Beneath the Church's hallowed shade

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Beneath the Church's hallowed shade,
we consecrate, O Lord, to thee
this plot of ground, wherein to lay
the remnants of mortality;
That they who bear upon their brows
the cross that thou, O Christ, hast borne,
may here--the cross above their graves--
await the resurrection morn.

Away from busy haunts of men,
where death shall plow, and death shall sow,
but ne'er shall reap the grain he sows,
for other reapers left to grow,
until the great world harvest field
with ripened grain is whitened o'er,
and white-winged reapers come to reap
and gather in their golden store.

Days, months, and years will soon be gone,
our sun e'en now is sinking low,
break up, O Lord, our fallow ground,
with heavenly seed the furrows sow;
rain down on all thy quickening grace,
that when thou com'st on earth again,
the angel-reapers here may reap
a hundredfold of ripened grain.