RELEVANT - Issue 82 - July/August 2016 by RELEVANT Media Group

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THE BREAKOUT R&B ARTISTâ&#x20AC;&#x2122;S STUNNING STORY OF HITTING ROCK BOTTOM AND THEN FINDING GOD IN A LIFEC H A N G I N G W A Y.

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Reflect on the Psalms with musician Bono, author Eugene Peterson, and Fuller theologian W. David O. Taylor

Photo: Taylor Martyn

Read a candid conversation on reconciling race and why we need to step into the dialogue, not away from it

Watch internationally acclaimed artist Makoto Fujimura as he introduces the Culture Care movement

Hear stories of women in ministry, business, the arts, and academia from FULLER studioâ&#x20AC;&#x2122;s unique Story Table

Read noted theologian Oliver Crisp on why he chooses to be evangelical and what it really means

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first word

A LET TER FROM THE EDITOR

RESTLESS TO FIND YOUR CALLING? BY CAMERON STR ANG

few days before this issue went to print, we celebrated the 16th anniversary of RELEVANT Media Group. It wasn’t a glamorous start—just me and a couple of interns doing whatever we could to keep the lights on while working to launch this magazine and digital platforms (which debuted a few years later). But this also means I’ve had the same job for 16 years. Big eyes emoji. To say doing the same thing that long is unusual would be an understatement. I read a report recently that said the average twentysomething stays in a job, on average, less than 18 months. And 91 percent of millennials say they don’t ever expect to stay in a job more than three years—which would mean 1520 jobs over the course of a career. Change, of course, can be good. And even though I haven’t moved employers, per se, my job and the company have changed significantly. Growth is important, of course. But changing jobs 20 times just sounds exhausting. I mean, I get it—especially in your twenties, you’re still figuring out what you want to do. Sometimes you need to try out a job to see if it’s the sort of work God is calling you to do or not. You’re learning and growing professionally, and as you

JUL_AUG 2016

grow God will open new doors for you. Your dreams are being clarified, and you’re getting a clearer sense of how your calling and profession intersect. But there’s a flipside to that season if we’re not careful—one that can lead to restlessness. Too much change can prevent healthy rootedness, and keep us in perpetually temporary seasons. If it isn’t fun anymore, we’ll just swipe left and move on. But if God has you in a job for a certain season, couldn’t it be that he has you there for a reason much deeper than just income? What is the impact you’re supposed to make there? What is God is trying to teach you? In jumping from job to job, we can actually lose sight of the larger things God is doing in our lives. The big challenge about life, faith and work is making sure we’re always pursuing God’s purpose for us. What is the dream He’s put in your heart for

your life? What do you want to be doing in 10 years? Now, what are you tangibly doing today to pursue that dream? Whether in our jobs or not, we can be growing, learning, serving and preparing ourselves for that dream. We shouldn’t look at our jobs as the fulfillment of those dreams. In the years before I started RELEVANT, I had another job in media. It wasn’t perfect, but it was a great opportunity to learn the industry. So I poured myself 100 percent into that job. I learned a ton and grew in my craft. But then, every night I’d go home and work on my crazy dream of starting RELEVANT. Working on the business plan, logos, grabbing domains, reading, learning. I didn’t know how or when (if ever) I’d be able to start my own company, but that didn’t stop me from working on that dream while pouring myself into my day job. There are no shortcuts. We need to chase our dreams, not just in our jobs, but in how we invest our personal time as well. If God has put a creative dream in you, but you’re in a job that’s mundane, that shouldn’t stop you. Get involved in the creative aspects at your church. Do personal design projects. Volunteer. All of a sudden, you won’t dislike your job as much, because you’ll have an outlet for those things God has put in you. The key is making sure we’re following God in all seasons. Not looking for shortcuts or fulfillment in places that will never satisfy. In our lives and careers we need to have that deeper sense that we’re pursuing and obeying God no matter the circumstances. All of our paths will be very different, and sometimes the process of growth is hard. There is no roadmap to changing the world or having a career you’re excited about. Maybe you’ll have 20 jobs, or maybe you’ll have two. But if we’re pursuing God, trusting Him and focused on the big picture instead of just the season we’re in, it’ll make all the difference.

CAMERON STR ANG is the founder and publisher of RELEVANT. Connect with him on Twitter, Facebook and Instagram at @cameronstrang.

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GIVING EWAN A CHANCE I wasn’t sure what to think when I first saw the cover story about Ewan McGregor and Last Days in the Desert, but this article really shifted the way I thought about Ewan and the movie itself. Thanks for being willing to cover and touch on the projects and stories that at first glance seem off. This ended up being one of my favorite articles! R ALPHIE GOODWIN / Via email

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Favorite magazine: @RELEVANT

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Dear @relevantmagazine, this is visually my favorite spread y’all have ever put out. And Darcey likes it too. Thanks for being an inspiration. @MANDIJEAN / Via Instagram

You are one of my go-to sources for finding info about current humanitarian crises, and how I can help. I love that Relevant not only informs, but challenges its readers to join the cause.

When I saw the digital issue of May/June, that’s when I decided I needed the real magazine—and I subscribed. So yeah, you may get some angry folks complaining about it, but I think you guys rock, being willing to talk about stuff that matters.

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JUL_AUG 2016

I just wanted to tell you guys that the “Do Less” article is one of the best I’ve read and so important. It’s so easy to be busy, get overwhelmed and end up not doing anything. The steps were so easy to follow.

A good read from Relevant magazine: Porn Addiction is Now Threatening an Entire Generation @ SMALLE ST_SAR AH

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I can always expect timely, challenging reminders from @CameronStrang’s first word in @RELEVANT @ SC OTTSAU LS

Thoughtful piece about not fearing people who disagree with your views.

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THE END OF FREE SPEECH WHY ARE STUDENT PROTESTS AT YALE AND OTHER CAMPUSES ACTUALLY FIGHTING THE RIGHT TO SAY WHAT YOU BELIEVE?

oes free speech have limits? In an era of hostile political rhetoric, social media abuse and constant questions about political correctness, it’s an issue that millennials appear to be reanalyzing. The issue of free speech has become a hot button topic at many American colleges, as debates about “safe spaces” and “trigger warnings” have called into question what can be said on campus—and what can’t. Nowhere is this more apparent than at Yale University.

