Fred Pratt Green

Fred Pratt Green was born at Roby near Liverpool, England, on September 2, 1903. He entered Methodist ministry after studying at Didsbury Theological College from 1925 to 1928 and served circuits across England. His appointments included wartime ministry in Ilford, where he also worked as an air-raid warden, and leadership as chair of the York and Hull District. Work on the Methodist supplement Hymns and Songs in 1967 helped turn his attention decisively toward hymn writing as he approached retirement.

After retiring to Norwich in 1969, Green wrote about three hundred hymns and songs. His texts addressed worship, Christian unity, social responsibility, work, creation, aging, and the arts with contemporary language and disciplined poetic form. He co-edited Partners in Praise, received an honorary doctorate from Emory University in 1982, established the Pratt Green Trust in 1984, and was appointed MBE in 1995. He died in Norwich on October 22, 2000.

Green's role in By Gracious Powers was translator and versifier, not author of Bonhoeffer's German poem. At Erik Routley's request, he prepared a five-stanza English version in 1972 for the World Council of Churches hymnal Cantate Domino. The translation was published in 1974 and remains copyrighted. This role is placed in the existing lyricist array only because the supplied schema has no separate translator field.