Keep The Promise

... is the theme of World AIDS Day tomorrow. Are you ready for a new podcast? "The World AIDS Day ONEcast will feature former President of South Africa Nelson Mandela, Bono, U2 lead singer and co-founder of DATA (Debt, AIDS, Trade for Africa) and Chris Martin of Coldplay, along with members of the faith community and other ONE supporters."

Every day I've faced the same choice. Despair or plant hope. That's the Advent choice.

Steve at e~mergent kiwi preaches an Advent sermon on hope in unexpected places using Simeon, Anna, and the Madonna del Parto. There's a U2 thread throughout, but nicely weaving three things in rather than picking just one. Good practical ending too.

The ONE Campaign: Big Noise letter

The ONE campaign is offering a sign on letter in advance of the WTO meeting on Dec 13. If you'd like to express support for fairer trade regulations "so trade becomes part of the solution to poverty, not the cause," do so here.

God is always in on the act

During this last tour there's been a series of generic, adequately-written U2 and spirituality articles reporting on how U2's work arises from a Christian worldview. Whether these pieces piggyback on church events, concerts, publications, or something else, I'm wondering more and more if it's worth linking them all. I have to believe most readers of the U2 Sermons blog already know these basic facts and have read multiple examples of, e.g., the mandatory "I Still Haven't Found What I'm Looking For" paragraph. Maybe I should start being more selective, and only highlighting things that either say something fresh about U2 and faith, or that document how people are working theologically with their material in a creative way.

Oh, what the heck, for the time being I guess I'll link one more generic piece. Mostly a Rolling Stone rehash with some Stockman insertions.

incarnation as the beginning of a new song

As we move into Advent, here's a brief post linking U2's "War" and "Yahweh": It feels as though the not yet of the already not yet is beginning to be found.

Can I then, at least, stand up for the little things?

Playing catch-up on links: A nice reflection on U2 live, Rosa Parks, and ONE.

Biblical illiteracy (like that's news)

I knew I wasn't going to be able to watch U2's appearance on 60 Minutes until midweek, but I did read some of the reports of it, and was confused by a quotation I saw a few places but cannot now find again (perhaps it's been corrected.) It referred to Bono as having said that as for the Beatles, U2 "cannot touch what he called their 'hymn.'" Other than conjuring up unwanted M.C. Hammer pictures, this sentence didn't communicate much to me; however, I figured there'd be a fuller explanation of what "hymn" referred to (the Beatles' whole oeuvre? their particular style?) when I saw the show. Well, of course, it wasn't a hymn....

In Distrust of Movements and Crumbs from Your Table

After a recent comment by Chad I was skimming his blog, and found a link to a 2000 Wendell Berry essay that sounded timely to me. You don't have to read more than two sentences into it before, if you are a U2 fan, you will ask yourself, "Hmmm....Do U2 read Wendell Berry?" Wouldn't especially surprise me.

Stereotypes run both ways...

Fascinating article by Kate Bowman Johnston on the response booking Wilco frontman Jeff Tweedy for a concert in the Calvin College chapel generated from secular-minded Wilco fans.

Atlanta area Christians find inspiration in lyrics of longtime rock band

This really seems to be the rising star of the list of possible mainstream media angles for a U2 story these days, doesn't it?

Christians Behind the Screen: An Interview with Barbara Nicolosi

Lots to ponder in this interview with someone I already mentioned recently on the blog, for people interested in how and why Christians make mainstream art. It's about film, but it applies to anything. Provocative issues: how have the values of the baby boomers hobbled the subsequent generation of Christian artists? What about collaboration with people who hold different belief systems? What's with this weird religious-fear-of-beauty thing? Why does drama need demons? And perhaps my favorite, and a very apt U2 question I've mentioned in speaking engagements occasionally: "How does a Christian talk about sin in a way that's not an occasion of sin?" (Answer: the opening riff of "An Cat Dubh," for one.)

Walk The Line

An addendum to yesterday evening's post: here's a nice reflection on U2 and Johnny Cash from someone who does seem to want God in the Kingdom.

They say they want the kingdom but they don't want God in it. You can say that again, but it has nothing to do with the subject of this post.

It was interesting to watch the Johnny Cash "I Walk The Line" tribute show tonight on CBS; having grown up in Tennessee I just have all those songs in my groundwater. Some of the covers were more successful than others, but of course I was especially curious about what U2 would do with "The Wanderer." Hearing Edge be the one to throw in a quote from an old hit, in this case Del Shannon's "Runaway" at the end of the verses, was a big kick, as was some lovely - what shall we call it, Edge Bongolese? - at the end there. And I appreciated the octave doubling beginning at the Jesus verse.