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At the Ivy League school According to recent findings last year, this issue went viral from the Pew Research Center, when someone posted a video millennials in general are far of a student literally screaming more likely to support limits at the “master” of a residential of speech and expression than think the college after he sent an email older generations—particularly “government that some students found inif it involves preventing offenshould prevent sensitive. In December, a stusive comments about minority people from dent group started a petition communities. saying” offensive to repeal the first amendment. Their global survey found things about minorities. And earlier this summer at that 40 percent of millenniYale, 66 percent of attendees als say that the “government at a debate told a survey that “free speech is should prevent people from saying” ofthreatened on college campuses.” fensive things about minorities. That’s a

40%

JOAQUIN PHOENIX IS THE NEXT JESUS?

Will he be Joaquin on water?

he Oscar-nominated actor behind critically acclaimed films like Her and The Master is reportedly in talks to portray Jesus Christ in an upcoming film about Mary Magdalene. According to Deadline, the biopic starring Rooney Mara will look at the “misunderstood” biblical figure in an “authentic and humanistic” light. In other words, don’t expect rock monsters. The Weinstein Co.-produced film starts shooting next year.

WHY IS THE U.S. MAKING IT SO HARD TO ADOPT? In 2004, American families adopted nearly 23,000 children from outside the country. Last year, that number was under 5,000. In fact, a recent State Department report found that international adoptions are at their lowest rates in 35 years. Though many countries are attempting to reform their foster care systems and in-nation adoption processes, there may be another reason for the dramatic fall. Despite demand among families looking to adopt remaining high, recent laws passed by the U.S. meant to prevent human trafficking have made it increasingly difficult and costly to adopt. So much so that the State Department may soon consider reforms.

Yale University students and faculty rally this spring to demand greater sensitivity on campus.

far greater percentage than any group older than 35. This issue grabbed mass attention when President Obama told students at Rutgers University this year they were wrong for disinviting former Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice to deliver a commencement address because of her political views. “I don’t think that’s how democracy works best, when we’re not even willing to listen to each other,” he said.

Even Donald Trump found an unlikely ally in Harry Potter author JK Rowling, who spoke out against a petition to have him banned from the U.K. Speaking at the Pen America gala, she said, “If you seek the removal of freedoms from an opponent simply on the grounds that they have offended you, you have crossed a line to stand alongside tyrants who imprison, torture and kill on exactly the same justifications.”

INTER-COUNTRY ADOPTION RATES U.S.

45k

WORLDWIDE

35k 25k 15k 5k 2004

2015

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DAVID OYELOWO IS TAKING AIM AT GUN VIOLENCE

ccording to the Gun Violence Archive, more than 13,000 Americans were killed by gun violence in 2015. Now, David Oyelowo is doing something about it. The Oscar-nominated actor will produce and star in the upcoming film adaptation of the book Another Day in the Death of America. For the non-fiction book (which hits shelves this fall), investigative journalist Gary Younge visited the families of 10 children who were killed by guns on a randomly selected day in 2013.

Over 13,000 Americans were killed by gun violence in 2015.

IS JUSTIN BIEBER THE ANTI-CELEBRITY? Pop star Justin Bieber wants fans to know that celebrity culture isn’t everything it’s cracked up to be. After his album Purpose became one of the biggest records of the year, Biebs has been outspoken about his rediscovered Christian faith—including getting a cross tatted on his face—but is also expressing his misgivings about American pop culture. Following the Billboard Music Awards, he posted a message to Instagram: “I don’t feel good when I’m there nor after … When I do get these awards the temptation of putting my worth in what I do is so hard to fight,” he wrote.

M I S C. Pew Research recently found that, for the first time since the 1880s, the majority of younger Americans live with their parents. The number has now edged out the percentage of 18to 34-year-olds who live in their own homes.

The people of Afghanistan are getting their first Afghani “Sesame Street” Muppet. And in a decidedly counter-cultural move, the character Zari is a 6-year-old girl.

NBA superstar and outspoken Christian Steph Curry recently told Fellowship of Christian Athletes: “I’m not a guy who’s going to be trying to bash people over the head with the Bible. I want people to know when they see me play that something is different, that I play for something different.”

To whom it may concern

We are not interested in finding the “qualified.” This is a search for the brave few who find value in serving others and showing mercy. This is not a program to participate in but a new way of being, a life dedicated to intentional community, humble service, and the stewardship of grace. The requirement is caring. The measurement is empathy. Only apply if you are poor in spirit. You mourn. You’re meek. You’re a peacemaker, persecuted and insulted, but also blessed, made righteous and redeemed. Only apply if you believe in giving, not taking. When the world tells you to consume, collect, gain, and prove—you choose to share, help, heal, and love. Christ bids you come and die, to be part of a generation of healers, not those who harm; of those who are here to serve not to be served.

JOIN US. SERVE SEATTLE.

Sincerely The brokenhearted, The bruised, The weary, The redeemed.

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THE H T LIST BIMONTHLY CULTURE POWER RANKINGS

COLORING BOOKS [HOT TEST] Between the Chance the Rapper’s mixtape and all of the best-selling actual books for grown-ups, coloring books are really having a moment.

FACE SWAPPING [HOT TER] Face-swapping is the funniest and most unsettling viral trend since that 3D dancing baby.

CARPOOL K AR AOKE [HOT] James Corden’s show’s most charming segment is becoming the stand alone TV show we all wanted it to be.

SURPRISE ALBUM RELEASES [COLD] The whole surprise album release was fun at first, but, surprise!, it’s getting pretty old.

POSSESSION SHOWS [COLDER] Preacher, Outcast, The Exorcist spin-off. This is just getting creepy, you guys.

VAPING [COLDEST] Vaping, verb: Where the gross part of smoking meets the lame part of a Sharper Image catalog.

JUL_AUG 2016

ANDREW WK WANTS TO FIX POLITICS

ndrew WK thinks that American politics needs reforming. The “Party Rock” singer, TV personality, advice columnist and motivational speaker recently launched his own alternative political party, called— wait for it—The Party Party. And, even though it sounds completely ridiculous (and completely awesome), the man behind anthems like “It’s Time to Party” insists it’s not a joke. “We’re re-prioritizing the good

things first,” he explained on a recent RELEVANT podcast. “Because as we have seen, trying to address the issues, trying to fix problems, trying to save the world—when you’re in a bad mood, it doesn’t tend to go very well.” So, will we see him on the ballot come November? “Unfortunately, it’s largely out of my power,” he said. “These decisions, for better or worse, are still are made by the U.S. Department of State and the federal government.”

