This is a reflection on a review of a book. So call me derivative. Hey, this is the Internet. Daniel Radosh’s new book, Rapture Ready!, reveals to secular America what many of us have known for a long time: Christians have no taste.
The book, which is an examination of the parallel universe of the evangelical Christian subculture, has a lot to make you think.
Here’s a key passage from a review by Hanna Rosin on Slate:
“In the ’80s, Christians were known as the boycotters, refusing to see movies or buy products that offended them. They felt about commercial culture much the way a Marxist might: that it was a decadent glorification of money and meaningless human relationships. Then, sometime during the ’90s, when conservative evangelicals started coming out of their shells, they took a different tack. The boycotters became co-opters and embarked on the curious quest to enlist America’s crassest material culture in the service of spiritual growth.
Most non-Christians are aware that there is something called Christian rock. We’ve all had the slightly unsettling experience of pausing the car radio on a pleasant, unfamiliar ballad until we realized … Ahhh. That’s not her boyfriend she’s mooning over! But few of us have any idea of how truly extensive this so-called subculture is. Reading Radosh’s book is like coming across another planet hidden somewhere on Earth where everything is just exactly like it is here except blue or made out of plastic. Every American pop phenomenon has its Christian equivalent, no matter how improbable. And Radosh seems to have experienced them all.”
So this shows us something about Christians living under the Law: In the 80s, they tried to go cold turkey: “We will not ingest anything from corrupted mainstream culture.”
Then, casuistry set in: “Well, let’s see if we can just re-jigger the culture so that it conforms to our narrow and self-righteous morality. So now rock music is OK, as long as it’s about Jesus.”
But this article also says something about non-Christian understandings of Christianity: They are just as legalistic as Christians–just in a different way.
Check out this bit from Rosin:
“What does commercializing do to the substance of belief, and what does an infusion of belief do to the product? When you make loving Christ sound just like loving your boyfriend, you can do damage to both your faith and your ballad. That’s true when you create a sanitized version of bands like Nirvana or artists like Jay-Z, too: You shoehorn a message that’s essentially about obeying authority into a genre that’s rebellious and nihilistic, and the result can be ugly, fake, or just limp.”
Now, there’s a lot there I can agree with. No one likes bad art (except when it’s so bad it’s great). But look at how Rosin characterizes Christianity in the last sentence: “a message that’s essentially about obeying authority.”
What? That’s the essence of Christianity?
Rosin’s article implies that Christians growing up with iPods are wising up to the fact that Christian pop music/art/comedy/literature is almost all bad. But if the remedy is to get more in touch with the “true” Christianity of obedience to authority, or to simply become insufferable snobs about art, then, as my grandmother used to say, Lord have mercy.
Contrary to what this article says, and what the Christians who make bad art (appear to) think, Christianity is about freedom. And if we understood that, there would be no such thing as “Christian rock” or “Christian T-shirts” or, as this article mentions, “Christian planetariums.”
As 20th-century German theologian Ernst Kasemann said: Jesus means freedom.
But you already knew that…
COMMENTS
12 responses to “Rapture Ready! – Adventures In The Parallel Universe Of Christian Pop Culture”
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Great post Aaron!
The only problem with losing Christian rock is then new Christians won’t get to have that painful experience of throwing away all of their secular albums for the apparently more sanctified versions put out by Christians:) I am still trying to replenish my collection after the brash act of tossing thousands of dollars worth of excellent music in college. Ironically, now I am in the process of throwing away most of the cheesy country and Christian albums that I bought during those years.
Still, I did come across Waterdeep during this period, and they remain one of my favorite bands even though they are Christians.
ok. so the thing is that hanna rosin gets her (admittedly undernuanced) definition of Christianity from encountering a combination of (at least the following) things:
1)Jesus’ language about the Kingdom of God and authority in the bible
2)watching the loveless power-struggles in American Christendom
3)pelagian over-emphasis on good behavior
4)Christian arguments for political engagement in America
who will give her a good reason to not think that Christianity is most fundamentally about “obedience to authority”? how can radical communities and radical voices founded with the mission to revise this notion do things other than talk to themselves and their sympathizers about theology? what does it look like to live such a radical vision? or does “livin’ it” (as bro stephen baldwin calls it) necessarily drag in too much ethics in the first place?
tell me the answer, mockingbirds!
I always thought Christianity was the “divine excuse” that you give when you want to break up with someone. I mean, it’s much nicer to say “God told me that I should be dating Jesus instead” than to say “I think you’re kind of lame and I want to break up with you.”
(I’m kidding. But seriously, I was once dumped by a guy who wanted to pursue Jesus first.)
