Written for dedication of the new St. John Neumann Catholic Church, Knoxville, Diocese of East Tennessee, USA, this hymn is available for download and duplication for non-commercial use at this link:
The text of the hymn was written by a member of the parish and reflects her strong devotion. Choirmaster Noel Jones composed the hymn tune.
----One of the projects at The Catholic Hymnal Project is to create custom hymnals for churches including hymns that are already strongly sung and others that should be. In addition, we feel that every church should have a hymn to its patron and sing it frequently, even every Sunday. This hymn to Saint John Neumann is an example of a hymn that captures the essence of the life of St. John Neumann, including his favorite prayer. In fact, he was also fond of saying "Dearest Jesus" and that too found a place in the hymn.
----We offer free downloads of public domain and staff-composed hymns in full SATB hymn format with permission for not-commercial duplication* from our Open Library of Catholic Hymns.
----We take on the job of printing hymnals in a large format style with full SATB hymn format for congregations because we know that many Catholics are musically literate and deserve to have hymnals with all the music for singing.
----The Catholic Hymnal staff feels that to create a singing church it is important to concentrate the singing on a few hymns that the people take to heart and sing rather than an ever changing parade of hymns that closely match the readings, but leave the people mute, sitting in the pews with the hymnbook closed.
Staff composers and writers are available to write a hymn for your church patron.
*(meaning, only that you may use them freely but can't put them in a hymnbook and sell it without permission)