The missing cross
7:27 AM
It's easy to be critical of the church, especially retrospectively. Like Monday morning quarterbacks, we can all look back through the centuries and see the folly of crusades, colonization, slavery, and the unholy marriage of political power and wealth with the name of Jesus. These failures are, ostensibly, the reasons offered by millions for their rejection of Christ and, especially, of the church.Surely our failures are part of the story, but I suspect there's more to it than that. Thomas Merton said something to the effect that the crisis among believers and unbelievers is really the same - we are, all of us, recoiling at the cross.
Of course, the church claims to embrace the cross. We sing songs about it; we wear it around our neck as jewelry; it figures prominently in our architecture; and most significantly, we teach it's centrality. The problem, though, is that in teaching it's centrality we tend to teach the reality that Jesus died FOR us, and so our responsibility is to receive this free gift so that we can be pardoned for our failures and be made right with God.
To declare that this is the heart of the gospel would be like saying that cutting down trees and making bats is the central theme of baseball. Talk about missing the point! The reality is this: Christ walked the path of the cross and then triumphed over the grave. Our journey with Christ begins by acknowledging our need for this gift and receiving it, but this is just the beginning, like receiving our bat and glove. The point is wholly other. The point is that we're now empowered with the same capacity to walk the road of our own cross, laying down our lives in literal and/or spiritual ways for three reasons:
#1 - because Jesus tells us that this is our calling
#2 - because this is where our credibility and life imparting power lies
#3 - because we believe that there's more to life than THIS life.
The early church gave validity to Christ's claims because it was the Christ followers who, in the time of the plague, were willing to open their homes and provide hospitality to the dying, often at cost of their own lives. Wherever the faith presents itself as powerful and real, it does so because there are real and tangible acts of relinquishing rights (to life, our happiness, or being first, or secure, or powerful, or vindicated) on the part of Christ's followers. Of course, the sad testimony of the church is that, too often, we've appropriated Christ's death FOR us, while overtly or covertly avoiding our own calling to die WITH Him. Thus does the church's lust for power, wealth, and prestige, mar the church's testimony, creating a caricature of Christ.
Yes, Christ died for us. But He beat death in order that we might be freed from the fear of death, in order that we might have the entire world opened up before us as we listen for the voice of our Guide and follow Him wherever He might take us. We know this, though, that the path that will impart life to others will only be seen to the extent that we say YES to the Guide who calls us to lay down our own agenda, instinct for survival, or lust for pleasure or power, choosing instead our own CROSS because we believe that life goes on, and on, forever.
As I begin the fall routine, I pray that I'll be willing to walk the path of the cross.
Posted in: MeditationsNew Burnside on Monday
5:00 PM
This may very well be the final post on the Burnside Blog.On Monday, barring any unforeseen disasters, and requiring a load of work this weekend, we will launch our new site. We've been working on it for a while, and we're thrilled to finally show you what we have. We've also changed our URL. The new site will be at burnsidewriters.com.
The blog will still be up, but posts won't go here. Our old site will link directly to our new one. The blog and main site will be integrated. Some of the posts you've seen here will become articles. For shorter pieces, our site will offer an Asides department, for quick links, posts, and videos.
I get a lot of the glory around here for making this thing happen, but the truth is John Pattison did a thousand times more work than I did bringing this all together. I also want to thank John Whitaker for helping build our site, Metaleap Design for our logo, and a whole host of others who consulted and helped us out along the way (in particular, John's.
More thanks to those who donated to Burnside. Your incentives for giving will be sent out as soon as we get copies of Million Miles.
We're still working out bugs, but the submissions process will be greatly streamlined. Upon launch, we'll be welcoming open submissions, and we'll be much better in fielding them and responding.
Thank you for visiting so far. Spread the word about our new site!
Genesis - The Facebook Edition
12:33 PM
I'm so glad I have access to David Sessions' Google status, or I would've missed this.And speaking of our friends at Patrol Magazine, they have a terrific editorial on profanity and Christian magazines.
We've got a similar piece on censorship and profanity as it pertains to Burnside coming with the launch of our new site...stay tuned.
9/11
8:34 AM
Relevant Magazine asked a few Burnside writers for short reflections on 9/11.You can read those here.
We didn't have a ton of room, but I do want to mention how writing about 9/11 feels vaguely self-absorbed. I mean, think that day changed everyone on some level, but writing on how my thoughts about the world, politics, and war began to shift seem to pale in comparison to people who suffered directly, before and since.