MEET THE $325,000 BURGER THAT JUST MIGHT SAVE THE WORLD MEAT GROWN IN A LAB MIGHT JUST HELP SAVE LIVES. A team of scientists at The

Netherland’s Maastricht University is developing a process that allows them to use stem cells from animals to create meat in lab environments. And it could have significant real-world humanitarian implications: Not only will it potentially be less environmentally taxing to create meat without livestock, but it could also provide communities without access to much meat with a vital source of food. The catch? The first patty cost upwards of $325,000. And while they’re way cheaper now (a little more than $11), we’re still in Whole Foods territory.

Yum! Petri Dish Meat!

SERVE THE CHURCH, NOT YOUR DEBTGa. Hentiuntur Ximodignis adi omnimi, quam

Photo Credit: Nathan Troester, Redeemer Presbyterian Church

“ IN MY YEARS AT GORDON-CONWELL, PROFESSORS, FRIENDS

AND COLLEAGUES HELPED ME FORGE A THEOLOGICAL VISION THAT HAS INFUSED MY PREACHING AND MINISTRY EVER SINCE. I OWE THE SCHOOL, ITS TEACHERS AND ITS ALUMNI A DEBT I CAN NEVER REPAY.” Rev. Tim Keller, M.Div. ’75

FIND OUT MORE ABOUT:

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M I S C. Henry Heimlich, who in the 1970s invented the widely taught, often-used “Heimlich Maneuver” to save choking victims, recently used the maneuver to save a life for the first time. He’s 96.

Workaholism is a real thing. A new study found that 8 percent of people who classified themselves as “workaholics” were also significantly more likely to suffer from OCD, ADHD, depression and anxiety.

Arrested Development creator Mitch Hurwitz revealed recently that a new season of the (mostly) beloved comedy is in the works at Netflix. He told Esquire: “It’ll definitely happen. I say that because the actors want to do it, the studio wants to do it, Netflix wants to do it, I want to do it.”

JUL_AUG 2016

DC TALK IS FINALLY REUNITING (ON A CRUISE) FAN EXCITEMENT TURNED TO DISAPPOINTMENT WHEN REUNION HOPES WERE THROWN OVERBOARD.

he guys of dc Talk have learned a valuable lesson in how not to market a comeback. This spring, Christian music’s most popular band of all time hinted to fans that they would be ending their 16-year hiatus. Overnight, an image appeared on their social profiles, simply offering the date and time of a

big announcement. Thousands of shares, likes and comments later, speculation reached a fever pitch and they made their “big” announcement: They would be hosting a themed cruise. Sure, the trio will perform a few on-board concerts, but a four-day boat ride wasn’t exactly what fans had been waiting a decade and a half for. The backlash

from Jesus Freaks was brutal. But as bandmember Kevin Max explains, just because the cruise announcement was fumbled doesn’t means fans should give up hope of a true comeback. “I didn’t look at it as like this is going to be the end-all and beall amalgamation of all of our dreams,” he said. “I look at it like a starting point.”

AND NOW, THERE’S AN EMOJI BIBLE TRANSLATION

THE WORLD’S LARGEST MUSLIM GROUP IS FIGHTING RADICALISM

FINALLY, A WAY TO READ the Word without all of those pesky

AT A GATHERING in Indonesia this spring, representatives from Nahdlatul Ulama—the world’s largest Muslim organization— announced an initiative to combat the violence from Islamic extremism that afflicts millions of Christians, Muslims and religious minorities across the world. The group, which represents more than 20 million Muslims, said they plan on working to fight two primary conditions that breed further radicalism: poverty and political injustices.

words. A translation called “Bible Emoji” has been released, using a emoji icons, text-message-style language and social media slang in the place of traditional verses. It’s basically every hermeneutics professor’s nightmare. The “Bible 4 Millienials,” as it is being marketed, was the brainchild of a Twitter user who goes by an emoji (the smiley face wearing Ray Bans) instead of, you know, a name. The translator told The Guardian he’s not worried about criticism from scholars, saying: “I think we should worry more about spreading & and less about what church affiliation we’re doing it under.”

Some people—including some Christians— have allowed fear to dominate the refugee conversation. This book thoughtfully counters the falsehoods that give rise to much of that fear, and calls each of us to be bold agents of Jesus’ transforming love. BILL AND LYNNE HYBELS Senior Pastor and Advocate for Global Engagement, Willow Creek Community Church

“Powerful and persuasive.”

RUSSELL MOORE President, Southern Baptist Ethics & Religious Liberty Commission

“Biblically based, missionally minded, and informed... I’d encourage every Christ follower to read this book.”

ED STETZER LifeWay Research

“Challenges and equips the church to take action...”

BRIAN FIKKERT Coauthor, When Helping Hurts

“Highly readable, informative, inspiring, and clarifying.”

STEPHANIE SUMMERS CEO, Center for Public Justice

GET YOUR COPY: www.worldrelief.org/seekingrefuge

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I . C .Y. M . I . IN C ASE YOU MISSED IT

ENTERTAINMENT ACTUALLY WORTH YOUR TIME

F IL M /T V AUDIO B O O KS

1 T HE CA R M I C H A E L S HOW With its unflinching—and often hilarious— examinations of difficult social issues Jerrod Carmichael’s NBC sitcom is becoming one of network TV’s most important shows. 2 S I N G STREET

This coming-of-age comedy about teens starting a band to impress a girl is a charming rock n‘ roll musical that’s got real heart. 3 T H E PAT H

Aaron Paul’s addictive Hulu series about a Scientologylike sect is a creepy—but sharply-paced—looked at the power of religious cults. 4 N F : T HERAP Y SESSION

The sophomore effort from Christian rapper NF is a raw—at times dark—look at faith and relationships. 5 THE MORNING THEY CAME FOR US

Though it’s not an easy read, journalist Janine Di Giovanni’s account of ISIS’s takeover of Syria is heartbreaking, chilling and shows the true evil they are capable of. 6 AU D R EY AS S AD : I N H E R I TANC E

The album of classic hymns embraces liturgical and contemporary tradition.

JUL_AUG 2016

THE PRICE OF MILLENNIAL HAPPINESS: $7,600

ust how much is a more fulfilling job worth for millennials? According to a new study from Fidelity Investments, just under eight grand. Their research, conducted for the “Evaluate a Job Offer Study” found that millennials

would take $7,600 less money to have a job that offered them a stronger work/life balance, offered more purposeful work, the chance to develop professionally and a better corporate culture. There are some things money really can’t buy.

