This hymn was written mainly for theological reasons, in direct response to some of the popular nineteenth century communion hymns sung in our more traditional churches. For example, people still love to sing W. Chatterton Dix's ‘Alleluya, sing to Jesus' (tune ‘HYFRYDOL') and G.H. Bourne's ‘Lord, enthroned in heavenly splendour' (tune ‘ST HELEN'), yet their words in my view are highly questionable. In Dix we sing of Christ as ‘robed in flesh' and in Bourne we are asked to affirm: ‘Though the lowliest form doth veil thee … Here as there thine angels hail thee'. These reflect views which arose in the first century of the Christian movement that Jesus was not really human, but ‘put on' his humanity in the way that one wears a garment (‘Docetism'). He was God in human disguise; Christ only appeared to be human. Church authorities soon declared these doctrinal positions to be harmful and heretical. The Council of Chalcedon (451CE) affirmed the orthodox position that Christ was ‘fully human and fully divine'.

The music is quietly meditative. In the verses the melody is sung in unison, accompanied by Barry Brinson's lyrical piano accompaniment. The refrain can be sung unison or in SATB parts. As a communion hymn, the verses could be sung by a soloist or by members of the choir in turn. The accompaniment can also be plucked on the guitar. This piece works well as an offertory hymn.

The four verses express the longing that we find Christ as the presence in the Holy Communion, in the quest for justice, in our grieving, and in our passions and gifts. Like the famous 4thC Celtic hymn, ‘St. Patrick's Breastplate', the first three lines of each verse start with ‘Christ', creating a strong litany effect.

The ‘host' (v.1) at the feast is both food and the person of Christ. ‘Presence' means both ‘the one who is there' and has the technical meaning of the ‘real presence' of Christ in the Eucharist. Verse three calls on Christ to ‘be the silence in the once fearful grave'. This draws on Quaker understandings of silence as something to be embraced, as no longer fearful. The silence of death becomes a particular kind of presence, rather than an absence. Furthermore, in Christ, there is room for the creative doubt generated by grief. This questioning needs to be clearly distinguished from ‘fear and unbelief' (line 4). Unlike Dix's communion hymn, faith both believes and questions how. The hymn ends with a strongly incarnational fourth verse.

© Jane Simpson 2002