O Christ, the Healer, we have come

O Christ, the Healer, we have come. Fred Pratt Green* (1903-2000). This was written in 1967, when Pratt Green was a member of the committee for Hymns and Songs (1969). The committee needed a hymn on mental health and healing, and Pratt Green wrote this hymn overnight, entitling it ‘A Prayer for Wholeness’. Following discussion, the last line of stanza 3, ‘Unconscious pride resists or shelves’, was provided by Brian Frost (then Director of the Notting Hill Ecumenical centre, London). The last line of the hymn has often been replaced by ‘Shall reach the whole of humankind’ but HP retains the original words, ‘Shall reach and shall enrich mankind’, at the request of the author. It was printed...