Famous Religious Poems (an Encouragement towards Devotion)

ByTMLT Publisher

Family Religious Poems: This article is a collection of the most famous religious poems in English literature, religious faith and religious doubt that provide words of comfort and wisdom and admit the sacrifice of Jesus Christ.

Famous Religious Poems that will Inspire You to be more religious

Are you a religious being? If your answer is YES, then you should read the following inspirational religious poems.

1. A Gloss (with a Spiritual Meaning)

A gloss (with spiritual meaning).
Without support yet with support,
living without light, in darkness,
I am wholly being consumed.

1. My soul is disentangled
from every created thing
and lifted above itself
in a life of gladness
supported only in God.
So now it can be said
that I most value this:
My soul now sees itself
without support yet with support.

2. And though I suffer darknesses
in this mortal life,
that is not so hard a thing;
for even if I have no light
I have the life of heaven.
For the blinder love is
the more it gives such life,
holding the soul surrendered,
living without light in darkness.

3. After I have known it
love works so in me
that whether things go well or badly
love turns them to one sweetness
transforming the soul in itself.
And so in its delighting flame
which I am feeling within me,
swiftly, with nothing spared,
I am wholly being consumed.
A gloss (with a spiritual meaning).
Not for all of beauty
will I ever lose myself,
but for I-don’t-know-what
which is so gladly gained.

4. Delight in the world’s good things
at the very most
can only tire the appetite
and spoil the palate;
and so, not for all of sweetness
will I ever lose myself,
but for I-don’t-know-what
which is so gladly found.

5. The generous heart
never delays with easy things
but eagerly goes on
to things more difficult.
Nothing satisfies it,
and its faith ascends so high
that it tastes I-don’t-know-what
which is so gladly found.

6. He who is sick with love,
whom God himself has touched,
finds his tastes so changed
that they fall away
like a fevered man’s
who loathes any food he sees
and desires I-don’t know-what
which is so gladly found.

7. Do not wonder
that the taste should be left like this,
for the cause of this sickness
differs from all others;
and so he is withdrawn
from all creatures,
and tastes I-don’t-know-what
which is so gladly found.

8. For when once the will
is touched by God himself,
it cannot find contentment
except in the Divinity;
but since his Beauty is open
to faith alone, the will
tastes him in I-don’t-know-what
which is so gladly found.

9. Tell me, then, would you pity
a person so in love,
who takes no delight
in all creation;
alone, mind empty of form and figure,
finding no support or foothold,
he tastes there I-don’t-know-what
which is so gladly found.

10. Do not think that he who lives
the so-precious inner life
finds joy and gladness
in the sweetness of the earth;
but there beyond all beauty
and what is and will be and was,
he tastes I-don’t-know-what
which is so gladly found.

11. Whoever seeks to advance
takes much more care
in what he has yet to gain
than in what he has already gained;
and so I will always tend
toward greater heights;
beyond all things, to I-don’t-know- what
which is so gladly found.

12. I will never lose myself
for that which the senses
can take in here,
nor for all the mind can hold,
no matter how lofty,
nor for grace or beauty,
but only for I-don’t-know-what
which is so gladly found.
Christmas Refrain
The Virgin, weighed
with the Word of God,
comes down the road:
if only you’ll shelter her. The Sum of Perfection
Forgetfulness of created things,
remembrance of the Creator,
attention turned toward inward things,
and loving the Beloved.

By St John of the Cross

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2. A Hymn to God the Father

Wilt thou forgive that sin where I begun,
Which is my sin, though it were done before?
Wilt thou forgive that sin through which I run,
And do run still, though still I do deplore?
When thou hast done, thou hast not done,
For I have more.

Wilt thou forgive that sin by which I have won
Others to sin? and made my sin their door?
Wilt thou forgive that sin which I did shun
A year or two, but wallowed in a score?
When thou hast done, thou hast not done,
For I have more.

I have a sin of fear, that when I have spun
My last thread, I shall perish on the shore;
Swear by thyself, that at my death thy Son
Shall shine as he shines now and heretofore;
And, having done that, thou hast done,
I fear no more.

By John Donne

3. An Ode of the Birth of Our Savior

In numbers, and but these few,
I sing thy birth, oh JESU!
Thou pretty Baby, born here,
With sup’rabundant scorn here;
Who for thy princely port here,
Hadst for thy place
Of birth, a base
Out-stable for thy court here.