THE KEY TO A LONG LIFE? SCIENCE SAYS IT’S REGULAR CHURCH ATTENDANCE WHAT’S THE KEY TO HAVING A LONG AND HAPPY LIFE? It may have to do with your Sunday morning routine. Harvard Researchers compiling the Nurses’ Health Study looked at the lives of more than 70,000 people, and found that those who attended church several times a week had a 33 percent lower chance of dying during the 20 years that the research was being gathered. In fact, they found a direct correlation between how frequently someone attended church, and how likely they were to die. Participants who went once a week had a 26 percent lower death rate, and even those who only went infrequently had a 13 percent lower chance of dying. Just something to think about about next time you want to sleep in on a Sunday.

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not have to do the hard work of being vulnerable and transparent and authentic in real relationships. And I think that’s a real danger for this generation. IT SEEMS SOMETIMES THAT IT’S EASIER TO SHOW LOVE TOWARD NON-CHRISTIANS THAN CHRISTIANS.

Q +A

CHRISTINE CAINE

ROM THE LOOK OF IT, Christine Caine has everything. She’s an internationally sought-after preacher, the cofounder of two influential organizations (A21 and Propel)—and now she’s a best-selling author. But her journey was anything but smooth. In her new book, Unashamed: Drop the Baggage, Pick up Your Freedom, Fulfill Your Destiny, she shares her story of being adopted as a nameless child only to be abandoned and abused throughout her childhood. She recently sat down with RELEVANT to discuss how she learned the importance of true, vulnerable community that ultimately helped her heal those wounds. AFTER SUCH A PAINFUL UPBRINGING, WAS THERE A POINT IN YOUR LIFE WHERE YOU DECIDED YOU’RE GOING TO FINALLY LET PEOPLE IN?

My husband Nick was the start, in terms of our marriage relationship. It was maybe two years later that a girl from church really went out of her way to go beyond a surface-level friendship, and that was so scary for me. But thank God, she persevered. I mean, how she still likes me only the Lord knows, because I was so dysfunctionally crazy. I think Christians ought to be the most

JUL_AUG 2016

relationally functional people on the earth, because by this we’ll only know that we are His disciples—by the love that we have for one another, not by all the things that we do for God. But I think in many cases we’re relationally dysfunctional, and we don’t have authentic love for one another because we are not willing to put our hearts out there and be ready to be stepped on, misunderstood, misinterpreted. It’s just safer—especially here in America where Christianity is a lot more individualized. You can basically have your whole Christian life online, and

Absolutely. The Bible says be careful to do good to all, especially those of the household of faith. It’s a lot easier to stand up for justice and go, “Let’s all hold hands and sing Kumbaya and be unified”—as long as I don’t really have to do daily life with you. I’m hoping that the book helps move the needle a little bit on all of that, because otherwise we’re just going to waste another generation and Jesus is going to have to wait until another generation arises that will get this. Because there is no dancing around it: At some point we’re going to have to do true community the way the Bible tells us to. And that’s how we’re going to be salt and light in a dark world. YOUR BOOK’S SUBTITLE IS, “PICK UP YOUR FREEDOM AND FULFILL YOUR DESTINY.” WHAT DOES THAT LOOK LIKE FOR YOU?

It’s getting up every day knowing that Christ in me is the hope of glory, and that I can do what God has called me to do for that day. I think I was so riddled by shame for so much of my life that I never thought I could do what God called me to do. It means that today I can put one foot in front of the other and hold my head up high and go where I feel the spirit of God is calling me. I think that is what walking shame-free is. It’s that I’m not going to allow my own limitations or what people have said to me or what people have done to me define where I’m going. In other words, I think most people go into the future but they are just totally stuck in their past. They’ve allowed their history to define their destiny. Once you decide that you’re going to drop your baggage and deal with your stuff, you can step into your destiny for the first time in your life—and you are just not living an eternal yesterday.

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AFTER A FOUR-YEAR BREAK, THEY’RE IS BACK WITH NEW MUSIC ike other iconic songs about the good ole U.S. of A (think Springsteen’s “Born in the U.S.A.” or Green Day’s “American Idiot”), Wintersleep’s “Amerika” is catchy and anthemic. Its driving drums and Americana-sounding guitar riffs linger like the last notes of the national anthem. It’s this year’s best rock song about America, but it’s by a band from Canada. Wintersleep recorded “Amerika” and the rest of their latest album, The Great Detachment, in their native Halifax, Nova Scotia. The indie-rock band had recently parted ways with their longtime manager and taken a year off from touring. Lead singer Paul Murphy and his wife had a baby. A lot

It’s this year’s best rock song about America, but it’s by a band from Canada. 22

MUSIC THAT MATTERS

of things were changing for the band, prompting big questions. “Amerika” mirrors that on a larger scale. Murphy borrows a line from a Walt Whitman poem (“Perennial with the Earth And freedom, love, and law and life”), but where Whitman’s words were optimistic, Murphy pairs them with questions: “What am I trying to find? Are you alive, oh my Amerika?” The song is one example of the way Wintersleep puts thoughtful lyrics in upbeat rock ‘n’ roll. The band had to narrow down the more than 40 songs they wrote for The Great Detachment to the 11 included on the album. To choose which songs made the cut, they took them on the road. “What we want to do with this record is make a great live performance of all the songs,” Murphy says. “Generally, our set wouldn’t have a lot of down moments. This record feels a lot like the way we would sculpt a setlist at a show.”

W H Y W E L OV E T HEM:

Wintersleep’s latest is the most polished of the band’s career, full of catchy, expansive tunes that sound like they belong on the soundtrack of your favorite inspiring movie. FOR FA NS OF:

Washed Out, Twin Shadow, Real Estate

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THE DROP

ARTISTS TO WATCH

car seat headrest THIS VIRGINIA -BASED CREW OFFERS A COMPLEX MIX OF INDIE ROCK, 90’S GRUNGE AND LITERATURE talking about the influences behind his layered, grungy indie rock, Car Seat Headrest’s Will Toledo cites everything from ’90s bands like Nirvana and Green Day, to the novelist James Joyce, to the TV series Mad Men. “I like how it works on a lot of different levels,” he says of the latter. “It’s triple-pronged in that it’s a critique of ’60s society, it’s a reflected critique of modern society, but it’s also a very penetrative look into the individual self.” The same could be said of Toledo’s work. His

“Songs and poems from thousands of years ago express the same sentiments we go through now.”

