Tag: war

Beyond the crime of crippled conversation…in spite of degradation

Beyond the crime of crippled conversation

1	Beyond the crime of crippled conversation, 
	that thunders when diplomacy is dead, 
	a still small voice will whisper in the darkness 
	dispelling what was once a living dread.

2	Here love, like feathers, scatters in a moment, 
	the breeze of war is reaching hatred’s height, 
	yet love is not forgotten or extinguished, 
	still bids us walk within the dying light.

3	And dawn will come again, another morning, 
	to shed its colours on a new found way, 
	and hope will rise in spite of degradation, 
	and still our praise will wake this dancing day.

Andrew E Pratt (born 1948)
© 2016 Stainer and Bell Ltd., London, England, www.stainer.co.uk. Please include any reproduction for local church use on your CCL Licence returns. All wider and any commercial use requires prior application to Stainer & Bell Ltd.


Watercolour © Andrew Pratt

When evil gathers in the wings – A hymn for Remembrance at a time of international tension

When evil gathers in the wings  - A hymn for Remembrance at a time of international tension

1	When evil gathers in the wings 
	the time of crisis offers choice: 
	to rise with courage and resist 
	or keep our silence, still each voice. 
	What shall we do when chaos reigns, 
	act out God’s love? Submit to chains?

2	As history echoes from the past, 
	while memories can tend to fade, 
	‘lest we forget’ let us recast 
	the hard decisions others made: 
	to live the love that Christ had shown, 
	self-sacrificial, Spirit blown.

Andrew E Pratt (born 1948)
Words © 2019 Stainer & Bell Ltd, London, England copyright@stainer.co.uk . Please include any reproduction for local church use on your CCL Licence returns. All wider and any commercial use requires prior application to Stainer & Bell Ltd
Metre: 8 8 8 8 8 8
Tune: ABINGDON



If God in love invests us with a voice – a Christian response to war?

At at a time of continued war in Israel/Palestine and Ukraine/Russia as people seek, or fear, to protest what might our Christian response be?

If God in love invests us with a voice, 
and given hell on earth, a human choice,
we cannot cry our tears into this night 
if we are silent with our people’s plight.

Don’t  say that they are foreign, not our own,
these faces greeting rocket, tank or drone, 
for as these people flee towards our shore 
they seek for care and safety, nothing more.

Humanity, the common life we share,
is all that’s left that we can hold and bear, 
so as we look into each human face, 
see Christ and through God’s Spirit offer grace.

Andrew Pratt 7/9/2025
Words © 2015 Stainer & Bell Ltd, London, England copyright@stainer.co.uk . Please include any reproduction for local church use on your CCL Licence returns. All wider and any commercial use requires prior application to Stainer & Bell Ltd
Metre: 10.10.10.10
Tune: EVENTIDE; ST AGNES (Langran)

Good God what are we doing? – a hymn in a time of war and remembrance of Hiroshima

Good God what are we doing? – a hymn in a time of war and remembrance of Hiroshima

Good God what are we doing 
upon this harrowed earth, 
with children  starved, or banished, 
a hell has to come to birth?
And even now the mid-wives
see nurtured babies die, 
while politicians hunker
and hide behind a lie.

If God is good the image 
that we uphold and bear 
is marred beyond cognition, 
humanity lacks care. 
A spark of holy presence   
becomes a fading shard
while hopeful grace is damaged,
love’s clarity is barred.

Good God forgive indifference 
that lets our children die, 
raise up again a spirit 
of grace beyond a sigh, 
until we cradle babies 
and nurture them with love, 
until war’s hawks are banished, 
peace settling like dove.

Andrew E Pratt (born 1948)
Words © 2026 Stainer & Bell Ltd, London, England copyright@stainer.co.uk . Please include any reproduction for local church use on your CCL Licence returns. All wider and any commercial use requires prior application to Stainer & Bell Ltd
Metre: 7.6.7.6 D
Tune: PASSION CHORALE