Te Deum Laudamus (1928 BCP)

Te Deum Laudamus (1928 BCP) is the great hymn of praise appointed after the First Lesson in Morning Prayer in the 1928 American Book of Common Prayer. It stands between the public reading of Scripture and the later New Testament lesson, so that the Church answers the Word of God with Trinitarian worship, Christological confession, and prayer for mercy.

The title comes from the hymn's opening Latin words, Te Deum laudamus, "We praise thee, O God." In the 1928 office the Te Deum is not an ornamental canticle. It gathers together the worship of earth and heaven, the confession of the Father, Son, and Holy Ghost, the saving work of Christ, the communion of saints, the expectation of judgment, and the daily petition that God's people may be preserved in grace.

Place in Morning Prayer

The Te Deum follows the appointed portion of the Psalter, the First Lesson, and the reader's closing formula:

Here shall be said or sung the following Hymn.

This placement is important. Morning Prayer has already moved from Scripture sentences, confession, absolution, the Lord's Prayer, the Venite, psalmody, and the First Lesson. The Te Deum is therefore the Church's first extended response to the lesson. It teaches that Scripture is not merely received as information; it is answered by praise and confession.

The 1928 rubric also allows Morning Prayer to pass toward Holy Communion after one of the morning canticles when Communion immediately follows:

after any one of the following Canticles of Morning Prayer has been said or sung, may pass at once to the Communion Service.

That direction links the Te Deum with the larger eucharistic life of the Church. The same congregation that has praised the triune God and confessed Christ's redeeming work may proceed to the Holy Communion, where Christ's death is pleaded and his people are fed.

Trinitarian Praise

The opening of the Te Deum addresses God with direct praise:

We praise thee, O God; we acknowledge thee to be the Lord.

The hymn is theological from its first line. It does not begin with human feeling or moral aspiration, but with the acknowledgment of the Lord. This makes it a natural canticle after the First Lesson: the God who speaks in Scripture is the God whom the Church worships.

The praise immediately becomes cosmic and angelic:

Holy, Holy, Holy, Lord God of Sabaoth; Heaven and earth are full of the Majesty of thy glory.

The words echo Isaiah's vision of the Lord in the temple:

Holy, holy, holy, is the LORD of hosts: the whole earth is full of his glory.

They also stand close to the heavenly worship in the Revelation:

Holy, holy, holy, Lord God Almighty, which was, and is, and is to come.

Anglican Morning Prayer therefore receives the biblical worship of heaven into the daily office. The Te Deum lets the parish congregation join angels, cherubim, seraphim, apostles, prophets, martyrs, and the whole Church in one act of praise.

Church, Saints, and the Rule of Faith

The Te Deum names the visible and heavenly company of praise:

The holy Church throughout all the world doth acknowledge thee;

This line gives the canticle an ecclesial scope. Morning Prayer may be said in a small parish church, a school chapel, a household, or by one reader, but the text places that prayer within the worship of the whole Church. The local office is never merely local.

The hymn then confesses the triune name:

The Father of an infinite Majesty; Thine adorable, true and only Son; Also the Holy Ghost the Comforter.

This is why the Te Deum functions like a doxological companion to the creeds. It is not the Apostles' Creed, but it prepares the congregation to confess the Creed later in the office. Article VIII of the Articles of Religion says that the received creeds "may be proved by most certain warrants of Holy Scripture." The Te Deum works in the same Anglican pattern: biblical worship, catholic confession, and common prayer belong together.

Christ the King of Glory

The central movement of the Te Deum turns explicitly to Christ:

Thou art the King of Glory, O Christ. Thou art the everlasting Son of the Father.

The hymn confesses Christ as King and eternal Son before it speaks of his saving work. This order matters. The one born of the Virgin and crucified for sinners is not a mere religious teacher. He is the eternal Son who acts for human deliverance.

The incarnation is stated with direct soteriological force:

When thou tookest upon thee to deliver man, thou didst humble thyself to be born of a Virgin.

St. John's Gospel gives the scriptural foundation for this confession:

And the Word was made flesh, and dwelt among us.

St. Paul gives the same movement in the language of humility:

he humbled himself, and became obedient unto death, even the death of the cross.

The Te Deum therefore joins Christmas, Good Friday, Easter, Ascension, and judgment in one compact confession. Morning Prayer does not isolate the events of Christ's life into separate devotional fragments. It teaches the Church to praise the whole economy of salvation.

