I have chosen the hymn ‘Lead, kindly Light’ which we don’t sing very often nowadays but which I particularly like, partly because of the interesting circumstances in which the author (Newman) wrote it
but more importantly because of the affinity I feel with many of the sentiments expressed in it.
The words were written by John Henry Newman in 1833 when he was still in his Anglican heyday, twelve years before he became a Roman Catholic and 46 years before he became Cardinal Newman.
He was at the time Vicar of the University Church in Oxford but in 1833 made a long journey, alone, through southern Italy and Sicily during which he was struck down with a severe viral infection which nearly killed him.
But he did recover and while on his journey home through the Mediterranean by boat he was becalmed for a week, and during this time, in the stifling heat of mid summer and in his low physical and mental state, he wrote the words of this poem which subsequently became a hymn.
My earliest memory of the hymn was as a choir boy in the nineteen fifties, when we sang it, usually at Evensong, and the combination of the rather melancholy tune (‘Sandon’ by CH Purday) with the words ‘encircling gloom’ seemed to capture my Sunday evening mood with the school week looming ahead.
But why I like the hymn nowadays are the opening words ‘Lead, Kindly Light’. I find it quite difficult to articulate a clear faith in a personal God but the idea of God as a ‘Kindly Light’ is one which is both attractive and real as, in many ways, I do feel that I have been led through my life by this ‘kindly light’.
So although I may feel that ‘I am far from home’ in terms of resolving all my faith issues, I do feel able to pray that the kindly light will continue to lead me on.
I look forward to singing this hymn again and hope that we may use ‘Sandon’ as the tune – it may be melancholy but it’s also lovely and, for me, no other tune will do.
Lead, kindly Light,
amid the encircling gloom,
Lead thou me on;
The night is dark
and I am far from home,
Lead thou me on.
Keep thou my feet,
I do not ask to see
The distant scene, one step enough
for me.
I was not ever thus,
nor prayed that thou
Should’st lead me on;
I loved to choose and see my path; but now
Lead thou me on.
I loved the garish day,
and, spite of fears,
Pride ruled my will:
remember not past years.
So long thy power
hath blessed me, sure it still
Will lead me on.
O’er moor and fen, o’er crag and torrent, till
The night is gone;
And with the morn
those angel faces smile,
Which I have loved long since,
and lost awhile. |