I'd been sort of apprehensively expecting some revisionist lyric changes to this deliberately dark and shocking album closer, and even wondering if they might rewrite the "in search of experience" bridge (which they didn't.) Still, "The Wanderer" did receive some softening, notably at the "Bible and a gun" verse where we got the almost Hallmark cardy "Bible in the sun," then "I was hoping I could be the one." (Not to mention the ethereal Edge Bongolese, which did sort of change the whole feel of the end of the song.) This is all of course consistent with U2's recent subtle reworking of their 90s material, but still... And I presume "I went out to bury my love" was a reference to June Carter Cash, especially in light of the story about Johnny Cash thinking U2's "paper" line was too flip.

While I'm here, I'll just throw in everyone's favorite U2/Cash anecdote. Bono: When I visited him at home one time, he said the most beautiful, poetic grace. He said, "Shall we bow our heads?" We all bowed our heads. Then, when he was done, he looked at me and Adam Clayton and said, "Sure miss the drugs, though."

What's Driving Today's Innovations? - LeadershipJournal.net

I was at a large conference some years ago where Leonard Sweet used a video of U2's late-2000 performance of "Elevation" on Saturday Night Live to illustrate worship-leading based on his E.P.I.C. paradigm (briefly: the culture of today values the experiential, the participatory, the image-based, and the connective). That conference was, I believe, the first time I had seen someone really work with U2 theologically (at that point Get Up Off Your Knees was not even a gleam in our eyes; heck, Walk On wasn't even out), and I was especially impressed because the show was only a month or so old at that point. The only noteworthy performance decision I thought he missed mentioning in his commentary was the ending reference to what one would have to call, in the rock 'n' roll calendar, the wider liturgical occasion (it was the day after the 20th anniversary of John Lennon's murder in New York, and Bono added the chorus of "Instant Karma" to the end of "Elevation.")

However, one aspect of the presentation bothered me a bit; it almost seemed as if Sweet was under the impression that this going into the audience business was a new thing, and that the band were just now on the cutting edge of discovering something revolutionary about being E.P.I.C. onstage. Sweet didn't make a big point of that, but it was enough that I actually joined the long line of conferees trying and failing to talk with him during the break; I planned to congratulate him on his choice of example but also to make sure he was aware that breaking the third wall to interact with the crowd was a longstanding preoccupation with U2. (For an example, let's even just restrict ourslves to events taking place in the NBC studios: "I Will Follow" on the Tomorrow Show with Tom Snyder in 1980? Exact same thing as "Elevation" on SNL in 2000.) Reading his comments in this article from earlier this year (scroll down to "participation"), I wish I had made it to the front of the line that day.

LeaderNotes.com: People have the Power

This is just a shade off topic, but I figure people interested in preaching and theology are also often interested in being good leaders, so here's a reflection from a business-to-business blog which (after some raving about a recent U2 concert) muses on what lessons for leadership are found in the fact that "people of all races, religions, political leanings, kids, grandparents participated in this experience. And I mean that in the full sense of the word. I have never been to a concert where the crowd sang more and interacted with the band like last night. Bono seemed thrilled to surrender the show to the audience...."

Amen, Baby -- it's a U2 joke, get it?

This story profiles a recent church plant in Fort Lauderdale whose pastors were impacted by U2 and talks about how they've used the band's work in worship. I'm linking it for that, not to endorse the overall focus, however, which is the familiar controversy over U2's spiritual influence: "are-they-or-aren't they?", paired with "...and let's criticize Christians who disagree with us about it." (Basically, although she hadn't picked this focus when we spoke last week by email, the article covers all the stuff I told the reporter I don't comment about on the record; no wonder none of what we discussed made it in). Chris Scharen and Steve Stockman, in keeping with the focus of both their books, join the debate with a quote each. A sidebar is this list of more reading on U2 and Christianity, including our book and about everything else there is (except for Bono In Conversation and Race of Angels, I guess). While we're linking, the same paper also has a cute list of 25 reasons U2 is the best band ever which seems to start at #11, but that's fitting for rock stars (it's a Spinal Tap joke, get it?)

Not a "Christian cinema" so much as Christians in cinema.

