Holy Ghost, come down upon Thy children

Author: Frederick W. Faber

Raised in the Church of England, Frederick W. Faber (b. Calverly, Yorkshire, England, 1814; d. Kensington, London, England, 1863) came from a Huguenot and strict Calvinistic family background. He was educated at Balliol College, Oxford, and ordained in the Church of England in 1839. Influenced by the teaching of John Henry Newman, Faber followed Newman into the Roman Catholic Church in 1845 and served under Newman's supervision in the Oratory of St. Philip Neri. Because he believed that Roman Catholics should sing hymns like those written by John Newton, Charles Wesley, and William Cowpe, Faber wrote 150 hymns himself. One of his best known, "Faith of Our Fathers," originally had these words in its third stanza: "Faith of Our Fathers! Mary'… Go to person page >

Holy Ghost, come down upon Thy children. F. W. Faber. [Whitsuntide.] Appeared in his Oratory Hymns, 1854, and again in his Hymns, 1862, in 6 stanzas of 4 lines, the opening stanza being repeated as a chorus. The metre is most awkward and unmusical, and fully justifies the alterations made in the Altar Hymnal, 1884, where it is rewritten in 8.7.8.7. metre, beginning "Holy Ghost, come down upon us."

--John Julian, Dictionary of Hymnology (1907)