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Easter Revolution – Garth’s new album and companion booklet now available!

It is a revolution of peacemaking, of following Jesus the peacemaker. It is a revolution that rejects violence as a solution, rejects greed, and embraces justice for all, sharing with all and welcoming the forgotten. It is a rejection of past ways of mistreating people and is a call for equality. It also recognises the responsibility for the care of the planet. It is a revolution of hope.

Garth Hewitt

The Album – 15 songs calling us to be members of the Easter Revolution – click here for more details and to order your CD

or here for your MP3 download

The Book – Here Garth has woven together art, wisdom and challenge from a selection of poets, painters, writers and prophets.Thirty-two colour pages include all the lyrics from the Easter Revolution album, some further thoughts of Garth on the subject of Easter, and much more – click here to find out who else’s thoughts Garth has included, and to order your copy

Making Holy Dreams Come True

What have they done to the “Little Town”?

Imprisoned it in a concrete wall

Bethlehem – once a holy city

Trapped inside a ghetto wall.

Here where angels sang of peace

Where love and hope were born anew

Once surrounded by a heavenly host

Now surrounded by a concrete view.

Yet people crushed and hidden away

Still celebrate on Christmas Eve

Lighting candles for the child –

They still remember – still believe.

So light a candle this Holy Night

For Bethlehem and Beit Sahour

And for all the people caught inside

That cold and grey prison wall

Longing for a world of peace

Where all are treated equally

Where all can recognise their worth

Where all can live with dignity –

Where all can join hands with neighbours

Whether Muslim, Christian or Jew

And find a way to live together

Making Holy dreams

Making Holy dreams come true.

The Dust of Death

I recorded this song, ’The Dust of Death’, in 1976, for my ‘Love Song For the Earth’ album – it is extraordinary how relevant these words seem this week (COP26)

In 1970 Tom Paxton released ‘Whose Garden Was This’ which I covered on my recent ‘My Name is Palestine’ album. Joni Mitchell’s ‘Big Yellow Taxi’ was also 1970 – we’ve been talking about these things for a long time! This week should be a week of action!

We came across this video put together by “e27mark” and this seems like a good time to share it.

May we never be silent

O God, just and loving,
May we find a way to speak up
for those who are being brutalised,
ignored or forgotten.
May we be those who speak up for refugees,
May we be those who speak up for the oppressed in Palestine
May we bring support where we can and may we never be silent.

Love is never silent and justice is never silent –
May we find ways to speak up
Especially when our sisters and brothers are asking for our solidarity –

with our voices telling the story.
May we echo the Palestinian Christian “Cry for hope”
And stand against injustice and apartheid –
And stand against the ethnic cleansing of Palestinians.
May we show the love and justice of Jesus
And find ways for our voices to tell the story.

And may the God who dances in creation
Who embraces us with human love
Who shakes our lives like thunder
Bless us and drive us out with power
To fill the world with her justice.

The final paragraph is a blessing from St Hilda’s Community

A song and a prayer for Easter

Song for Easter

Jesus of the Scars

If we have never sought, we seek you now;

Your eyes burn through the dark our only stars;

We must have sight of thorn-marks on your brow,

We must have you, O Jesus of the scars.

The heavens frighten us, they are too calm;

In all the universe we have no place

Our wounds are hurting us; where is the balm?

Lord Jesus, by your scars we know your grace

O Jesus of the scars we seek you now

We must have sight of the thorn-marks on your brow

We must have you, O Jesus of the scars

The other gods were strong but you were weak;

They rode, but you did stumble to a throne;

But to our wounds only God’s wounds can speak,

And not a god has wounds but you alone.

music by Garth Hewitt

poem by Edward Shillito, written at the end of the First World War

Prayer for Easter

O God, whether in India, Greece or Bethlehem

Or anywhere else in our global village

Lead us through the wilderness of worry, despair,

Illness, sorrow and suffering

And lead our wounded world to the resurrection of hope.

May we all learn from this world wide virus

That we are all in this together.

So no more violence and war,

No more greed and selfishness –

It is time to support one another

And genuinely love our neighbour as ourself.

Let Nothing Disturb You

Garth tells the background to the song:

“‘Let Nothing Disturb You’ was inspired by some words of Teresa of Avila, also known as St Teresa of Jesus (1515 – 1582). She was a Prioress and Carmelite nun, a central figure in a movement of spiritual and monastic renewal.

And she wrote these words as a poem, translated here:

All things are passing

God alone never changes

Patience gains all things

If you have God

You will want for nothing

God alone suffices

These words were taken by musicians at Taizé and turned into a short four line song – suitable for times of worship, and the song is repeated again and again. Taizé music is beautiful and very suitable for Lent. I heard the Taizé song from friend and guitarist Dave Perry who played it to a group of us one evening – Dave was the guitarist on my new album My Name Is Palestine, which includes this song.

I liked this chorus, and thought that for a song on an album it needed a bit more progression so I wrote three other verses and then a chorus section. The words are picking up on the original theme of Teresa and also Taizé, where again the song is normally sung in Spanish so I end the song with the Spanish words “Nada te turbé”. Read more…

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