(It's also a shame Susan Isaacs' memories weren't posted...she didn't have time to write a piece, but her story is in her book, and it's crazy.)
"More coffee, hun?"
4:33 PM
I�ve had many memories at Waffle House. But I�m guessing some of you have never even been to one before. For those who don't know, it's a 24 hour grease-pit. A southern staple of grits and hospitality. It originally began in a little suburb outside of
With three of us at the table my friend looks at my other friend and says, �translate this for me, I�ve been wondering about this for a while.�
He glanced across my friend�s brand new MacBook Pro and starts translating arcane Greek sentences from the ancient Nicene Creed devised by the Romans in 325AD. This is a bedrock, if not the bedrock document securing the survival and health of Christendom.
From across the table I hear, f?? ?? f?t??, Te?? ???????? ?? Te?? ????????, ?e??????ta ?? p??????ta, ?�???s??? t? ?at??, d?' ?? t? p??ta ????et? . . . God from God, Light from Light . . .
In Waffle House, mind you, he starts telling us about the annoying propensity to which the Grecians utilized reflexive participles. A literary faux-pas if you ask him. I start laughing at the insanity of it all. I mean, a Waffle House is no place for a MacBook. Let alone an opinionated lecture on an archaic language. My life doesn 't make sense and I'm beginning to be okay with that.
And right before this happened on the same MacBook we purchased plane tickets from
As we were laughing at this juxtaposition our waitress yelled across the room, �Good morning Duke!�
I looked up at Duke. Duke was more probably a local trucker. He had a Harley Davison hat with flames coming off the bill. A cigarette hung from his mouth and tattoos lined his arms. His black Sturgis t-shirt was tucked into his Brett Favre Wranglers but on his feet he did not have boots . . . on his feet he had flannel house shoes.
Duke garbled, �Good morning darlin.�
I later got in my car and followed my friend back to his house so he could use my car the next day. He was driving his mothers car at the time. And I passed a cop and panicked because my speedometer light is out in my hubcap-less 95� red Buick Skylark. I didn�t know how fast I was going. It was five in the morning. The story started swirling in my head, �Officer, we were just at Waffle House buying a plane ticket to China because we�ll be over there next week and my friend needs to use my car because he�s taking his mothers car back to her so she can go to work in a little bit. He needs to go to this bookstore in
And I�m sure he would have said something like, �Sir, I�ve heard a lot of stories in my day. Step out of your car.�
Teach Me To Pray
4:18 AM
I write at a kitchen table. There are days when I'd love to have a writer's desk with an old Tiffany lamp perched just so and fountain pens in an empty soup can and copies of The New Yorker strewn about the edges and...but that would be someone else's story. I write at a kitchen table.
As I wrote yesterday, I could see him. Then he'd disappear. Then I'd see him again. Rising. Falling. Rising again. You see, his backyard has a trampoline, like our backyard does. I watched him turn flip after flip after flip, I bet twenty in a row, his eyes closed. He was poetry. Our trampoline has a black safety web that feeds our abandon. His does not; he jumps without a net.
The lights in his house stay on all night long and the windows are always, always open, every last one, and people are always yelling or screaming or crying or hollering. Sometimes, when I'm writing at the kitchen table in the wee small hours I see the lights and hear the sounds. Sometimes I stop writing and pray. There used to be a daddy in his house, but now he's gone. There were rumors about, well, they were rumors. Now there's a boyfriend in his house and rumors of marriage.
Sometimes I stop writing and wonder about him. It used to bug me that the lights stayed on all night but then I thought what if that's because a daddy loved darkness rather than light? That was the rumor. It doesn't bug me so much now, after that thought. And I used to wonder why he would spend long stretches of time doing flip after flip after flip. But then I thought sometimes even a new boyfriend can't put humpty together again and maybe he asks God to make him a bird so he can fly, fly away but God doesn't listen, so the closest he can get to the sky, to being untethered by the things of this world, is to barrel outside and close his eyes and spread his wings and jump without a net.
If I had that writer's desk like I mentioned, it would probably be tucked away in some corner of the house surrounded by books that reached to the ceiling. If I had that desk, I couldn't see Icarus; I wouldn't know how to pray.
Wait a minute...THERE'S A WALL HERE!!!
9:30 PM
AND IT'S NOT HOLDING BACK PALESTINIANS!!!If there's a single area of the world I would infer would be completely covered by archaeologists, that single area would be Jerusalem.
You know what they say: when you infer, you make an in out of 'f' and 'er'.