Instead of neat enclosures
Of interwoven osiers;
Instead of fragrant posies
Of daffadils and roses,
Thy cradle, kingly stranger,
As gospel tells,
Was nothing else,
But, here, a homely manger.

But we with silks, not cruels,
With sundry precious jewels,
And lily-work will dress thee;
And as we dispossess thee
Of clo}ts, we’ll make a chamber,
Sweet babe, for thee,
Of ivory,
And plaster’d round with amber.

The Jews, they did disdain thee;
But we will entertain thee
With glories to await here,
Upon thy princely state here,
And more for love than pity:
From year to year
We’ll make thee, here,
A free-born of our city.

By Robert Herrick

4. Bible Study

Who would have imagined that I would have to go
a million miles away from the place where I was born
to find people who would love me?
And that I would go that distance and that I would find those people?

In the dream JoAnne was showing me how much arm to amputate
if your hand gets trapped in the gears of the machine;
if you acted fast, she said, you could save everything above the wrist.
You want to keep a really sharp blade close by, she said.

Now I raise that hand to scratch one of those nasty little
scabs on the back of my head, and we sit outside and watch
the sun go down, inflamed as an appendicitis
over western Illinois?—?which then subsides and cools into a smooth gray sea.

Who knows, this might be the last good night of summer.
My broken nose is forming an idea of what’s for supper.
Hard to believe that death is just around the corner.
What kind of idiot would think he even had a destiny?

I was on the road for so long by myself,
I took to reading motel Bibles just for company.
Lying on the chintz bedspread before going to sleep,
still feeling the motion of the car inside my body,
I thought some wrongness in myself had made me that alone.

And God said, you are worth more to me
than one hundred sparrows.
And when I read that, I wept.
And God said, Whom have I blessed more than I have blessed you?

And I looked at the mini bar
and the bad abstract hotel art on the wall
and the dark TV set watching like a deacon.

And God said, Survive. And carry my perfume among the perishing.

By Tony Hoagland

5. Buddha at Kamakura

O ye who tread the Narrow Way
By Tophet-flare to Judgment Day,
Be gentle when “the heathen” pray
To Buddha at Kamakura!

To him the Way, the Law, apart,
Whom Maya held beneath her heart,
Ananda’s Lord, the Bodhisat,
The Buddha of Kamakura.

For though he neither burns nor sees,
Nor hears ye thank your Deities,
Ye have not sinned with such as these,
His children at Kamakura,

Yet spare us still the Western joke
When joss-sticks turn to scented smoke
The little sins of little folk
That worship at Kamakura —

The grey-robed, gay-sashed butterflies
That flit beneath the Master’s eyes.
He is beyond the Mysteries
But loves them at Kamakura.

And whoso will, from Pride released,
Contemning neither creed nor priest,
May feel the Soul of all the East
About him at Kamakura.

Yea, every tale Ananda heard,
Of birth as fish or beast or bird,
While yet in lives the Master stirred,
The warm wind brings Kamakura.

Till drowsy eyelids seem to see
A-flower ‘neath her golden htee
The Shwe-Dagon flare easterly
From Burmah to Kamakura,

And down the loaded air there comes
The thunder of Thibetan drums,
And droned — “Om mane padme hums” —
A world’s-width from Kamakura.

Yet Brahmans rule Benares still,
Buddh-Gaya’s ruins pit the hill,
And beef-fed zealots threaten ill
To Buddha and Kamakura.

A tourist-show, a legend told,
A rusting bulk of bronze and gold,
So much, and scarce so much, ye hold
The meaning of Kamakura?

But when the morning prayer is prayed,
Think, ere ye pass to strife and trade,
Is God in human image made
No nearer than Kamakura?

By Rudyard Kipling

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6. Church and State

Here is fresh matter, poet,
Matter for old age meet;
Might of the Church and the State,
Their mobs put under their feet.
O but heart’s wine shall run pure,
Mind’s bread grow sweet.

That were a cowardly song,
Wander in dreams no more;
What if the Church and the State
Are the mob that howls at the door!
Wine shall run thick to the end,
Bread taste sour.

By William Butler Yeats

7. Church Going

Once I am sure there’s nothing going on
I step inside, letting the door thud shut.
Another church: matting, seats, and stone,
And little books; sprawlings of flowers, cut
For Sunday, brownish now; some brass and stuff
Up at the holy end; the small neat organ;
And a tense, musty, unignorable silence,
Brewed God knows how long. Hatless, I take off
My cycle-clips in awkward reverence,
Move forward, run my hand around the font.

