Kumbaya?

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mozier

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Whenever comtemporary church music is criticized (and in many cases, rightly so!), the song “Kumbaya” is used to describe it. But seriously, when was the last time anyone actually heard the song “Kumbaya” used in their respective parishes?

For me, I honestly cannot remember, other than the possibility of it being used back when I was in early primary school in the early 1970’s. I actually remember the song “Whatsoever You Do” and “Let There Be Peace On Earth” a lot more, the politically incorrect versions that used “to the least of my brothers” and “brothers all are we”, respectively.

So do tell! When was the last time you heard “Kumbaya” literally sung in your parish?
 
mozier said:
Whenever comtemporary church music is criticized (and in many cases, rightly so!), the song “Kumbaya” is used to describe it. But seriously, when was the last time anyone actually heard the song “Kumbaya” used in their respective parishes?

For me, I honestly cannot remember, other than the possibility of it being used back when I was in early primary school in the early 1970’s. I actually remember the song “Whatsoever You Do” and “Let There Be Peace On Earth” a lot more, the politically incorrect versions that used “to the least of my brothers” and “brothers all are we”, respectively.

So do tell! When was the last time you heard “Kumbaya” literally sung in your parish?
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Only once in my entire life have I actually heard ‘Kumbaya’ sung in a church - and that wasn’t my parish, it was overseas. Almost exactly 20 years ago, if memory serves.

I’m also of a vintage to remember ‘Whatsoever you do’. I didn’t know ‘Let there be Peace on Earth’ was old-school, I think I only first heard it about five years ago or so.
 
LilyM said:
Only once in my entire life have I actually heard ‘Kumbaya’ sung in a church - and that wasn’t my parish, it was overseas. Almost exactly 20 years ago, if memory serves.

I’m also of a vintage to remember ‘Whatsoever you do’. I didn’t know ‘Let there be Peace on Earth’ was old-school, I think I only first heard it about five years ago or so.
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I’ve heard “Come by here” within the last 5 years – they think the kids can’t sing anything more complicated.

“Let There Be Peace on Earth” I haven’t heard recently but “Whatsoever you do” I’ve heard in the last couple of months and, worse, almost every week for Communion at the anticipated Sunday Mass we sing “Peace is Flowing Like a River”. That one makes me want to hurl.
 
I have never (that I remember) heard Kumbaya sung in a parish. However, it is a very good short-cut to a long description. I mean, everyone knows what song you mean, and most people have an excellent idea what kind of music you are talking about and a pretty good idea of what you are saying about it. It evokes a whole mental picture.

It’s like using “Pong” or “Space Invaders” to evoke the early days of video games.

–Jen

P.S. I think “Let There be Peace on Earth” was written in the 50s by Protestants, but I am not sure about that. As for “Peace is Flowing Like a River,” how can you stay awake long enough to be bothered by it? 😉
 
revert_jen said:
P.S. I think “Let There be Peace on Earth” was written in the 50s by Protestants, but I am not sure about that.
1955 Sy Miller; Jill Jackson. She wrote the lyrics after surviving a suicide attempt.

As for “Peace is Flowing Like a River,” how can you stay awake long enough to be bothered by it? 😉

If I fall asleep I’ll fall and crack my head, I’m in the Communion line. 😃
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About a year and a half ago, the children’s choir at our former parish sang “Kumbaya” during the 11:30 mass. That’s the only time I’ve heard it in a church since my own childhood in the 1970’s, when it was a staple of my school’s Friday morning chapel service.
 
mozier said:
Whenever comtemporary church music is criticized (and in many cases, rightly so!), the song “Kumbaya” is used to describe it. But seriously, when was the last time anyone actually heard the song “Kumbaya” used in their respective parishes?

For me, I honestly cannot remember, other than the possibility of it being used back when I was in early primary school in the early 1970’s. I actually remember the song “Whatsoever You Do” and “Let There Be Peace On Earth” a lot more, the politically incorrect versions that used “to the least of my brothers” and “brothers all are we”, respectively.

So do tell! When was the last time you heard “Kumbaya” literally sung in your parish?
Click to expand...
Last time I heard and had to sing “Kumbaya” was in the late 1980s and I was in grade school. But back then, even as children, we didn’t really take that hymn seriously. I think that the teachers finally caught on because, we never sang it again after about 5th grade, nor did we ever hear the younger grades sing it.