MUSIC THAT MATTERS

songs draw on his own experiences and emotions, but also pull from history and pop culture. His music has a sort of literary quality (he does have a degree in English, after all), which has gotten him noticed by critics. His previous album, Teens of Style, is a collection of revamped songs from his extensive online catalog, many of which include biblical references. He grew up in the Presbyterian church, and though he says he isn’t religious now, he really connected with religious texts in college. “A lot of that stuff was in my head, but I never really engaged with it on a deep level until I went to college and started learning about it from an academic perspective,” he says. “It allowed me to feel more connected with the rest of humanity, because these emotional archetypes go so far back in our history. It’s comforting to see songs and poems from thousands of years ago express basically the same sentiments we go through now.”

W H Y W E L OV E HIM:

Toledo has experimented with music since he was in middle school, and he’s mastered his craft, meticulously layering beats, instruments and melodies into a cohesive whole. FOR FA NS OF:

Porches, Mitski, Teen Suicide

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Ultimate Oceans

ESCONDIDO TYLER JAMES AND JESSICA MAROS connected

over Quentin Tarantino and spaghetti Western soundtracks. Both solo artists in Nashville, they decided to team up and started sculpting soundtrack-worthy indie folk rock. “We wanted to make music that was a great backdrop for this cinematic beauty,” James says. While the duo recorded their first album in one day, their sophomore release, Walking With a Stranger took nearly six months to finish, but they feel like they got it right. “There’s a song for everyone on this record,” Maros says. “We’ve got the slow ballads, we’ve got the mid-tempos. It really takes you from start to finish. It has this story behind it. It was sort of like an evolution.” WHY WE LOV E THE M:

J O S H G AU T O N

As the waters rise

The band is proving that worship music can have a broader appeal to fans outside the church. F OR FAN S OF :

Young Oceans, Bellarive, Colony House

ANADEL

Well and the Wild

W R IT TEN IN K INGS

Troubles

FRANKIE COSM0S REBECCA ROUBION

Sleepless Nights

Z AC H B O L E N

1001

THE DAUGHTER OF ACTORS KEVIN KLINE AND PHOEBE CATES, Greta Kline grew up

WHY WE L OVE HER:

knowing art was a legitimate vocation. “My parents both made art part of our childhood because they viewed it as a normal part of life instead of an extracurricular thing,” she says. Art quickly became an everyday part of life for Kline, who sang backup vocals for indie rock band, Porches, before forming her own band under the stage name Frankie Cosmos. She has trouble describing the sound of her new band: “I usually just say rock ‘n’ roll band,” she says, laughing. “But my other bandmate always says, ‘No, no, it’s indie pop.’”

The lyrics on Frankie Cosmos’ sophomore album, Next Thing, are confessional, relatable and unapologetically quirky. FOR FAN S OF:

Sharon Van Etten, Wye Oak, Angel Olsen

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REJECT APATHY S U S TAIN AB L E CH AN G E. SA C RIF IC IA L LIVIN G .

COULD THE ZIKA VIRUS MAKE THE RIO OLYMPICS A GLOBAL HEALTH CRISIS?

n all likelihood, the summer of 2016 will be remembered less for the Olympics games—which begin in August—and more for the Zika virus. The games’ host country, Brazil, sits at the center of the outbreak, and that has health experts asking if Rio de Janeiro is safe enough to welcome the world. Ethical ambiguity isn’t new to the Olympics. For decades, the games have been plagued by cheating scandals. Just this summer, Yahoo Sports reported that the

SUSTAINABLE CHANGE. INTENTIONAL LIVING.

International Olympic Committee uncovered 31 new doping cases of athletes who used banned performance-enhancing drugs in the 2008 Beijing games and another 23 from London 2012. This year’s Olympic scandal isn’t about cheating—it’s about the health of millions of people, present and yet-born. Zika has been linked to more than 4,000 cases of microcephaly—a birth defect in children born to Zika-infected mothers—in Brazil and Latin America, and experts expect more than four million people to contract the virus within the next year.

Concerns about the threat Zika poses in Rio have now reached the point where several U.S. Senators recently wrote the U.S. Olympic Committee, asking to know how it plans to protect U.S. athletes. Though the games are still scheduled to go-on as planned, the World Health Organization is taking the threat seriously. Because the virus—which is spread by mosquito bites—can cause severe birth defects, the group issued a statement, telling some travelers to cancel their plans: “WHO advises pregnant women not to travel to areas with ongoing Zika virus transmission. This

THE END OF ISIS?

t just about goes without saying that the rise of ISIS is one of the most significant humanitarian crises of the last 50 years. But Jeremy Courtney, president the Iraq-based global humanitarian aid organization, Preemptive Love, thinks the end is near for the terrorist group. Why? He says ISIS is disintegrating from the inside out. “Some are defecting from ISIS because they feel like they were sold a bill of goods,” he says. “They got on the inside and they realized what ISIS truly is and it was more brutal, more inhumane, less Islamic and less true in one way or another to what they thought they were going to experience.” Intelligence officials agree. According to a recent IHS Janes report, from January to March 2016, they lost at least 22 percent of the land they had held, and defections are on the rise.

Health workers get ready to spray insecticide in preparation for the 2016 Rio de Janeiro Olympics.

includes Rio de Janeiro.” However, a group of over 200 health experts now say Rio 2016 shouldn’t happen right now at all. They posted an open letter calling for the Rio Olympics to be postponed or moved because they say Zika cases of represents a public health emergency of inmicrocephaly in Brazil ternational concern.” and Latin America For months, the Centers for Disease Conhave been associated with the Zika virus trol and Prevention has been advising travelers to cancel or postpone travel to South America. But Rio will attract around 500,000 international visitors, not including some 10,000 athletes. If health experts are right about Zika, the Rio Olympics could represent a massive global threat.

4000

NEARLY 46 MILLION PEOPLE ARE CURRENTLY LIVING IN SLAVERY

Today, more people are living in slavery than any time in recorded human history. According to the 2016 Global Slavery Index released are known today than just by the Walk Free Fountwo years ago. dation, that number currently sits at an astonishing 46 million. The ability to research deeper led researchers to the almost unbelievable discovery that the world has 28 percent more slaves than just two years ago. India is far and away the worst offender in terms of sheer numbers, with some 18 million people living in slavery. There is some good news, however. The organization found that many countries, including India, have begun taking significant steps to increase penalties for trafficking, slavery and child labor.

MILLION MORE SLAVES

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C H R I S T I A N S L O V E T O TA L K A B O U T I T. B U T D O T H E Y K N O W W H AT I T I S ?

