to Drew on Thursday morning.  After a brief detour through Scranton, PA (you had to be there), we arrived just in time to attend the weekly chapel service at the Seminary.  Charles Rice, the professor of preaching and worship, delivered the sermon and referenced the movie “Mass Appeal,” about a young Catholic seminarian having trouble completing his studies. It was a great sermon.  I had never heard anyone preach so quietly and yet so forcefully before (I reflect upon the key scene of this film and in Rice’s sermon near the the end of this post).

After the message came the prayers and then we celebrated Holy Communion together.  This communion time remains the most powerful celebration of the sacrament I have ever experienced.  Finally, at the end of the service, we all stood and sang, “This Is My Song.”

Having grown up in the pentecostal “Church of God,” I had never heard, let alone sang, this hymn.  I was also thoroughly unfamiliar with the hymn tune.  But as we sang, something came over me, and I knew then and there that I would attend Drew Theological School to earn my M.Div.  Such can be the power of a single sermon and a simple selection of music.  The words to “This Is My Song” are printed below the video.

“This Is My Song”

This is my song, O God of all the nations,
a song of peace for lands afar and mine;
this is my home, the country where my heart is;
here are my hopes, my dreams, my holy shrine:
but other hearts in other lands are beating
with hopes and dreams as true and high as mine.

My country’s skies are bluer than the ocean,
and sunlight beams on cloverleaf and pine;
but other lands have sunlight too, and clover,
and skies are everywhere as blue as mine:
O hear my song, thou God of all the nations,
a song of peace for their land and for mine.

This is my prayer, O Lord of all earth’s kingdoms,
thy kingdom come, on earth, thy will be done;
let Christ be lifted up ’til all shall serve him,
and hearts united, learn to live as one:
O hear my prayer, thou God of all the nations,
myself I give thee — let thy will be done.

My take on the film “Mass Appeal.”

One of my favorite films is entitled Mass Appeal . It is the story of a brash young man who wants to become a priest. I feel a ready identification with Mark Dolson, who has just been ordained a deacon. The journey that Mark makes is similar to my own. Both of us had at one time left the Church, only to find that we were drawn back into it by God and God’s desire for us to work in ministry through ordination.

Mark gives two sermons in the film which are illustrative of two very distinct attitudes towards the Church. The first one is a total flop. He accuses the congregation of a variety of sins, he rakes them over the coals, and alienates himself from the people. But over the course of a few weeks some rather dramatic changes occur. Father Farley, who is assigned to work with Mark, sees an angry young man and asks him why he wants to become a priest anyway. Mark seems so full of hate, and Farley asks if he does indeed hate the people – that would seem to be the only reason for saying some of the things he says. Mark says that he doesn’t hate them; he loves them. Father Farley then tells him to show the people his love.

In his second sermon, a changed Mark Dolson tells the story of why he decided to become a priest. He tells a story about his fish tank and tropical fish. In concluding this section, I quote his words, for they say much about my own decision to enter ministry and how my religious development has occurred. Mark begins to preach . . .

I had a tank of tropical fish. Someone turned up the tank heater and they all boiled. I woke up on a Friday morning and went to feed them, and there they were. All my beautiful fish floating on top. Most of them split into, others with their eyes hanging out. It looked like violence.

But it was such a quiet night. And I remember wishing I had the kind of ears that could hear fish screams, because they looked as if they had suffered, and I wanted so badly to save them.  And that Sunday in church I heard that Christ had told his apostles to be fishers of men. And from then on I looked upon all the the people in the church as fish.

I was young, so I saw them as beautiful tropical fish, and so I knew they were all quiet screamers. The church was so quiet. I thought everyone was boiling, and I wanted the kind of ears that could hear what they were screaming about, cause I wanted to save them.

As I got older the people lost the look of tropical fish. They became catfish to me – just overdressed scavengers. So I drowned out whatever I might be able to hear, and made my world my tank, so hot that I almost split. But now I am back listening, listening for the screams of angels.

James Thurber was born on this date in 1894, Flip Wilson in 1933, and David Carradine in 1935. The singer Sinead O’Connor is 42 years old today, and on this date in 1980, John Lennon was killed by Mark David Chapman.  Finally, on  Dec. 8, 1941, the United States entered World War II as Congress declared war against Japan one day after the attack on Pearl Harbor.

Below are a couple of videos that seem like perfect companion pieces to the hymn “This Is My Song” printed above.  The first features Thurber’s story “The Last Flower.”  The second contains images of the Civil War and has Sinead O’Connor singing “Paddy’s Lament.”