especially if bagpipes are involved.
Makes me cry every time. Maybe because it's been played on a couple of funerals that I have had the misfortune to attend.

and lead singing practice. I'm constantly impressed by the power of these tunes, old and new.
For kids I like 'Give Me Oil In My Lamp' and 'One More Step Along The World I Go' just great, really inspiring.
I'm not deeply religious, but it's a truly uplifting experience to hear these songs sung well by a large group.

Here's one:

....a huge amount of affection for the old "English Hymnal" and "Hymns Ancient & Modern" tunes. I was a cathedral chorister as a kid, and the school I went to after that was very proud of the massively raucous and enthusiastic roaring of the hymns every morning in chapel. Yes, I went to public school.

It was brilliant, though: I remember my first morning at public school so clearly. I filed into the very impressive chapel - an almost perfect scaled down copy of King's, Cambridge - with the other new Third Years in my house, all cowering and nervous, and very conscious of my height. I'm 6'0" and had stopped growing by this point, so I stood out a bit. It was really nerve-wracking, and I was conscious of being scrutinised by all these confident, wealthy kids. I could feel a small class chip starting to form on my shoulder, one which grew very healthily over the next few years. Anyway, so the chaplain does his bit and then says "we now sing hymn number 432, Jerusalem The Golden", and 700 people rumble to their feet.

Now, at this point I'm used to cathedral congregations (trying their best but pretty dismal) and the very half-arsed mumble of the occasional hymn in my previous school's assemblies.

So it's simultaneously hilarious and awe-inspiring as the organ finishes the intro, and I realise that every single kid and teacher in the place has drawn a massive inward breath. The wall of noise which erupts from this school's massed throats is indescribable. Every single person in that chapel is singing at the top of their voice, from the sweetest boy treble in the choir to the hairiest tone-deaf rumbling prop forward in the Upper Sixth. It's so loud.

I remember being conscious that my mouth was standing ajar, and then I remember laughing delightedly. And then I joined in. I had five often miserable years at that school, but I never missed chapel. It was such a pleasure, every time - just a joyful, joyful sound.

So:

Jerusalem The Golden
Jerusalem (natch)
Come Down, O Love Divine (beautiful tune, beautiful words. They still roared it.)
Of The Father's Love Begotten (at Christmas)
St. Patrick's Breastplate (I Bind Unto Myself Today)

There are so many. I love a good hymn. Even now, as a very atheist atheist, I like to go to the Cathedral with my mum and dad when I'm home and belt a few tunes out.

Something similar.

I did two years at a School where we had morning Assembly in the Cathedral. Ever since then, 'Jerusalem', the School hymn, has had a special place in my heart; 'To Be a Pilgrim', the other school's hymn equally is special. I can still sing them twenty *cough* years later.

Like Idiotbear I'm a confirmed non believer, yet I do find something very reassuring in the old hymns, and indeed Christmas carols. Mind you, I'm also a complete sucker for finding peace and inner quiet in old churches.

You can equally take new modern churches (yes, St Joseph's in Guildford, that includes you) and the newer, clappier hymns and shove 'em. Give me the classics every time!

...which we choirboys sang each Founders Day in the opening procession at the Cathedral. Which means over the years I got to sing all four parts. Oh, and on the Christmas Carol front, noone does it like these guys...Locust, please fill the cultural gaps...

And from the Valleys-Guide me, O thou great Jehovah. Which, as a bass is TREMENDOUS fun to sing.

a politically incorrect backlash but I remember "Onward Christian Soldiers" being the one we all along to at school, even though we didn't really understand the message.

I take the Bertrand Russell view on religion, he considered all forms not only wrong but harmful (or something like that), but I´m still a sucker for a good melody and that´s a beautiful one.

refused to sing anything at assembly except the last 'O Come let us adore him' at Christmas which was a mighty noise.

Can't get past the second line without blubbing like a child. Something to do with fathers, sons & the memory of days like these...

Some plain song derived

some not

some whose composers didn't really like how they were used (but which I got the music teacher to play as slowly as possible:

)

and some which I thought were by Bach but whose main tune turned out to be Hassler

So perhaps not surprising that I hear echoes everywhere, especially in bands like Split Enz, or is that just me ?

Whilst watching the excellent "Rev." on the BBC iPlayer I was pleasantly surprised (well astonished to be honest) to still know the words to "He Who Would Valiant Be" after 30 odd years.

By the way, is anyone else enjoying Rev?

When I moved from a primary school in Glasgow to a secondary school in north Wales a great disappointment was the lack of variety in hymns. I used to enjoy belting out any one of a large selection at my previous school, even though I have never been a Christian. I even joined the choir so I could sing more, but led the great primary choir rebellion the following year when I didn't realise that it was a rhetorical question when we were asked if anyone wanted to leave. Three quarters of them, emboldened by my lead rather than out of any loyalty to me, followed.
Back to Wales. I was gutted to find that in my new school we were expected to sing the same hymn every single day in assembly, and it wasn't even one of the good ones. Each day we would mutter through At the Name of Jesus. Why that one is anybody's guess, but is a dismal groaner with a hideous split note in each chorus ('... king of glo-ho-re-ee now ...'). I'm sure there would have been more enthusiasm and a much better noise if they made a virtue of the range of hynms available instead of treating the hymn as a daily chore to endured by all concerned.

A postscript - I think the trigger for my slaves' rebellion was the Christmas concert at which we sang something called Calypso Carol, in which a bunch on Glaswegian pre-teens were instructed to start swaying from side to side during the chorus. Everyone in the congregation laughed, and though I'm sure it looked very cute from the audience's point of view I had never felt such a twat in my 10 years of born days. There was no way back for me and the choir once my artistic integrity had been piqued.

Is rather nice. Also:

Guide me now thou great Redeemer
Lo! He Comes with clouds descending
The Day thou gavest Lord is ended
He who would valiant be
Christians Awake
Love divine (to Blaenwern)

Am not a churchgoer at all but used to be a choirboy and love a good hymn.

Only because it had to be taken off the list at school when the "The purple-headed mountain" line started to cause too many attacks of the giggles.

We then started on another one which, unfortunately, contained the line "With all our souls on fire" which nearly caused a riot when some mumbled "Vindaloo!!"

recent excellent series on BBC4 'Sacred Music' has led me to some marvellous stuff, but recently it's been Faure's Requiem which has dominated my listening, especially this:

*edit* Be Thou My Saviour
How Great Thou Art ('Then sings my soul, my saviour God to thee...' - now give it the bifter lads...)
Hail Queen of Heaven (spot the Fenian)
Hail Glorious St Patrick (ditto)

... it's got to be Bread of Heaven.

I wasn't there.

Makes me physically respond every time I hear it; though I never know which response will happen- sometimes goosebumps, or hair on the back of my neck, even tears.

My family know that it has to be one my funeral songs.

I Watch the Sunrise is one of my faves, too.

There was a similar one called Do not be Afraid (I think); it included the line "When the fire is burning all around you/ you will never be consumed by the flames.."

It's odd how, even though the religion has ebbed out of me in the years since I used to hear these songs regularly, I still think they're brilliant: there's a majesty to them that brings a bit of a tear to the eye.

A beautiful hymn with a perfect vocal.