reasons to hold onto Worship II

1) Some nice hymn choices that I’m not sure have found their way into subsequent hymnals. The harmonizations, such as “Amazing Grace”, are often worth keeping.

2) Sequences are in their pre-1998 Lectionary form (so the accentuation patterns actually WORK...more on that below), and they include a prose translation, which is helpful if, like me, your Latin is iffy at best. (And they include the Lauda Sion sequence on Body and Blood Sunday in their Lectionary.)

3) The Gelineau responses are often better than what is in Worship III; compare, for example, the Ps. 42/43 response (Easter Vigil #7) in Worship II with what you find in the current Gelineau psalter. The former is lyrical and sticks in your head; the latter is uninspiring and kinda ugly, in my not-always-humble opinion. (The text is identical, mind you.)

I actually had not realized that the pre-1998 Lectionary has the sequences in a form that respects the metrical stresses in the text, but it doesn’t surprise me given what one reason of Bp. Trautman & Co. talking about adapting language to the needs of people today. (I’ll bet people today like their poetry to rhyme just as much as people in 1940 did.)

It is interesting how the preface states a preference for not altering traditional hymn texts that, 11 years later in Worship III, the same company would effectively negate.

Any other reasons to hold onto a Worship II? (They *can* still be ordered from GIA.)