From where I stand, the roof looks almost new-
Cleaned or restored? Someone would know: I don’t.
Mounting the lectern, I peruse a few
Hectoring large-scale verses, and pronounce
“Here endeth” much more loudly than I’d meant.
The echoes snigger briefly. Back at the door
I sign the book, donate an Irish sixpence,
Reflect the place was not worth stopping for.

Yet stop I did: in fact I often do,
And always end much at a loss like this,
Wondering what to look for; wondering, too,
When churches fall completely out of use
What we shall turn them into, if we shall keep
A few cathedrals chronically on show,
Their parchment, plate, and pyx in locked cases,
And let the rest rent-free to rain and sheep.

Shall we avoid them as unlucky places?
Or, after dark, will dubious women come
To make their children touch a particular stone;
Pick simples for a cancer; or on some
Advised night see walking a dead one?
Power of some sort or other will go on

In games, in riddles, seemingly at random;
But superstition, like belief, must die,
And what remains when disbelief has gone?
Grass, weedy pavement, brambles, buttress, sky,
A shape less recognizable each week,
A purpose more obscure. I wonder who
Will be the last, the very last, to seek

This place for what it was; one of the crew
That tap and jot and know what rood-lofts were?
Some ruin-bibber, randy for antique,
Or Christmas-addict, counting on a whiff
Of gown-and-bands and organ-pipes and myrrh?
Or will he be my representative,

Bored, uninformed, knowing the ghostly silt
Dispersed, yet tending to this cross of ground
Through suburb scrub because it held unspilt
So long and equably what since is found
Only in separation — marriage, and birth,
And death, and thoughts of these — for whom was built
This special shell? For, though I’ve no idea
What this accoutred frowsty barn is worth,

It pleases me to stand in silence here;
A serious house on serious earth it is,
In whose blent air all our compulsions meet,
Are recognised, and robed as destinies.

And that much never can be obsolete,
Since someone will forever be surprising
A hunger in himself to be more serious,
And gravitating with it to this ground,
Which, he once heard, was proper to grow wise in,
If only that so many dead lie round.

By Philip Larkin

8. Crazy Jane on the Day of Judgment

‘Love is all
Unsatisfied
That cannot take the whole
Body and soul’;
And that is what Jane said.

‘Take the sour
If you take me
I can scoff and lour
And scold for an hour.’
“That’s certainly the case,’ said he.

‘Naked I lay,
The grass my bed;
Naked and hidden away,
That black day’;
And that is what Jane said.

‘What can be shown?
What true love be?
All could be known or shown
If Time were but gone.’
‘That’s certainly the case,’ said he.

By William Butler Yeats

9. Fruits of the Passion

Fruits of the passion,
Blood of the vein,
All our salvations,
Citric the pain,

Suffered the fault,
Of the lives that he bought,
By his prayers to stay sane,
Through redemption his thought,

Fertile the marks,
Adorn bristles his frown,
Garland laurels for scars,
Of the thorns for a crown,

Let the new days dawning, seed,
The harvest of the lives we need,
But not the tree to wood that cross,
Be ever grown again by us,

And splintered back, subjected, torn,
With vinegar on lip to quell,
His persecution, we’re reborn,
The thirst, for crying “save us”, hell,

And by the watered crop, his tears,
Reign down upon us, grain,
Until we bud from weeping fears,
The yield he wished, regain,

Our souls he reaped,
When after all his harm,
What’s sown, has stopped,
His life, was cropped,
To resurrect the calm.

By David Hollywood

10. Man Versus Satan

Both: Man and Satan are the fuel of falsehood,
But the ingredient that tell between them,
Is of stupendous, quite contradictory, opposing.

Satan remains staunch, unbent and resolute,
On the false commission of the deeds.
Though Man commits wrongs trespassingly no doubt,
Goes against the imposed restrictions or barriers,
Chasing taste, attractions or carnal pleasures,
Under the influence of some unbridled desires,
Yet when the deed is done, the wrong is committed,
He is bent, sheds tears, becomes penitent,
The more tears he sheds fearing Omnipotence,
The more he is raised, dignified to the heights,
Approaches the regal status that once our Parents,
Were deprived, beguiled thorough diabolic tricks.

