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Sunday, November 1, 2026

by Joshua L. Mazur, Director of Music

Hymn 287: For All the Saints

Few hymns are more closely associated with a particular feast than For All the Saints. Written by William Walsham How, an Anglican priest who later became Bishop of Wakefield, the text was first published in 1864. How was particularly concerned with the pastoral work of the Church, and his hymn gives ordinary Christians a way to understand their place among the saints of God.

The hymn begins by giving thanks for those who have completed their earthly lives in faith. As the stanzas unfold, however, the congregation finds itself included in the story. We sing of those who have gone before us, of our own continuing struggles, and of the day when the whole Church will be gathered in God's presence. The hymn draws upon the New Testament's understanding of the saints as God's holy people, united in Christ across generations and even across death.

SINE NOMINE

The tune SINE NOMINE was composed by Ralph Vaughan Williams for The English Hymnal of 1906. Its Latin name means “without name,” an appropriate title for a hymn celebrating the countless faithful whose names may be unknown to us but whose lives are known to God.

Vaughan Williams gives the hymn a remarkable sense of movement. The long musical phrases carry the congregation forward, while the recurring Alleluias provide a joyful response to each stanza. The music is particularly effective in procession, and its energy helps sustain a text that tells a substantial story over several verses.

One Communion and Fellowship

This year, All Saints' Day falls on Sunday, November 1, making our parish's patronal feast especially significant. The appointed reading from Revelation describes “a great multitude that no one could count, from every nation, from all tribes and peoples and languages,” standing before the throne of God. The Collect asks God to grant that we may follow His saints in virtuous and godly living and come to the joys prepared for those who love Him.

Our Prayer Book describes the Church as the communion of saints, the whole family of God, living and departed, united in Christ. We remember the faithful who have gone before us with gratitude, and we recognize that we share their calling. Their lives provide examples of Christian faithfulness, and their hope in the resurrection is our hope as well.

The hymn's final vision is of the Church gathered together in the worship of God. On our patronal feast, that is a particularly fitting reminder of what it means to belong to All Saints'. We have inherited the faith from those who came before us, and we bear responsibility for passing it faithfully to those who will follow.

What will those who come after us inherit from the faithfulness of our lives?