Still basking in the glow created by participating with over 900 UU's Singing, Shouting, Celebrating New England Hymns, led earlier that day by Rev. David A. Johnson and Eugene Navias in Unitarian Universalist history-rich Mechanics Hall, I was reading for the first time Our Chosen Faith by UUA president John A. Buehrens and F. Forrester Church. I found their exposition of UUA principles so harmonious with my own I felt I could well have authored such a book myself (or perhaps wished I had).
With that realization, I felt an almost irresistible urge to create a song. On reflection, I now realize that it was the "muse" of the Source of all creation moving in my soul. I began composing the first verse and the accompanying melody. The following morning, I polished the lyrics while immersed in an inspirational Sunday service -- Rev. Dr. Buehrens' talk on the UU ministry, Rev. Barbara Merritt's sermon on Fixing the World, together with music director Will Sherwood and the choir's wonderful music -- at First Unitarian Church in Worcester. Continuing in the after-glow, I wrote verses two and three after returning home in Sunderland, MA. One week later, while completing my reading of Our Chosen Faith, particularly the lore about our flaming chalice, I wrote the last verse.
It seems to me our UUA covenant and principles express three major themes: transpersonal, personal, and interpersonal. My hymn reiterates those three themes. While each of the four stanzas blend all three themes, my intent is to make the first more transpersonal, focusing on awakening to our essential transcendental, yet imminent, psychospiritual unity with our ageless, infinite Source, and freedom to choose our faith. The second stanza is more individualistic and personal in focus, with emphasis on rising in our consciousness to realize our authentic individuated self, and our liberty and responsibility for "working out our own salvation." The third is more social and interpersonal, focusing on addressing and solving social problems -- particularly "managing conflict." The last stanza is more evangelistic in orientation. Guided by the glow of our flaming chalice, this verse reflects the vision of us Unitarian Universalists as proactive agents of mutually healthful social change.
I am grateful to all those people identified above on whose shoulders I stood to create this hymn. Also, my loving and understanding wife, Millis Mershon, who supportively put up with my obsessive-like preoccupation with composing it. Others who deserve recognition and thanks for their interest, time, expertise, and encouragement are Fran Plumer, music director at the Unitarian Universalist Society of Amherst; professional musician and possessor of numerous other professions, Carolyn Holstein; professional musicians Michael and Lynn Sussman; and professor of music at the University of Massachusetts Amherst Horace Boyer, who put my single-voice melody into four-part harmony. Finally, I am indebted to the Source of all inspiration, and to the congregation of the Unitarian Universalist Society of Amherst who, during our Sunday service on January 14, 1996, in which we featured an adaptation of Singing, Shouting, Celebrating New England Hymns, gave my hymn the acid test for "congregation singability and acceptability." The experience was ineffable. To say the very least, I was thrilled with the spirit and gusto with which they sang Awake, Each Soul, and Choose Your Faith. I hope that, when you sing it, you too will find it an enjoyable, inspirational, and healthful experience.
Robert Wayne Johnston, Unitarian Universalist Society of Amherst, Massachusetts, February 14, 1996.