“Whatsoever You Do”, we’ve sung through highschool and even a bit in college, although I haven’t heard it done for a few years. “Let There Be Peace On Earth” I still get as a request once in a while for funerals and have heard it sung during a regular Sunday mass at parishes I’ve attended as a visitor.
 
mozier said:
Whenever comtemporary church music is criticized (and in many cases, rightly so!), the song “Kumbaya” is used to describe it. But seriously, when was the last time anyone actually heard the song “Kumbaya” used in their respective parishes?

For me, I honestly cannot remember, other than the possibility of it being used back when I was in early primary school in the early 1970’s. I actually remember the song “Whatsoever You Do” and “Let There Be Peace On Earth” a lot more, the politically incorrect versions that used “to the least of my brothers” and “brothers all are we”, respectively.

So do tell! When was the last time you heard “Kumbaya” literally sung in your parish?
Click to expand...
Kumbaya at the parish attached to my kid’s school (not my “official” parish) last year.

Let there Be Peace on Earth - last May at 8th grade graduation - I quipped that I sang it at my own 8th grade graduation.

Whatsoever You Do - just a few weeks ago at my own parish’s Sunday Mass. The music leader tries to use the PC lyrics but there are several of us “old school” types who happily sing about our brothers. 😉
 
Kumbaya at my church - never.

Let There Be Peace on Earth - Seventh Sunday of Easter this year.

Whatsoever you do - Back in 2007.
 
To the best of my knowledge I haven’t heard Kumbaya in over 20 years. (Well, maybe on television.) And if I ever heard it at Mass it was probably not in a parish church setting. It would most likely have been for a school function or at a retreat center, or something like that. (So we are speaking 1970s). It was more a song to be sung for prayer meetings, bible study, and retreats.

I think I first learned it when I was a Girl Scout back in the 1960s. I’ve always thought of it as a campfire kind of song.

I honestly can’t remember the last time I heard “Whatsoever You Do” or “Let There Be Peace On Earth”. I have this sense that I have heard them both in the last two or three years but it wasn’t at any Mass for which my choir sings. So it either wasn’t for a Mass or it must have been at some other parish or for a weekday Mass.
 
Agape_Thom said:
Is there a problem with a song or hymn if it is written by “Protestants”?
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If the song is theologically compatible with Catholicism and musically suitable for mass, then no.

If the song is not theologically compatible with Catholicism and not musically suitable for mass, then yes.
 
I’ve never heard “Kumbaya” sung during a mass, but I do remember at least once we had to sing it during CCD in my elementary school years. This would have been sometime in the late '80s or very early '90s. Ah, repressed memories… :o
 
Kumbaya was sung in my old parish about 4 years ago. I left right after that. So two years later I went back to see how things had deteriorated, and no Kumbaya! However, I got to struggle through the “clappy” Gloria. That did it. I left for a much more reverent parish.
 
mozier said:
Whenever comtemporary church music is criticized (and in many cases, rightly so!), the song “Kumbaya” is used to describe it. But seriously, when was the last time anyone actually heard the song “Kumbaya” used in their respective parishes?

For me, I honestly cannot remember, other than the possibility of it being used back when I was in early primary school in the early 1970’s. I actually remember the song “Whatsoever You Do” and “Let There Be Peace On Earth” a lot more, the politically incorrect versions that used “to the least of my brothers” and “brothers all are we”, respectively.

So do tell! When was the last time you heard “Kumbaya” literally sung in your parish?
Click to expand...
:rotfl: mozier

Mmmmm…Only as a joke, and even that was in the eighties.

It can really go downhill fast…

"Someone’s laughing Lord…
"someone’s crying Lord…
"Someone’s sleeping Lord…
"Someone’s vomiting Lord…Kumbayah.

Plays out more like a Mad Lib than a P & W chorus. 😛
 
Kumbaya? Last heard in my old parish about 20 years ago.
Let There Be Peace…? Don’t recall it sung, but an organist played it once or twice. This one became the most popular song at the six-nights a week campfires at a private camp where I worked an awful long time ago. Am not sure if 36 campfires in six weeks or this song 36 times in six weeks was worse.
I think the reference to Kumbaya is a sort of blanket description of the guitar-folk Masses, some of which tended to slip over into other Masses.
Now, if our cantor can just find a few new songs that are not at funeral pace with the organ dragging along behind. I prefer to stay awake during Mass.
 
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