But seriously, they just found a giant wall in Jerusalem. Now the maps in the back of every Bible ever have to be rewritten!!!
(When reached for comment, the Christian book industry simply said, "Cha-ching!".)
Ugly Ducklings
6:21 AM
I'm trying to remember a worse day to be a Duck fan.It was nearly comical.
The Oregon Ducks-Boise State Broncos matchup to kick off the college football season ended up a disaster. From the opening kick-off, the aura played into Boise's hands: the plucky, all-American underdog facing its Nike-funded, evil-empire, neighboring state, BCS rival.
In last year's game, a Boise State defender delivered a vicious helmet-to-helmet cheap shot to Oregon QB Jeremiah Masoli after his first pass attempt. It was the one moral ground a Ducks fan could stand on going in, and even then it was reluctant. Before the last two season, most Oregon fans loved Boise State. The Broncos aren't in the Pac-10, they've featured a slew of Oregon-grown talent (like Jared Zabransky and Legedu Naanee), and they pulled off one of the greatest games in college football history against a team Duck fans do hate. Even their head coach, Chris Peterson, is a favorite son in Eugene, serving as an assistant coach under Mike Bellotti for six years.
They were also ranked two slots higher in preseason rankings, making this game a lose-lose situation. Smaller conference teams aren't expected to beat teams like Oregon, even if they're consistent college football powerhouses. On paper, in Boise, the Ducks were the underdog, but most of the country doesn't know that. This game also marked the beginning of a new era under the Ducks' promising new coach, Chip Kelly, after the 14 year reign of Mike Bellotti.
What ensued was the most frustrating game imaginable. Despite their much-vaunted offense, which racked up an average of 54 points per game over the last three games last season, Oregon gained a total of 14 yards in the first half. They did not manage to convert a first down until the third quarter.
Despite the ineptitude, the Ducks kept getting breaks. They were only down 13 at the half due to Boise State's two missed field goals, and a series of fumbles and stops kept giving the ball back when it looked hopeless. After their first first down of the game, the Ducks suddenly started playing like they usually do, and rolled in for an easy touchdown. There was an entire quarter and a half to go, and the Ducks were only down 11 points.
It never panned out, and neither team scored again. It was sloppy and ugly on both sides, and I was almost relieved when the clock finally ticked out, but not before Oregon's hardest hitter, T.J. Ward, was injured badly, and not before they repeatedly the same teary-eyed Duck fan in the crowd, a man who looked to be in his 20s, sulking.
Then, things got really bad.
From ESPN's game report:
As the Broncos began celebrating on their famous blue turf, Hout yelled in Blount's face and tapped him on the shoulder pad. That drew an immediate scream from Boise State head coach Chris Petersen, but before Petersen could pull Hout away, Blount landed a right hand to the defensive end's jaw.Then, Blount wouldn't leave quietly, fighting with the police escorts ushering him off the field, and making blind rushes at taunting fans over the exit tunnel.
I felt two primary emotions in quick succession.
1. A vague sense of justice. I like to pretend, despite my fanhood, I'm fairly objective. But that Boise State player sure came off an @$$hole. Who taunts an opposing team like that, especially after such a humiliating loss? Trash talk is part of the game, I know, but I've always felt sore winners are more obnoxious than sore losers. LaGarrette Blount entered this game one of the top NFL running back prospects in the nation. He finished with -5 yards on 8 carries. That's all the talk you need...rubbing it in during the post-game handshakes is classless.
So watching Hout get absolutely cold-cocked in response was vaguely satisfying. I'm ashamed I felt this way.
2. Anger. I was embarrassed to be somewhat pleased by the punch, and immediately swung the other way. My exact Facebook post was "LaGarrette Blount should be kicked off the Oregon Ducks." Blount's actions made Oregon look as evil as Bronco fans wanted them to be. It's bad enough being the powerhouse team humbled by their small conference neighbor. It's another to punch a guy in an epic display of bad sportsmanship, on national television, in the first game of the year. For many Ducks fans and players, it was shame heaped on a humiliating game.
The next morning, I don't feel the same. Blount should not be kicked off the team, though he should suffer a lengthy suspension. With one emotional reaction, Blount has done irreparable harm to his future. His actions could cost him a shot at the 1st round of the NFL draft (maybe more - with more emphasis on character in pro sports lately, he could drop considerably, costing him millions of dollars in bonuses).
I wasn't alone in my response. The cries were out all over Facebook ("Horrible, I say. Hope they boot him from that sorry excuse of a team..."), from the announcers ("unconscionable!" "reprehensible!"), and the always-indignant John Canzano.
