Growing Up in the Choir

Monday, August 25, 2025

Happy Monday, my friends! One of the church spaces that has often and historically been a haven for LGBTQIA+ people, particularly gay men, is the church choir. Artistic expression, otherwise considered unmanly, has been permitted when it praises God in song and dance. While we can point to specific Bible passages which support men praising God through music, in a lived reality, both Queer and straight men have found a refuge in church choirs. Not only have the careers of many noted musicians began by singing in church, entire genres have their roots in church music.

Even though my immediate family is not particularly musical, I’ve always been musically inclined. I grew up playing the violin and then the clarinet. When I was about ten years old, my church was celebrating its 100^th anniversary and put out a call for adults and children to join a special choir for the occasion. Through a misunderstanding, I got signed up for the weekly adult choir (there was no children’s or youth choir at the time). Starting as a boy soprano and then, following puberty, a tenor, I sang with the choir for the next nine years until I left for college. I also trained as a cantor to be able to sing at other services. At the height of my church kid/church teenager years I’d serve the 8am service as a master of ceremonies, sing with the choir at the 10am service, teach Sunday School[1], and then either join my family for or cantor the 12pm service. I didn’t think about it at the time, but my connection with the Divine and with church was almost entirely through liturgy and the arts. Naturally, when I arrived at Sewanee, I joined the University Choir[2] which serves as the liturgical working choir for All Saints Chapel, singing each Sunday service and a special Evensong each month in addition to the Festival of Lessons and Carols in December and a spring concert. Unfortunately, after college I’ve only sung briefly with other choirs.

Choral music requires a certain discipline which I have never fully had. For me music, particularly church music, should be personal and between the singer and God. Yes, I love good, well performed music, but we often run the risk of promoting the artistry over the object of the music, which in church should be God. When I served on the vestry[3] of an Episcopal church in Pennsylvania, we had a series of lengthy conversations about the merits of replacing the boiler versus continuing to fund paid choral scholar positions. The director of music in complete sincerity argued that people could wear coats in a cold church, but they couldn’t hear excellent music without the choral scholars.

Church music should elevate our hearts and minds to God. It should help create an experience of the holy among us and allow more of the kin-dom of God to break into our lives. However, our experience of faith and spirituality should not be dependent on that music. If music and the arts get us to church and assist our praise of God, it is serving its best ends. However, when music and the arts take the place of God in our lives or become the only reason we continue to engage with church or with faith, then we need to critically examine what we’re doing.

How has music and the arts shown up in your faith journey? What are your top five church songs?

Let us pray: O God, whom saints and angels delight to worship in heaven: Be ever present with your servants who seek through art and music to perfect the praises offered by your people on earth; and grant to them even now glimpses of your beauty, and make them worthy at length to behold it unveiled for evermore; through Jesus Christ our Lord. Amen.

“For Church Musicians and Artists,” The Book of Common Prayer 1982

Blessings on your weeks, my friends! Please let me know if there is anything I can do for you.

Faithfully,

Ben +

PS. My top five church songs are:

1.     “What Wondrous Love is This” (The Sacred Harp 1991 - #159)

2.     “King of Glory, King of Peace” (The Hymnal 1982 - #383)

3.     “Gather Us In” (Glory and Praise (3^rd ed.) - #471)

4.     “Dear Lord and Father of Mankind” (The Hymnal 1982 - #653)

5.     “I’ll Praise My Maker While I’ve Breath” (The Hymnal 1982 - #429)

[1] For the Catholics and former Catholics who might be reading, this was CCD.

[2] One of our guests on Season Two of “Coming Out Christian,” the Rev. Cn. Ryan Currie, was also a part of the University Choir and discusses the choir during his episode.

[3] Congregational governing board