“I sing because I… [have] found it the best way for me to express my joy or sorrow, and I can sense that people are sending back their own feelings.
“But it also allows me to step into the emotional shoes of the composer—to step beyond an intellectual empathy with another person and imagine that I really feel what he or she wanted to convey. So even if the lyrics are not something I would write, I have a deeper understanding of another human being.
“With gratitude we celebrate the gifts shared. With wonder and delight we receive. May the melodic offerings continue to touch our hearts and nurture our spirits.” -From a responsive reading by Carie J. Johnsen
Sing something today and notice how it makes you feel.
Music cuts both ways. Because it appeals directly to the emotions, it can spread the most pernicious nonsense or even dangerous messages. There’s a reason “UUs read ahead in the hymnal to see if they agree with the words.”