YOU DON’T HAVE TO HANG AROUND THIS GENERATION of Christians very long before you’ll hear talk of justice. High-profile conferences, trendy nonprofits and endless books are all built around raising awareness of global and domestic injustices. A nd with critical issues like human trafficking or sex slavery, the generational response seems to be a collective, “What can I do?” “But the answer to ‘What can I do?’ is actually a commitment over the long haul. A nd not everyone is willing to sign up for that,” says Bethany Hanke Hoang. “They might be willing to wear a T-shirt or put a cause on social media, but actually to engage in a way that makes a difference in the lives of people who are suffering is a whole other matter.” Hoang is a director of the Institute for Biblical Justice for the International Justice Mission, and the co-author of a new book, The Justice Calling: Where Passion Meets Perseverance. We sat down with her to talk about what justice is and what it means to do justice work.

CHRISTIANS LOVE TO TALK ABOUT JUSTICE. BUT WHAT IS IT THEY’RE TALKING ABOUT?

We want people to understand what we actually mean when we’re talking about justice and where that comes from. It actually comes, not from our good intentions but from the heart of God. We knew that justice was pervasive throughout the Scripture, but it actually follows the whole storyline of Scripture, from Genesis to Revelation. I am convinced that if people understood that better, it would shape their whole perception of what they’re doing in the world and how they’re living their lives. IT SEEMS LIKE THERE’S A TENSION FOR CHRISTIANS IN THAT THEY ARE BOTH JUSTICE PEOPLE AND GRACE PEOPLE. ARE THOSE TWO IN TENSION?

The true meaning of justice, when you look at it from Scriptures and from the character of God, actually cannot exist without grace. Justice is, on the one hand, a setting of things that are wrong back to right. It’s taking what’s been broken by sin and seeing God intervene and set things back to right. ... In justice work, there’s an intervention and rescue for the person who has been victimized. But justice isn’t complete when that person is put in prison. God’s justice is actually this much longer arch that stretches all the way to flourishing. So if in our quests for justice we can’t see that the full extension of justice from God’s heart is for even the most

vile perpetrators, then we haven’t fully understood justice. DO YOU THINK SOME OF THE EXCITEMENT WE SEE ABOUT JUSTICE WORK IS ALTRUISTIC, OR EVEN SELF-AGGRANDIZING?

I do. I see it in myself, honestly. I see my own desire for self-actualization, to understand more who am I and my purpose in the world through getting to be a part of something that’s bigger than I. But that’s ultimately not sustainable. And not only is it not sustainable, it’s not helpful to the person who, right in this moment, is sitting in a really difficult, harrowing nightmare beyond what we can even imagine. They’re crying out to God and they’re waiting for rescue. I think the desire to be involved in working for the needy—whatever that self-driven part is—God can use. But there’s certainly distractions there that keep us from seeing what He actually might be calling us to do. We’re waiting for an opportunity when God may already have an invitation for us to step out today. There are opportunities all around us that God can use to prepare us, whether it’s going far to the other side of the world or being involved right where you are. The key is every day to be asking God to give us the eyes to see what He’s inviting us into— and not just the impulses of our desires to be useful. SOME OF THAT DESIRE CAN BE A HERO COMPLEX. YOU ACTUALLY DRAW A

DISTINCTION BETWEEN AND HEROES AND SAINTS.

The difference is really who it’s all about in the end. The problem with heroes is that it’s ultimately about the person who is being heroic and finding within themselves the courage and bravery to go out and do something great. What I find over and over again when people encounter issues like human trafficking is the impulse to ask, “What can I do?” The answer they’re going to be most satisfied with is something that gets them closer to being in that hero role. They might not say it or admit it on the surface, of course. We all want to be a part of feeling like we’re the hero. God has made us in His likeness and He’s making us to be more and more like Jesus Christ as we follow Him. The work of the Holy Spirit is making us saints. When we’re referred to as “saints,” the picture is of us as a body of Christ together. It’s about who we’re being made into because of what Jesus has done. It’s about being able to go into really dark places and to go with courage and to be used by God not because of what we have to bring, but because of what the Holy Spirit is doing. YOU MAKE THE POINT THAT JUSTICE IS ESSENTIALLY A SPIRITUAL FRUIT. THAT SEEMS COUNTERINTUITIVE TO THE IDEA OF “DOING” JUSTICE.

It’s totally the most counterintuitive fruit possible to say, “let’s go out and seek justice and all of that starts by stopping.” But this hard-charging work is done by stopping first. We go into realizing it’s not ultimately on us. This is the work of our God who loves justice. He cares about it far more than we do. … When Jesus is telling the disciples that He’s about to face the cross and there will be this movement launched from His band of followers, His word to them is, “Abide in me, apart from me you can do nothing.” There’s a whole lot of stuff we can try to do—and we can do stuff that looks really successful and we can pat ourselves on the backs for it—but if it’s apart from Him, we’re ultimately not going to succeed.

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WATER, MARKED W E ’ R E W I N N I N G T H E B AT T L E F O R C L E A N W AT E R A R O U N D T H E GLOBE—BUT THERE ARE STILL MILLIONS WITHOUT ACCESS. “Globally, the world has made huge progress in providing clean water access, with more than 2 billion people reached in the last 25 years,” says Greg Allgood, vice president of World Vision Water. But that doesn’t mean the water global water crisis is over. In fact, “there are still 663 million people without access,” he says. Last year, the World Economic Forum named the water crisis the No.1 global risk because of its devastating impact on societies and cultures. We’ve mapped out the parts of the globe where real people go without safe water every day.

U N I T E D S TAT E S / 2 , 6 8 6 , 2 0 0

P O P U L AT I O N W I T H O U T A C C E S S

MEXICO / 4,871,100

Almost 5 percent of Mexico’s population doesn’t have safe access to clean water.

BRASIL / 3,819,800

Right now, Sao Paulo is in the middle of one of its most severe water shortages ever. > 2 MILLION

> 10 MILLION

Map source: National Geographic, 2015

SUSTAINABLE CHANGE. INTENTIONAL LIVING.

> 50 MILLION

SOURCE: N AT ION A L GEOGR A PHIC

That’s right: Contrary to what you may think, the United States is not immune to the global crisis.

A G L O B A L P O P U L AT I O N W I T H O U T W AT E R

INDIA / 75,778,000

India is under severe drought conditions—with the water shortage wreaking havoc on crops.