I was joking around the other day with friends about making a “Stuff Christians Like” page, sort of like “Stuff White People Like”. Here’s the list we thought of:
1. Bracelets with acronyms (e.g., WWJD, FROG)
2. Dating Jesus
3. Breaking up with someone so you can date Jesus
4. Themed bibles
5. Witness wear (I once had a t-shirt with a life saver that said “life savior”)
6. Promise rings
7. Being Purpose-Driven
8. The 6-inch rule (i.e. how close you can stand to someone of the opposite sex)
9. Praying for another person’s problems aloud but really just talking about that person’s faults
Dang, we _are_ pretty lame! And we get very attached to things that represent God instead of to God himself.
I think the “answer” to your question, cjdm, is a life that is meaningfully, completely, totally free. Free of neurosis. Freud thought religion is the cause, not the solution, of human neurosis. Who could disagree?! But he can’t be 100% right if the message of Christ is freedom, not neurosis. I’m inclined to go with seeing freedom as a marker of real Christianity. Not the kind of freedom just a mask for reaction or rebellion, but the kind that truly has no ties with anything other than with the Spirit of God.
Unfortunately, since our representations of God are so flawed, our efforts to foster such ties generally don’t get us very close to God. Too often they just get us closer to ourselves and what we *think* is God. It’s a good thing that the Spirit was SENT to us, rather than the other way around!
I saw this silly indie-bluegrass band once who were great musicians but ultimately, in my opinion, just really silly (and they weren’t trying to be). But they had a song whose lyrics I couldn’t make out but whose message was in fact very profound and not silly at all. The singer introduced the song by saying simply, “This song is about how world peace starts at home.”
What I took it to mean is that we must have peace with our friends and family, if world peace is to be tangible – or that if we can’t make peace with our friends and family, we’ll never have world peace.
I mention this because it reminds me of how Jesus is concerned with our hearts and motivations first. The root, like the “home” in the band’s song. Any example of a sanctified life or “good works” is only ever a natural extension (freedom freedom freedom) of the work of the Holy Spirit in our hearts.
The Holy Spirit guides us through our lives into and out of relationships and jobs and residences, etc. God claims our lives as His, not our own (despite how self-involved we might feel). He uses us on the small scale, at the root of all human life media art, which is relationships. I think our witness in human relationships is our freedom, and also that we can talk about our bondage (which is a display of freedom, really). 1 Corinthians 4:4 says, “My conscience is clear, but that does not make me innocent.”
Thanks for this discussion! I am a Christian who is also an artist and am immersed in the legalism of the commercial/institutional art world. Yet I have my own law too. I have always been burdened with how to make my art reflect my faith in some way but at the same time have always found overtly Christian art contrived. This reflection on a review ☺ helped illuminate the law I fall back into; that is, the law of trying to make my art Christian in some way thereby not ever trusting that God would ever work through whatever desire he gives to me. That’s very freeing to me.
Cjdm,
Thanks for your comment. I think you bring up a good point that we shouldn’t just be “talking to ourselves and our sympathizers about theology”. Mbird’s goal is to engage anyone and everyone willing to listen. Thankfully the blog has provided this opportunity as there have been plenty of great discussions where differing opinions have been voiced.
In answer to your question about how it looks, I agree with Bonnie that it is a life of freedom, which is only possible by God’s perfect grace. I would like to add that because I believe we are continual failures in life, and more often than not our lives do not look free we continue to share the message we’ve been told (hence the name Mockingbird). We cannot model the right Christian life, rather we tell people the message that has given us relief while “coping with our failures to be good people” (borrowing a line from Jacob Smith here).
If there is any example that we set or any way we “live it out” it is by failing and ending up back at the cross where we find the unconditional forgiveness of God through Jesus Christ.
What are your thoughts on this?
I’d like to point out that Stuff Christians Like already exists, although it’s not half as funny or incisive as the SWPL.
http://stufffchristianslike.blogspot.com/
As to the topic at hand: I think Dave’s posts on this blog amply demonstrate that most rock music is in fact Christian rock music. Nearly all of the greatest American songwriters borrow religious imagery or deal with faith at some point. The gospel message, once heard, marks people irrevocably. This is not to say that these songwriters don’t try to twist the message, or work against it, but rather to suggest that the line we draw is more or less artificial, based mainly on which label releases the music and in which stores it is sold. There’s trash on both sides of the fence; there is treasure also.
Hanna Rosin spent a year or so researching Christian culture at Patrick Henry College, a conservative school that draws from the best and brightest homeschoolers in the country; ne of my good friends got to know her a little bit while she was there. It’s a campus loaded with rules about clothing, movies, etc., and I’m pretty sure that the Jon Stewart anecdote took place there.
hey william thanks for posting the link for stuff Christians like. That’s hilarious!!!
Mary Zahl once told a story about sitting next to a conservative Presbyterian leader on a flight into Birmingham.
“Jesus told the Church to be IN the world but not OF the world. We’ve decided to be OF the world but not IN it.”
That can’t be true that he said that!
Hi Jeff!
Hey Trevor!
He was making a *critique* of cultural Christianity, as I understood it, not offering the new PCA position.