"It is indeed a moral rather than a musical issue."

Vaughan Williams, on discussing Hymn tunes, stated, "It is indeed a moral rather than a musical issue. No doubt it requires a certain effort to tune oneself to the moral atmosphere implied by a fine melody; and it is far easier to dwell in the miasma of the languishing and sentimental hymn tunes which so often disfigure our services. Such poverty of heart may not be uncommon, but at least it should not be encouraged by those who direct the services of the Church; it ought no longer to be true anywhere that the most exalted moments of a church-goer's week are associated with music that would not be tolerated in any place of secular entertainment." (171)

I am not sure whether or not Vaughan Williams was a Christian, so I won't harp on the fact that he leaves out the text of the songs and sticks only to the tune. However, he is right about the tunes of our Christian worship songs. They should not be embarrassing and should be quality tunes. Unfortunately, we have the same problem of poor, embarrassing tunes today. Some are unsingable, unimaginative, and give off a vile odor to the secular world. My prayer is that more and more of Christian musicians today will work hard to produce modern hymns that have tunes with quality and singability (and, of course, with good texts).