Here's my problem, 10 hours later, with the outrage:
The Oregon and Boise State players had just finished 60 minutes of football. They are big and powerful men, running across the field and slamming into each other at full speed. These men are ridiculously strong. As Chuck Klosterman pointed out years ago in a brilliant essay for ESPN, NFL linebacker Shawne Merriman weighs more than the greatest offensive tackle of all-time (Anthony Munoz, who retired in 1993) and runs faster than the greatest receiver did during his draft combine (Jerry Rice, who retired in 2005). These men are destroying each other for our entertainment.
And yet, when that raw emotion and energy spills out for even a moment after the game, we gasp in self-righteousness. We recall our time on the field - in Little League, or out with friends - and pretend we understand what it's like. If we were tackled just once by a 200 pound man, we would file assault charges. LaGarrette Blount was pulled to the ground 8 times by groups of men even larger, while he was running full speed. We can't fathom, from our pure white towers of the finest carved ivory, how he could ever resort to flinging his fist into an opponent's smug grin?
Maybe I should start taking some notes from hockey: if I'm going to cheer on the barbarism and slow death of athletes, I may as well cheer when they fight, as well. Or at least not recoil in hypocritical horror like a pious windbag.
(UPDATE: Maybe I'm not such a homer after all...Deadspin's post on the incident has some similar themes.)
(FURTHER UPDATE: Blount has been suspended for the rest of the season.)
This has to be a joke...
8:26 AM
Apparently, Christians aren't the only ones looking to profit off the apocalypse.I'm not sure it's real. (The FAQs say it is!) If it is, though...oh, mama. What a wonderful scheme.
(Thanks to reader James for the tip. This blog would be a sad, liberal-infested place without him, and we love him for that.)
Who wants SEC Championship Game tickets?
6:06 AM
Okay, I know a great many of you live in the Pacific Northwest. And I know most of you who care about football care more about the PAC 10. But I'm writing a book on Faith and Fanaticism in the Southeastern Conference, and to generate a little interest in the project I'm giving away two tickets to the SEC Title Game.
Here is how the contest works.
You have until Oct 17th to enter. On the 18th I will draw 10 names, and those fans will compete in a six-week, knock out style pick 'em contest, with the winner taking two tickets to the big game. So how do you get entered? Easy, there are three ways.
1. Join my Facebook group.
2. Take the Faith and Fanaticism survey.
3. Re-tweet the survey or Facebook group along with @Chad_Gibbs on Twitter.
In fact, you can do all three and triple your chances of winning!
Thanks for your help, and good luck!
"E" - the estrogen factor of American Christianity
7:15 AM
I'm intrigued by a study David Murrow did (found here, archives of the Winter 2008 issue) that examined a possible hypothesis regarding the vast percentage difference between the genders when it comes to church attendance. It's about 60/40 in our church, and this is common. This imbalance is unique to Christianity, as Buddhists, Muslims, Jews, and Hindus all display a remarkable gender balance in their faith practices.One could speculate about the 'why' of this, and such speculations abound, including hypotheses that address the patriarchal bent of other religions ("of course men are in... they carry all the power cards!"), or their cultural mandate ("it's just that everyone's in, unlike our secular society"), but Murrow's hypothesis is the one I find most intriguing.
He asked both Christians and Non-Christians to answer the question: "Which set of values better characterizes Jesus Christ and his true followers?" They chose between:
Set #1
Competence
Power
Efficiency
Accomplishment
Achievement
Proving Oneself
Results Objects
Technology
Goal-Oriented
Success
Competition
Set #2
Loving Cooperation
Personal Expression
Communication
Relationship
Beauty
Support
Help
Nurture
Feeling
Sharing
Relating
Harmony
Community
95% of those surveyed said list #2 represents the values of Christ. In reality, the lists aren't the values of Christ and/or someone else, but the lists of masculine and feminine values from John Gray's book, "Men are from Mars, Women are from Venus". You can debate the merits of this book. You can decry the generalizations and stereotypes. What you can't do is ignore the reality that men don't get involved in faith communities as consistently as women.
The thesis of the surveyor is that American Christianity has been feminized. That's one theory. But those who go down that right tend to simply move the ethos of the church from one imbalanced list to the another. This doesn't seem adequate.
