O Come All Ye Faithful

CAIN's version keeps the eighteenth-century Latin hymn's English translation intact through its first two verses, then adds a repeated response that isn't part of the original text: "we bow our hearts before him, for He is Christ the Lord." The hymn's summons gets an answer built directly into the song.

"Sing, choirs of angels, sing in exultation, sing all ye citizens of heaven above" widens the invitation from the human congregation to the whole of heaven in a single breath, the same move the hymn has always made.

John's declaration that the Word became flesh and dwelt among humanity sits behind the hymn's third-verse claim, even where CAIN's arrangement doesn't include that verse directly, and Luke's account of the angels announcing glory to God in the highest gives the "glory in the highest" line its source. The repeated closing command — "O come, let us adore Him" — still hasn't needed updating after nearly three centuries of being sung.