Death, Resurrection, and Judgment

The hymn next confesses Christ's victory over death:

When thou hadst overcome the sharpness of death, thou didst open the Kingdom of Heaven to all believers.

This is the Gospel heart of the canticle. The worship of Christ is not abstract majesty only; it is praise for redemption. The believer's access to the kingdom rests on Christ's victory, not on human worthiness.

The Te Deum also confesses Christ's session and return:

Thou sittest at the right hand of God, in the glory of the Father.

The New Testament makes the same confession:

After the Lord had spoken unto them, he was received up into heaven, and sat on the right hand of God.

The canticle then turns the doctrine of judgment into prayer:

We believe that thou shalt come to be our Judge.

This keeps Anglican praise morally serious. The congregation that sings Christ's glory also stands before him as Judge. Yet the next petition is not despair but appeal to redemption: "help thy servants, whom thou hast redeemed with thy precious blood." Judgment and mercy are held together in the person of Christ.

Daily Prayer and Perseverance

The final part of the Te Deum turns from confession to petition:

O Lord, save thy people, and bless thine heritage.

The hymn does not leave the Church gazing upward without asking for grace. It prays for God's people to be saved, blessed, governed, lifted up, kept from sin, and preserved from shame. The transition is characteristically Anglican: doctrine becomes prayer.

The daily character of Morning Prayer is especially clear in the line:

Day by day we magnify thee;

Morning Prayer forms Christians by repetition. The Te Deum is not only a festival hymn for great occasions, though it is certainly fit for them. In the ordinary office it teaches daily magnification of God, daily remembrance of Christ's redemption, and daily dependence on mercy.

Its plea for preservation from sin belongs naturally after the opening penitential order of Morning Prayer:

Vouchsafe, O Lord, to keep us this day without sin.

The same office began with confession and absolution. The Te Deum now asks that the absolved people may live in holiness. This is close to the Catechism's account of Christian duty: faith, obedience, prayer, and sacramental life are not separated from praise.

Relation to the Benedicite

The 1928 Morning Prayer provides canticles after the First Lesson, including the Te Deum, the Benedictus es Domine, and the Benedicite Omnia Opera Domini. The alternatives are not interchangeable filler. Each gives a different scriptural and theological accent.

The Te Deum is especially full in its confession of Christ. The Benedicite gives creation a vast summons to bless the Lord. Both are fitting after the First Lesson, but they answer Scripture in different modes: the Te Deum by creed-shaped praise and redemption, the Benedicite by creation's universal blessing of God.

This helps explain why the Te Deum has such prominence in Anglican Morning Prayer. It receives the First Lesson into the Church's rule of faith, then prepares the congregation for the Second Lesson, the Apostles' Creed, the suffrages, and the collects. It is a bridge between Scripture read and doctrine confessed.

Use in Worship and Teaching

In parish worship, the Te Deum should be said or sung as a major canticle, not hurried as a transition. Its structure is clear: praise of God, heavenly worship, confession of the Trinity, confession of Christ, remembrance of redemption, expectation of judgment, and prayer for mercy and perseverance.

In teaching, the Te Deum is a concise entry into Anglican doctrine. It shows that the Daily Office is biblical, catholic, evangelical, and pastoral at once. It is biblical because it echoes Isaiah, Revelation, John, Paul, and the apostolic proclamation of Christ. It is catholic because it joins the whole Church's praise. It is evangelical because Christ's incarnation, victory over death, session, judgment, and redeeming blood stand at the center. It is pastoral because the hymn ends by asking God to keep his people in mercy day by day.

For Reformed Episcopal and classical Anglican readers, the Te Deum illustrates how the Prayer Book embeds doctrine in worship. The congregation does not learn the Trinity, Christology, grace, judgment, and perseverance as detached topics only. It learns them by praying and singing them after Scripture, within the ordinary discipline of the Daily Office.

See Also

• Book of Common Prayer (1928)
• Daily Office (1928 BCP)
• Morning Prayer (1928 BCP)
• First Lesson in Morning Prayer (1928 BCP)
• Benedicite Omnia Opera Domini (1928 BCP)
• Apostles' Creed in Morning Prayer (1928 BCP)
• Holy Communion (1928 BCP)
• The Creeds in the 1928 BCP
• Scripture in the 1928 BCP

External Links

• The 1928 Book of Common Prayer