Instead, I'd suggest that men are staying away for a few simple reasons:
1. Men are bored by church. It might be because the sermon's boring, or it might be because there's no compelling vision or venue for involvement. When Christ called his disciples he didn't call them to sit in endless meeting, but to go out and change the world. The school of faith that Jesus ran took place in markets, on walking trails, at sea. Yes, there was teaching, but the teaching was only important to the extent that there was a real thing happening. I'm bored by reading books about the technicalities of mountaineering - unless I'm about to go climbing. Our need to provide a balance of teaching and activity is vital, and addressed here.
2. There's no "vision quest" anymore. My 23 year old son just phoned me from Yosemite Valley in California. He got there by riding his bicycle over 1000 miles, from Seattle, down the Oregon Coast, down the California coast, to San Francisco, and then east to the Sierra Nevada mountains, and into Yosemite. I can tell, just by phone, that he's profoundly changed by doing this. In a sanitized world where even play sets are injury proof, we run the risk of boring our sons to death with Bible stories, Bible ethics, Bible characters, and oh so mellow music, when what might be needed is a week at sea, or a 1000 mile bike trip, or a month in Central America or Africa or... ? You tell me.
3. There's just not enough vision. I don't want to overgeneralize, so I'll say it this way: There are millions of men, and many women as well, who need a mountain to climb; who need a vision that will engage their whole selves; who need to shoot for the moon and the stars when they wake up each day. These people (of both gender) are the ones the church runs the risk of losing if we don't help people see that 'church life' isn't about sitting quietly and singing sweet songs - it's about being spun out (see previous post) of comfort zone, and using our gifts to make the invisible God visible in tangible ways. Doing that will require character qualities from BOTH lists, and both genders.
What do you think? Agree or disagree? Why is there a shortage of men in church?
Posted in: Gender RolesDerek Webb, Stockholm Syndrome
11:50 AM
I like Derek Webb a lot. He's a truly creative guy, working in and around the fringes of Christian music, a genre that doesn't exactly prize "the artist" often. I met him briefly when he was touring during his first round with Caedmon's Call (a band Webb announced he will be reuniting with soon) and it already seemed he was uneasy with the constraints of the business, frustrated by the limitations of playing in churches and the unofficially-enforced Jesus-per-minute standard. After a very weird time in Caedmon's (his songs seemed either pinned on at the last minute, or on a few albums, Webb didn't get a song on at all), he turned to a solo career that seems to flirt with controversy with each release. His first album used the word "whore" in the lyrics, other albums hit hard on social justice issues. Webb transitioned from a straight-ahead singer-songwriter type to a more experimental performer, although in a generally Yankee Hotel Foxtrot way. In the meantime, Webb gave an album away online, and then, inspired by the experience, started Noisetrade.com, a remarkable way for artists to market their music in the uncertain digital age. It's easy to cheer for Webb. He seems like a man with honorable convictions and a desire for his music to mean something.Which brings us to Webb's new album, Stockholm Syndrome. Webb's online marketing project leading up to the album and controversy with his label over his use of somewhat banal profanity built a frenzy for its release, and now reviewers seem to be lining up to hand out album-of-the-year honors to Stockholm Syndrome. Notably, culture e-zine Christian Manifesto called SS "one of the most important albums of the last 10 years." The problem is, Stockholm Syndrome doesn't come close to deserving that sort of hype.
Stockholm Syndrome is as enjoyable as any disc full of songs intending to be prophetic is likely to be, but neither the message nor the medium end up being all that powerful. The lyrics on "What You Give Up To Get It" are painfully trite at points. The profanity on "What Matters More" is no big deal, especially for anyone younger than age 50 (which includes essentially everyone in Webb's core audience) and the rest of the album ends up interesting and somewhat thought provoking if you're willing to bring your own issues to the table. Still, "Freddie Please" is a criticism of Westboro Baptist "pastor" Fred Phelps, someone you'd have a hard time finding a defender for, even in the most homophobic mainstream churches. I think the church should do a better job of sorting out our attitudes about homosexuality, too, but this particular song, like most of the album, seemed to be more about Webb scolding his audience for their intolerance.
The unfortunate thing is his audience is likely to assume the song is directed towards someone else - someone not hip enough to pick up the Derek Webb disc. Webb is at his most effective when he turns to the theme of the album's title: that, as Christians, we have become too sympathetic to our captors (the world). A few songs seem to return to that thought, but not quite enough. For every profound moment, Webb goes back into prophet mode, but his reliance on extended metaphor and imagery fails his message, and that's assuming the message is focused to begin with. It's not enough, and at times it seems Webb has become overly sympathetic to his captor named Outrage, forgetting about grace. He's not alone in that camp, however...you could probably count the number of Christian musicians able to bring the balance of the Gospel to their work on one hand, and that's only if you include musicians no longer with us, like Rich Mullins.
