Fred Pratt Green

The Reverend Fred Pratt Green (2 September 1903 – 22 October 2000) CBE was a British Methodist minister and hymnwriter.

Born in Roby, Lancashire, England, he began his ministry in the Filey circuit. He was ordained as a Methodist minister in 1928 and served circuits in the north and south of England until 1969. During his career as a minister he wrote numerous plays and hymns. It was not until he retired, however, that he began writing prolifically.

His hymns reflect his rejection of fundamentalism and show his concern with social issues. They include many that were written to supply obvious liturgical needs of the modern church, speaking to topics or appropriate for events for which there were few traditional hymns available. His hymns appear in hymn books of various denominations, but most notably in Hymns and Psalms, the hymn book of the Methodist Church of Great Britain, and the United Methodist Hymnal used in the United States.

As well as writing his own hymns, Green produced translations, notably translating one of Dietrich Bonhoeffer's late poems as the hymn, "By gracious powers so wonderfully sheltered". Green also wrote poetry and his poem The Old Couple was included by Philip Larkin in 'The Oxford Book of Twentieth-Century English Verse' (1973).

The Pratt Green trust was set up from the royalties from his hymns. His scrapbooks and hymnbook collections are now held in the Pratt Green Collection at Durham University.

The collection of related materials at the Pitts Theology Library consists of 51 scrapbooks maintained by Fred Pratt Green from approximately 1971 until he ceased writing hymns in 1988. Green compiled an index to his scrapbooks that includes an index to the first line of each hymn, references to pieces in Hymns and Ballads by Fred Pratt Green, color-coded references to published works and translations, and information on how a hymn was used. The scrapbooks contain drafts of hymns, photographs, correspondence, bulletins and programs from services that used his hymns, announcements, newspaper and journal clippings, and handwritten notations by Green describing when a hymn was written and reprinted and why and for whom the piece was written.

List of hymns (partial)--
A Carol for Easter Eve
A Carol for Mothering Sunday
An upper room did our Lord prepare
Christ is the world's light
For the Fruits of This Creation
God in his love for us lent us this planet
God is here! As we his people meet to offer praise and prayer
How Blest Are They Who Trust in Christ
It is God who holds the nations in the hollow of his hand
Let Us Praise Creation's Lord
Long ago prophets knew Christ would come, born a Jew
Lord Let Us Listen When You Speak
Lord we have come at your own invitation
Now Praise the Hidden Love of God
O Christ, the Healer
Of All the Spirit's Gifts to Me
Rejoice in God's Saints
Seek the Lord
The church of Christ, in every age
There is a Love
This joyful Eastertide
To Mock Your Reign, O Dearest Lord
When in Our Music God Is Glorified
When Jesus Came to Jordan
When Our Confidence Is Shaken
When the Church of Jesus
Whom Shall I Send?
You Dear Lord Resplendent Within Our Darkness
Yours Be the Glory

Publications--
The Hymns of Fred Pratt Green, Braley The Expository Times.2003; 114: 409-412 [1]
The Old Couple. Poems. Stockport, Peterloo Poets, 1976
The Last Lap. A Sequence of Verse on the Theme of Old Age. London, Stainer & Bell Ltd and Carol Stream, Hope Publishing Company, 1991.

--wikipedia.org