Voices Found: sing for Advent justice and peace with Star Child, VF35,
Voices Found #35
Star-child, earth child, go-between of God,
love Child, Christ-child, heaven's lightening rod,
Refrain:
this year, this year, let the day arrive,
when Christmas comes to everyone,
everyone alive!
Street child, beat Chile, no place left to go,
hurt child, used child no one wants to know,
Refrain:
this year, this year, let the day arrive,
when Christmas comes to everyone,
everyone alive!
Hoped for peace child, God's stupendous sign,
down-to earth Child, star of stars that shine.
Refrain:
this year, this year, let the day arrive,
when Christmas comes to everyone,
everyone alive!
Words: Shirley Erena Murray (1931-2020) verses 1, 2 and 5
Music: Star-child, Carlton R. Young
Shirley and John Murray were a team in every sense of the word. John, who died in February 2017, was an ordained minister of the Presbyterian Church of New Zealand. He was directly responsible for encouraging Shirley to begin writing poetry for song. That nudge was a direct result of John’s inability to find appropriate post-sermon hymns using conventional resources.
Shirley’s self-acknowledged mentor was hymn writer Brian Wren. Her first reaction to his hymns was that they were “both personal and political,” and she found it enormously appealing that his creativity went beyond conventional wisdom. From the moment she first experienced the clarity of his writing, she recalled thinking, “I’d like to be like that!”
She had a particular interest in creating new Christmas carols. “Carols have kept puzzling me, annoying me,” she said. She felt that the incarnation story needed to be taken far more seriously than many of what she referred to as “jolly songs of the season” do. With tongue only partially in cheek, John added that, because Christmas in New Zealand occurs as a midsummer holiday, it was also important to develop “snow-free carols.
From an online article in Broadview magazine by Ron Klusmeier
Voices Found offers Murray's carol as a reminder that Christmas means justice and peace for all . As a "snow free" carol for it is especially appropriate for singing in lands, including South Florida, where snow does not fall at Christmas. The Voices Found committee was delighted to add "Star-Child" to our Advent collection of congregational song.
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