The album as a whole reminds me of what someone (I wish I remembered who) said about U2's "Pride": "When you think about it, what does that song tell us about either Jesus or Martin Luther King Jr.? It just evokes our memories of them in a mishmash of imagery to seem evocative and meaningful." The same is true for Stockholm Syndrome, minus the Martin Luther King part. For all the stumbling to try to crown this album as "a force that could topple the Jerichos of modern evangelicalism" (as David Sessions wrote for Patrol), I can't quite figure out what to take away from Webb's work, and I suspect I'm just looking in the wrong place.
Besides the muddled message, what's going to keep Stockholm Syndrome from being one of the "most important" albums of the decade (even if we're limiting ourselves to releases in the Christian genre) is that the sound of the songs themselves isn't as innovative as critics (or Webb himself) think. This probably wasn't his intent, but the influence that I kept thinking of throughout repeated listens wasn't Aphex Twin or Radiohead, but David Gray's White Ladder, recalling a time around the turn of the century when folk type musicians started messing with synths and drum machines. So, on the tracks with programmed beats, there isn't the uneasiness or induced paranoia that comes from a Massive Attack record or the aggressiveness that comes from great hip-hop; just a beat that doesn't add much of anything. The Patrol review throws out adjectives to try to describe the album's sounds, including "chopped" and "screwed", which makes me wonder if the reviewer has ever heard a Houston-area remixed rap album (from which those terms come). Webb might have, but if there's a single moment on Stockholm that DJ Screw would have recognized as derived from his influence, that would be the surprise of my lifetime.
I suspect "Jena & Jimmy" is supposed to have a sensual, sexy feel, but it fails on that front. Slower paced tracks like "The Proverbial Gun" and "The State" drag on without much momentum. It's not like there aren't enjoyable moments, because there are ("I Love/Hate You" is probably one of Webb's best songs to date and "Cobra Con" has a nice feel to it), but overall, Stockholm Syndrome sounds like a moderately hip adult contemporary record. The electronic accoutrements feel tacked on and lack a connection to either the present or future of music. (The programming on the most recent David Crowder Band album felt far more connected to a specific musical intent and aesthetic, for example.) Would I recommend the album? Maybe, as long as you temper your expectations. If you're looking for an album that "deserves comparisons to Ok Computer and Kid A" as John Wofford wrote in his review, you'll be incredibly disappointed.
It's certainly not just Christians that get into this endless quest to crown the next great album. There's something about the internet that encourages that sort of behavior. After all, remember when every music site went nuts for Clap Your Hands Say Yeah? I like the Talking Heads as much as anyone, but it didn't take long for that bubble to burst. Sometime next year, the authors of these glowing reviews will move on to something else, and what was "Derek Webb�s exhilarating, subversive masterpiece [Patrol]" will be consigned to the archives. The fault isn't with Derek, who clearly put a lot of effort into Stockholm Syndrome, with moderately successful results. The problem is with our need to feel validated and to have someone in the marketplace championing what we feel is wrong with Christianity.
I loved Steve Taylor when I was younger, as his albums took on Christian retail, Operation Rescue and holier-than-thou church goers; the same people we jaded kids in the back pews couldn't stand either. [In fact, what does this line from a British magazine's review of Taylor's I Want to Be a Clone remind you of?: "This six-track 'mini-LP' is the most exciting and radically 'prophetic' recording the rock'n'roll subculture has so far presented to the Church." As they say, there's nothing new under the sun.] While Taylor has moved on to other ventures, his catalog of albums which seemed prophetic then are now out of print and largely forgotten. Taylor then, and Webb now, aren't exactly preaching to the choir, but instead headline a pep rally for those frustrated with mainstream Christianity.
Oddly, the same day Stockholm Syndrome hits iTunes, the new David Bazan album arrives as well. While Curse Your Branches doesn't attempt to create a new sonic landscape, Bazan hits a new high mark lyrically, essentially writing a concept album on doubt, with every song aching with a struggle to believe. Bazan turns the spotlight on himself and then on the Christian evangelical ideas of God and truth, which is definitely more difficult to listen to and take in, where Webb (and his laudatory fans in the review pages) just keep pointing at a crowd that, to be frank, probably won't ever hear his words. Maybe it's enough to make those slighted by the dominant paradigm to feel better about life on the fringe, but we can't confuse that with prophecy or the likelihood of real change.