Beliefnet, home of a ludicrously mixed bag of spiritual tricks and treats (and of the last Bono interview about faith before U2's dissimulation policy was retired), has just published an excerpt from the new book Behind the Screen: Hollywood Insiders on Faith Film and Culture. I was interested as I read this to try and apply it outside the world of film, thinking of some artists I know who are Christian, as well as one group of rock musicians about whose work I blog. In the excerpt, Barbara Nicolosi of Act One writes "While Christian projects will not be defined by the topics they treat, we can expect that certain defining themes will inhere in our projects as the cinematic 'aroma of Christ.'" How's this for a list (I'll just give you snippets):

Affirmation of Spiritual Realities...."Created with a Christian sensibility, a movie should be haunted by the invisible world."
Connectedness.... "A Christian film should be imbued with the certainty that we are not alone.... We are connected to one another and to the One who yearns for us as the apple of his eye."
Good and Evil Are Not Equal... "A Christian dramatist needs to portray sin with the same intensity as does a purely secular dramatist... but ultimately lead viewers away from cynicism and toward hope."
The Culture of Life... "A Christian movie will reflect a reverence in its bearing toward the human person. Our reverence to persons will dictate not only the kinds of stories that we tell but also the method in which we tell them."
Juxtaposition of Joy and Suffering... "The weirdest thing about Christians is the way we can hold both terrible suffering and joy in our hands at the same time without any sense of contradiction."

Sound familiar?

Three U2 and faith events on Nov 12-13

American readers: Jim of the Covenant Church of Easton, Connecticut invites anyone in the area to their upcoming "Wide Open Gathering," on the topic "Love, God & U2," November 13th at 6:30pm. A representative from the ONE Campaign will be there as well. For more info email jim -at- wideopenonline -dot- org.
Chris Scharen is preaching on "Streets" Saturday November 12th at "elevate": read more about the series he's part of on his blog.

UK readers: a reminder that Graham, a Methodist pastor working on an MA in Mission and Evangelism through Manchester University with a dissertation on U2, hopes some of you might come to the evening U2 event at his church in Hutton Rudby (North Yorkshire, UK) on the 13th.

U2 Theology notes

Some notes on the "U2 Theology" session with Dwight Friesen and (mostly) Jeff Keuss at a recent conference called "Generous Orthodoxy." Difficult to get too much out of these brief notes, but it does include an audio file (be patient, quality is uneven). A chronological and interactive 1-hour presentation, a few interesting comments about the nature of fandom, several connections from Jeff of the kind that (as with Robert Vagacs referenced below) you can only get from someone who has interacted with U2 steadily as part of his own spiritual life for years. (Hey, I'll listen to anyone who, during a highly promising reading of "With or Without You," would have it occur to him to posit a link between the Edge's "infinite guitar" effect and the apophatic tradition. And he even gets the Bongolese right! Memo to Jeff: the rest of it's great too, but publish this!)

And it's up to the minute enough to be using the Rolling Stone podcast.

Love the image used about ATYCLB and HTDAAB: "Moving from singing to the world to trying to get the world to sing along." And for anyone who knows U2 in the 90s well, how clever is this subheading: "Dropping a Fly in the Chalice: Seeing the Sacrament amidst the Spectacle"? Overall, very worth a listen.

Religious Nuts, Political Fanatics by Robert Vagacs

[post edited 11/16 because the publisher seems to have changed the book ID #]
Some preliminary information from Cascade Books is finally out about Religious Nuts, Political Fanatics: U2 in Theological Perspective by Robert Vagacs. (As I reported in a previous post, Vagacs was cited by Get Up Off Your Knees contributor Brian Walsh for having "open[ed] up new vistas of interpretation" of U2's work to him; now all of you who emailed me after that post to ask where you could get the book may rejoice.) Religious Nuts, Political Fanatics: U2 in Theological Perspective doesn't seem to be on any of the online sites yet, but I know how that is....

Excerpt from the publisher's blurb: Weaving the threads of U2's lyrics, scripture, and theology into one cord, this book tracks the Irish rock band's theological insights and perspectives through their poetry. Along this lyrical path we encounter the characters of the Drowning Man, the Wanderer, and the Sojourner. Though seemingly different, they are one and the same, and they represent each of us.

This is a compact, somewhat technical, and clever book; it's a master's thesis reworked, and thus has some of the typical limitations of reworked theses -- it's maybe a tad uneven in tone and unsure of its audience. But it's by someone who has been thinking theologically about U2 steadily for years, and gets it, and doesn't just weave the usual tissue of see-Bono-likes-Jesus quotes... and that's worth a lot. Overall I'll just say I believe what I wrote about it some time ago for its back cover.