By Shahida Latif

11. Prayers to God

Many people pray to god for many things
“God help me with my math test.”
“God, have mercy on me because I failed my drivers test.”
“God, I want you to heal me.”
“God, I want you to heal my family.”

Many people try to bribe God
“God, heal me and I will change my ways.”
“God, please help my family and I will go to church every Sunday.”
“God, grant me tickets to WWE and I will do whatever you want.”
“God, I will follow your law to the letter if you will make me famous.”

Many people blame God for their lives
“God, why did you give me cancer?”
“God, why did you let my best friend died?”
“God, how could you let this happen to me?”
“God, why don’t you do anything to help me?

We are all guilty of these at some point in our lives
I treasure what I have and couldn’t ask for anything more
God has no real control of our lives
He lets us fall and make our own mistakes
It’s what you plan to do about it that God helps you.

By Alyssa Garner

12. Repentance

O Lord, how I thank thee
To have thy love so close to me.

To be forgiven, to be redeemed
To be able to head upstream.

Lord, I’ll work hard, I’ll do my best
I’ll keep thy commandments, I’ll have no rest.

I’ll come to forgive, I’ll come to forget
The sins of my brethren, and all of their debt.

But two more things that have to get done,
Fasting and prayer can’t go undone.

So Lord I’ll ask thee one more thing,
That thy spirit may fill my soul,
So this repentance can be made whole.

By Ygor Noblott

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13. Searching for God

I thought I’d look for God today
In places searched before
Hoping that I’ve missed a clue
Or find an unopened door

My search began with the morning news
For something to bring cheer
To let me know that God is real
I found only hate and fear

I then turned to the Bible
For hope that hope is well
To only find in cryptic words
My destiny in hell

I peered into my own desires
For meaning in my quests
I found a lot of guilt and shame
And a heart that has no rest

I looked to friends and neighbors
For some good news in their eyes
Their down cast face of sorrow
Told me they too realize

That God is either gone or not
His presence is not here
Today’s the same as yesterday
As it’s been throughout the years

But all those well meaning folks
Tell me “just have a little faith
And God will come and carry you home
To that peaceful loving place”

They say “it’s faith that saves us”
But I can’t see how that can be
For faith was never crucified
Nor died to set us free

No, faith is just for coping
With this helpless life of sin
An instrument for getting by
While waiting for the end

Faith fortifies our journey
So that we finish and not roam
It leads us through the darkened valley
Till we all are brought back home

I didn’t find God today
No matter where I looked
Perhaps it’s just my inept ways
Or a truth that was mistook

And tomorrow I’ll begin again
To see what I might see
And maybe someday the time will come
When God will search for me

By James Moody

14. The Blessed

Cumhal called out, bending his head,
Till Dathi came and stood,
With a blink in his eyes, at the cave-mouth,
Between the wind and the wood.

And Cumhal said, bending his knees,
‘I have come by the windy way
To gather the half of your blessedness
And learn to pray when you pray.

‘I can bring you salmon out of the streams
And heron out of the skies.’
But Dathi folded his hands and smiled
With the secrets of God in his eyes.

And Cumhal saw like a drifting smoke
All manner of blessed souls,
Women and children, young men with books,
And old men with croziers and stoles.

‘praise God and God’s Mother,’ Dathi said,
‘For God and God’s Mother have sent
The blessedest souls that walk in the world
To fill your heart with content.’

‘And which is the blessedest,’ Cumhal said,
‘Where all are comely and good?
Is it these that with golden thuribles
Are singing about the wood?’

‘My eyes are blinking,’ Dathi said,
‘With the secrets of God half blind,
But I can see where the wind goes
And follow the way of the wind;

‘And blessedness goes where the wind goes,
And when it is gone we are dead;
I see the blessedest soul in the world
And he nods a drunken head.

‘O blessedness comes in the night and the day
And whither the wise heart knows;
And one has seen in the redness of wine
The Incorruptible Rose,

‘That drowsily drops faint leaves on him
And the sweetness of desire,
While time and the world are ebbing away
In twilights of dew and of fire.’

By William Butler Yeats

Religion can be very disagreeing based on beliefs, but we can see the magic of poetry in its uniting ability, to find one common belief- mostly established on love and devotion, then casts this united light to scare off the darkness of disharmony.

What do you think of this collection? Share your ideas in the comment section just as you share this poem with the first name or face that crosses your mind. Let us read of his/her opinion too.

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