Does a famous Beatles song channel a popular Catholic prayer?

By Michael Patrick O’Brien–

When looking for sacred allusions in Beatles’ music, folks often point to Paul McCartney’s “Mother Mary…speaking words of wisdom” lyrics in “Let it Be.” McCartney has said a dream about his mother named Mary, and not the Virgin Mary, inspired that tune.

Yet, the famous singer-songwriter has never disclaimed a possible religious influence on another Beatles’ melody, one that just happens to be one of my personal favorites.

“The End” is the second-to-last song on Abbey Road, one of the band’s final albums. Thanks to the musical influence of my older sisters—both teenagers when Beatlemania raged in the 1960s—I discovered and fell in love with the song and album almost a decade after they were released in 1969.

It was the first time I had admired the composition of an entire album, as opposed to appreciating just a song or two. Using an old cassette player, I’d lie on my bed in the dark and absorb the music, almost by osmosis. And the emotional climax of that musical experience always was “The End.”

McCartney composed it—the last song recorded collectively by all four Beatles. It also was one of the final lyrical messages to their legions of fans. Accordingly, the Fab Four made the song quite special in several ways.

Although George Harrison did most Beatles guitar solos, John Lennon and McCartney joined him for individual riffs on “The End.” Contemporary accounts say the three musicians performed their dueling solos in one take, together in the same room, with zest and excitement. For a brief moment in time, all the bad blood and anger that permeated their relationship melted away.

The song also includes a rare Ringo Starr drum solo, which he recorded using twelve microphones. His percussion masterpiece is fantastic. The song’s climactic moments feature an orchestration arrangement and a humming chorus, creating what is perhaps the quintessential Beatles sound.

McCartney also wrote and sang the final (and now famous) lyrics: “And in the end, the love you take, is equal to the love you make…” When the Beatles released the song, Lennon had few good things to say about McCartney, but he did describe these words as “a very cosmic, philosophical line.”

McCartney credited Shakespeare, saying, “I wanted it to end with a little meaningful couplet, so I followed the Bard and wrote a couplet.” In a 1969 review, Rolling Stone critic John Mendelsohn called it “a perfect epitaph” for the legendary band.

It’s a pretty good motto for life too—i.e. focus on giving love instead of wondering where or when you will get it. The words mesmerized me and seemed familiar, as if they were embroidered on my spirit and soul. And no wonder—they were penned for me by another Irish Catholic boy.

McCartney was baptized Catholic, but raised non-denominationally. His mother Mary Mahon was Irish Catholic. She died when Paul was only 14 and is buried in a Catholic cemetery near their hometown of Liverpool. Situated as it is on the Irish Sea, Liverpool (sometimes called “East Dublin”) arguably is the most Irish-Catholic city in England.

McCartney tells reporters he is an agnostic and does not believe in God. In 2012 he elaborated, “I have a kind of personal faith in something good, but it really doesn’t go much further than that.” Still, I wonder if the Catholicism of his mother and youth—and one Catholic prayer I love— left an imprint on him.

An unknown author wrote the prayer in the early twentieth century. It was distributed widely in Europe and the United States, especially during and just after World Wars I and II. It’s called “The Peace Prayer of Saint Francis of Assisi,” but is not found in any of the Italian saint’s writings.

The prayer eventually was put to music too. Bing Crosby recorded a version in 1954. In 1967, a lay Franciscan songwriter adapted the prayer into a popular hymn, one you probably have heard or sung.

As a Catholic child of the sixties and seventies, I heard and sang it often. As a cultural Catholic, as a child of his times, and as a musician with a good ear, my guess is that McCartney heard it too.

Parts of the prayer/hymn promote the same give-rather-than-take philosophy also articulated on my favorite Beatles album:

“O divine Master, grant that I may not so much seek

to be consoled as to console,

to be understood as to understand,

to be loved as to love.

For it is in giving that we receive,

it is in pardoning that we are pardoned,

and it is in dying that we are born to eternal life.”

Of course, only McCartney himself knows what inspired the philosophical message of generosity in “The End” lyrics, but I think my Catholic imprint theory has merit. In 2018, McCartney told British journalist Chris Heath that the musician felt a kinship with St. Francis. McCartney said, “I mean, Saint Francis of Assisi was my big favorite and I turned out to be for animal welfare, animal lover and nature lover.”

We may discover if my hunch is right soon. McCartney’s new book, The Lyrics: 1956 to the Present, a two-volume collection of essays about his songs, is available as of November 2021.

*Mike O’Brien (author website here) is a writer and attorney living in Salt Lake City, Utah. His book Monastery Mornings (found here), about growing up with the monks at the old Trappist monastery in Huntsville, Utah, was published by Paraclete Press (more information here) in August 2021.