Te Deum laudamus

This Latin hymn is more commonly known as the ‘Te Deum’.

It was written somewhere between the 4th and 5th Century. According to legend, it was improvised by St. Ambrose at St. Augustine’s baptism. Nowadays however, people think it is more likely to have been composed by Nicetas, bishop of Remesiana.

In Latin, the hymn’s title means ‘God, We Praise You’. Much of this text is made up of Christian beliefs about each person of the Holy Trinity. It is written using ‘prose’ (written in the way you would say something), rather than using ‘metrical structure’ (each line having a set number of beats so that the structure of the hymn follows a traditionally set rhythmical structure – most hymns do this).

Around the time of its writing, people were arguing about the divinity of Christ. The people who didn’t believe that Jesus was the son of God were called ‘Arians’. The ‘Te Deum’ goes against what the Arians believed, by stating ‘You Christ, are the king of glory, the eternal Son of the Father’.

Our Catholic Church teaches us that Jesus is the son of God and therefore that ‘Arianism’ is a ‘false teaching’. The Church calls anything that it considers to be ‘false teaching’ – ‘heresy’.