You’ve probably heard it at a wedding. Or maybe in a grocery store aisle while picking out cereal. It’s got that heavy, soulful piano and Hozier’s booming voice that feels like it’s shaking the dust off the rafters. But if you actually listen—I mean really lean into the Take Me to Church lyrics—you realize it is perhaps the least "wedding-appropriate" song to ever hit the Top 40.
Honestly, it’s a protest song.
Andrew Hozier-Byrne wasn't some polished pop product when he wrote this. He was a 22-year-old guy recording vocals in the attic of his parents' house in County Wicklow, Ireland, at two in the morning. It was 2013. He was broke. He’d just come off a rough breakup, and he was angry. Not just "sad-song" angry, but deeply frustrated with the institutional weight of the Catholic Church in Ireland.
The "Born Sick" Problem
There is a specific line that usually catches people off guard: "We were born sick, you heard them say it."
That’s not just a poetic flourish. Hozier is directly quoting—or at least heavily leaning on—the 17th-century poet Fulke Greville, who wrote about being "created sick, commanded to be sound." It’s a biting critique of the concept of original sin. The idea that you come into this world already "broken" or "sinful" and need an institution to fix you.
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For Hozier, the fix isn't found in a pew. It's found in the bedroom.
The song treats sex not as something shameful, but as something sacramental. When he sings, "She tells me 'worship in the bedroom,'" he’s flipping the script. He’s saying that the most human, tangible act of love is more "holy" than any doctrine that tries to shame it.
What the Video Changed
If the lyrics are about the "soft power" of the church in Ireland, the music video took that fire and pointed it at Russia.
The black-and-white visuals don't show Hozier at all. Instead, they follow a gay couple being hunted by a masked mob. This wasn't random. At the time, Russia was seeing a terrifying rise in state-sanctioned homophobia and vigilante attacks. Hozier wanted to show that when an institution—be it a church or a government—labels a type of love as "unnatural" or "disordered," it gives a "God-given justification" for violence.
It’s heavy stuff for a song that people often mistake for a straightforward religious anthem.
Why the Metaphors Work (and Confuse)
The genius—and the reason it ranks so high on everyone’s "misunderstood lyrics" list—is the vocabulary. He uses "amen," "shrine," "sin," and "liturgy." If you aren't paying attention, you might think he's looking for salvation.
But look at the chorus:
"I'll worship like a dog at the shrine of your lies / I'll tell you my sins and you can sharpen your knife."
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That is not a happy confession. It’s a description of someone offering themselves up to be destroyed by a system that doesn't actually want to save them. He’s choosing the "gentle sin" of a human relationship over the "poison" of the Sunday service.
It's Not Just About Ireland Anymore
In the years since its release, the Take Me to Church lyrics have taken on lives Hozier never expected.
In 2022, a video went viral of Sarina Esmailzadeh, a 16-year-old Iranian girl, singing along to the track. Shortly after, she was killed during protests for women's rights in Iran. Hozier himself has spoken about how humbling—and devastating—it is to see his song become a rallying cry for people facing actual, life-threatening stakes for their identity.
It’s moved beyond a "tongue-in-cheek swipe" at the Vatican. It’s become a global anthem for bodily autonomy.
The "Deathless Death"
One of the weirder phrases in the song is the request for a "deathless death."
In an interview with The Irish Times, Hozier explained that falling in love feels like a kind of death. Not the "stop breathing" kind, but the "everything I thought I knew about myself is gone" kind. You see yourself through someone else's eyes and the old version of you dies off.
It’s a "small d" death. A moment of transcendence.
How to Actually Listen to It
If you want to understand the track, stop thinking of it as a song about God. Start thinking of it as a song about humanity.
- Acknowledge the satire: When he says "Good God, let me give you my life," he isn't talking to the man upstairs. He's talking to his lover.
- Watch the imagery: Notice the "high horse" and the "stable." He’s mocking the moral high ground that religious institutions claim while ignoring the "starving faithful."
- Recognize the paganism: He calls himself a "pagan of the good times." He’s rejecting the rigid, structured faith for something older, more primal, and—in his eyes—more honest.
The song is essentially a reclamation project. It takes the language used to shame people and uses it to celebrate them instead.
To get the full weight of the message, listen to the demo version—the one Hozier actually recorded in his attic. You can hear the raw, unpolished frustration in his voice. It reminds you that this wasn't a calculated move to top the Billboard charts. It was just a guy in a dark room trying to make sense of a world that told him he was "born sick."
Next time it comes on the radio, listen for the "knife." It’s the sharpest part of the song, and it explains everything.
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To truly appreciate the context of Hozier's songwriting, explore the works of Christopher Hitchens or the poetry of Fulke Greville, both of whom Hozier has cited as major influences on his lyrical world-building. Understanding the "Chorus Sacerdotum" poem will give you a completely different perspective the next time that "born sick" line hits.