‘Imperfection’

What is a Preamble?

And a Constitution?

We have our Church, king, and fatherland;

With these we find no fault and are content.

In them the folk become as one.

The Holy Body and Blood

Of the Son of God,

Held in the sacred silver cup,

Knit us together in a deep

And wonderful way.

Our Christian king, the father

Of all in the clan,

Distributes justice

Without the gall of fav’ritism.

In this man, we behold our history:

Ev’ry joy and sorrow,

Ev’ry custom, old and dear.

We wearies himself on our behalf,

And our love for him has no bounds.

The fatherland is our common home and life.

Though seemingly separate,

All our lives are woven together

In the same rivers and trees,

Mountains and lakes, rains and winds.

We walk upon the same soil,

Build our homes upon it,

Bury our dead within it.

Our crops and livestock

Are nourished by it.

Through Christian living,

The Holy Ghost hallows it.

The land embraces ev’ry one of us,

And in each heart, there is the fatherland.

We know no other faith

Than the Orthodoxy

Of our forebears:

The Faith of the Apostles and Councils,

Devout husbands and wives,

Hidden hermits and public pastors,

Angels singing praises.

The Church’s ethos of asceticism

And repentance we dare not

Cast aside:  simplicity,

Fasting, lowly-mindedness,

Bodily labor, discomfort,

Tears, prayer, love.

The Church is our folk,

And our folk is the Church.

Our prayer to the end will be,

‘Lord Jesus Christ, have mercy,

Son of God, on us,

A people by sin undone!’

--

Holy Ælfred the Great, King of England, South Patron, pray for us sinners at the Souð, unworthy though we are!

Anathema to the Union!