ETHIOPIA / 42,251,000

Ethiopia is currently facing massive droughts which play a large role in their access to safe water.

INDONESIA / 32,286,300

A staggering 13 percent of Indonesia’s population faces a lack of safe water for even general use.

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W H AT WOULD JESUS BREW? BY ASHLEY ABR AMSON

N O T T O O L O N G A G O, ‘G OOD CH R IST I A NS’ WOU L DN’ T TOUCH A LCOHOL. THEN A N E W G E N E R AT I O N R ET HOUGH T W H AT T H E B I B L E

A C T U A L LY S AY S A B O U T I T. B U T I S R IGH T OR W RONG R E A L LY T H E O N LY QUESTION?

.L. Mayfield is an activist who lives in Portland, Oregon—basically a Mecca for craft beer and cocktails. But she doesn’t really drink anymore. She didn’t give up alcohol because of a legalistic church background or even because she struggled with abuse. She gave it up for her neighbors. “I think living with your neighbor in mind is a huge theme in Scripture,” Mayfield says. “What I’ve tried to gently point out is how so many of us are only in relationships with people who are just like ourselves—which is a bigger problem than drinking or not drinking. “Reading the Bible with people who are different from me—alcoholics, drug addicts, people involved in prostitution, Muslims, children, people experiencing poverty—has been such a gift to me. It has caused me to think beyond myself, to consider how my actions might benefit the common good.” For Christian millennials, unlike the generation before them, drinking can be a signpost for a version of Christianity that isn’t at odds with the culture world around them. And, frankly, isn’t odd. Not long ago, a Barna study found that the Christian witness and its public reputation are in significant decline, especially among millennials—only 16 percent said they had a “good impression” of Christians, while overall, 87 percent of them perceived Christians as judgmental. Combine these cultural perceptions with a growing understanding that the Bible not only doesn’t condemn but condones alcohol, and the answer seemed obvious. Drinking alcohol is not only biblically acceptable, but it can earn credibility with the surrounding culture. But, in reality, experts and pastors see this issue as more complex and nuanced.

THE PENDULUM SWING In a well-intended attempt to make up for an

era of pretty intense legalism in some parts of the church, many Christians of the millennial variety now view craft beer as something of a sacrament. “I have a hunch that part of [this current Christian drinking trend] is a normal pendulum swing,” Mayfield says. “And a part of it is our lack of relationships beyond race and class lines.” According to Chris Cruz, young adults pastor at Bethel Church in Redding, California, addressing behavior without probing our hearts is anything but a healthy response. “People will flee from legalism and avoid anything that smells like it,” he says. “But if we don’t fill the space legalism filled with a life governed by the Spirit and true identity, we are in danger of abusing freedom.” With a “let’s drink so we don’t blow our witness” perspective, we may be headed in that direction. Interestingly, the same Barna study also revealed that younger Christians described themselves as far more tempted (28 percent) by alcohol abuse than their predecessors—the same predecessors whose teetotalism they often think gave them a bad name. Clay Kirkland, a University of Georgia alum who now works as a campus minister at his alma mater, watched it happen over two decades. “When I was in school, drinking was something you definitely should not do as a Christian. The idea was to separate yourself as much as you could from the sinners,” he says. “Today, many Christians judge other Christians for not drinking, and those who do that act like there are no limitations as to where you should drink or how much you should drink.” Like Newton’s third law, the force of legalism put the opposite reaction into motion, and what we see now in the evangelical landscape—drinking to the point of indiscretion— is the most obvious symptom. Jon Bloom, president of Desiring God Ministries, says the pendulum swing is a perennial problem and also the symptom of a much

deeper issue: “Many American Christians one-tothree generations ago had a tendency to conflate teetotalism with righteousness,” he says. “But that mistake, basing our sense of self-righteousness on our behavior as opposed to Christ’s imputed righteousness, is made by every generation in its own way. “It just wears more up-to-date clothes.

LOVE IS THE LAW The Pharisees of the New Testament had a trusty formula: follow rules, acquire righteousness, repeat. And even though many millennial Christians seem to think consuming alcohol to deflate a popular mindset is the better, non-pharisaical thing to do, it can end up in exactly the same place, Kirkland says. “Christians who separate themselves [from drinking] believe it’s up to them to determine their holiness, while the Christians who have no regard for limitations with drinking believe it is up to them to determine their behavior,” he says. “Both miss the point, because Jesus did not operate in those ways.” When it comes to gray areas like alcohol consumption, Scripture offers a handful of verses to guide us: Don’t get drunk (Ephesians 5:18); don’t let alcohol enslave you (Titus 2:3); don’t be led astray by it (Proverbs 20:1); and don’t do it if it’s not helpful (1 Corinthians 10:23). The law that hinges all of these together, though, is love.

MISSION INVOLVING ALCOHOL HAS BEEN HISTORICALLY EFFECTIVE—BUT ONLY WHEN IT WAS ABOUT LOVE AND CHARITY, NOT REPUTATION. Like bad fashion trends, it’s often easier to spot in retrospect than in real-time.” Bloom is saying that when Christians just react to the previous generation—even when that generation is wrong—they run the risk of being legalists with slightly cooler clothes. But that doesn’t mean Christians shouldn’t ask questions and challenge the Church culture status quo. Believers, Bloom says, need to stop recycling unhealthy mindsets and discover an approach to drinking that not only guards against abuse, but also displays God’s love.

YOUR [CHURCH] FATHER’S BREW Contrary to what children of the ‘80s might know, the history of Christianity and the history of beer actually have a friendly relationship. Here’s a look at some of Christianity’s most famous beer enthusiasts.

JUL_AUG 2016

When the Pharisees, hungry for laws to live by, asked Jesus about the most important rule, his answer was disarming: “You shall love the Lord your God with all your heart and with all your soul and with all your mind,” He said. “This is the great and first commandment. And a second is like it: You shall love your neighbor as yourself” (Matthew 22:36-39). Teetotalism and drinking may be culturally at odds, but their causes are the same—and so are their antidotes. For Christians who want to live out their faith in public, Christian teaching says the place to start is love.

LOVE YOUR NEIGHBOR, IN CONTEXT Despite its controversial nature, mission involving alcohol has been historically effective—but only when it was about love and charity, not reputation.

1483-1546

1722-1803

1725-1803

MARTIN LUTHER

SAMUEL ADAMS

ARTHUR GUINNESS

THE SHARP-TONGUED

reformer was a prolific writer, and his love of beer—especially ones made by his wife—frequently showed up in his letters and correspondence. In one, he invited friends to a party, asking them to bring food because, “one must not depend on beer alone, of which my Katie has brewed fourteen tuns.”

