Hymn of the Day: “Hope of the World” ACS 1085 Text:
Georgia Harkness, 1891–1974, alt.
Music: Trente quatre pseaumes de David, Geneva, 1551; arr. Claude Goudimel, 1514–1572

Although she was repeatedly denied admission as a seminary student, Georgia Harkness became the first woman to teach theology at an American seminary. She was ordained by the Methodist Church in 1926, but along with all women in that denomination, she was unable to serve as a minister until 1956. This text was the winning entry from a field of more than five hundred submissions in a hymn contest for the Second Assembly of the World Council of Churches in 1954, whose theme was “Jesus Christ, Hope of the World.” The tune name comes from the first line of Psalm 12, “Give help, O Lord.”