THIS FOUNDING FATHER

frequently wrote of the virtues of Christianity. But perhaps even more than his faith or acts of nation-founding, Sam Adams is most associated with a different achievement: beer. The Sam Adams Boston Beer Company— one of America’s biggest beer makers—is named after the real guy who was a real Christian.

INSPIRED BY A SERMON by

John Wesley, Arthur Guinness decide to turn his brewery and his brand into a force for good. With the money he made, he founded some of this country’s first Sunday schools and gave generously to the poor.

Historian David Underdown, in his book Fire From Heaven: Life in an English Town in the Seventeenth Century, tells the story of how the Puritans of Dorchester opened a brewhouse to assist the poor, donating the proceeds from beer sales

to provide clothes, food and schooling for children. Their efforts in shifting culture were wildly successful within their context. Three centuries later, Christians have to ask, Who does a loose approach to alcohol

1892-1973

1898-1963

J.R.R. TOLKIEN

C.S. LEWIS

THE ENGLISH WRITER with perhaps the most powerful and lasting imagination of anyone in his era said it best: When a fan of his fantasy trilogy, The Lord of the Rings, asked about the pubs in Middle Earth (where the LOTR stories are set), he responded with: “I’m quite fond of beer.”

THE

MAN

WHO

WROTE

some of Christianity’s most popular books frequently sought inspiration in one place: the pub. Whether it was meeting his fellow Inklings or tying a few on at lunch, Lewis was a frequenter of local bars.

actually help, and more importantly, who could it harm? “I personally have never identified with the belief that drinking can be a great community builder,” Mayfield says. “Honestly, that only seems to be true for a pretty select population—white, middle-to-upper class millennials, possibly people who have been hurt by a fundamentalist upbringing. Since that is not my community and those are not my neighbors, drinking is not a way for me to see God’s kingdom come on earth. I would much rather be talking about systemic injustice than about beer.” Bloom also encourages discretion with alcohol use around others—before flying the freedom flag, Christians would be wise to check their own hearts and examine their context. “Assuming our own conscience is clear before God, we need to ask ‘What is best way to get in proximity to those we are trying to reach with the Gospel?’ he says. The stats addressing our questions about alcohol in our context are, well, sobering. As of 2014, 16.3 million American adults had an alcohol-use disorder, according to the National Institute on Alcohol Abuse and Alcoholism, and nearly 88,000 people die from alcohol-related causes every year. That makes it the fourth leading preventable cause of death in the U.S. This leads to the sobering fact that alcohol consumption for Christians, in many ways, can be as harmful as it is helpful. And although it could be destructive for some, drinking could be a viable means of reaching others.

SACRIFICING FREEDOM FOR LOVE For Cruz, the freedom flag of the recovering legalist only represents real liberty when it’s governed by love. “Real love decides to sacrifice its liberties on behalf of another,” Cruz says. “Until you are willing to do that with drinking then it has power over you. It is arrogance to claim our personal freedom should always trump someone’s growth.” Christians are free to drink. And, they’re also free not to. What are the deciding factors? Well, whether or not you have a taste for it certainly plays a part. But the main thing is to keep the goal in mind: loving neighbors like Jesus does—with nuance and wisdom. When Mayfield lived in an apartment down the hall from recovering alcoholics and drug addicts, that choice was easy for her. And now that her community is a little different, so are her drinking habits. “I have had a drink here or there in the past year—mostly due to the fact that we moved back to Portland and most of my relationships are with refugees, none of whom have pronounced substance abuse issues,” she says. The case for or against alcohol and Christians can go either way, all depending on unique contexts. Drinking might not always be helpful and sometimes it might. “There aren’t any ‘shoulds’ when it comes to living missionally,” Cruz says. “We are missional when we authentically follow Jesus.” ASHLE Y ABR AHMSON is a writer living in Redding, California. Connect at @ashleyabrmsn.

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H E R S T R O N G , S O U L F U L V O I C E A N D E X P E R I M E N TA L P R O D U C T I O N M I X W I T H C A P T I VAT I N G R E S U LT S , B U T H E R M U S I C M AT T E R S F O R A M U C H B I G G E R R E A S O N .

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hances are, if you’re young, female, British and have a powerful singing voice, you’re going to get called the next Adele. And breakout indie-pop singer Låpsley definitely has—though such comparisons would be misguided. Låpsley’s debut album, Long Way Home—which dropped earlier this year— has received rave reviews and worldwide buzz, but the 19-year-old is forging an entirely different path for herself in the world of popular music.

THE WORLDS OF SONGS Throughout Long Way Home, singer/ songwriter/producer Holly Fletcher—who goes by her middle name, Låpsley—pulls her listeners through the willwe-or-won’t-we experiences that will be familiar to anyone who has ever been in a long-distance relationship. The lyrics of her hit single “Hurt Me” are a case-in-point: The song hauntingly reflects the turmoil of being in a relationship you both know needs to end, but aren’t quite ready to give up. Her lyrics are full of twisted defiance and self-destruction in the name of love. “It’s interesting because it’s not like someone hurt me in the sense that someone had cheated on me or something,” she says of “Hurt Me.” “It was very much like this relationship is hurting me, rather than you as a person [are hurting me].” This is why Låpsley’s lyrics resonate: Set against a metronomic background of electronic minimalism, she expresses (with remarkable insight for someone who is only 19) the complexity and pain of relationships. Continuing the theme, “Station” is about a long-distance relationship that can’t quite figure out where it wants to land. The song also operates on an illusion: It sounds like a duet between a man and a woman, but it’s actually Låpsley’s voice two ways—at a regular pitch, and pitched down a few octaves. The world of “Station” overlaps completely with the world of Låpsley, the performer. She has said that she doesn’t want to do a track that she hasn’t written or produced herself, because it wouldn’t feel authentic.

“I use writing as my outlet,” she says. “My personality is very different from the way I write. I’m very loud, and [writing] balances me out ... it’s a bit like therapy.” The solo nature of her writing and producing creates songs that feel like worlds unto themselves, songs that you could listen to over and over again and still discover something new each time.

THE SCIENCE OF MUSIC Born in 1996 to a family of high-achieving doctors and lawyers, Låpsley grew up with an interest in music but not much time for it. “I was kind of like missing out on trying to figure out who I was myself because I was doing so many other things,” she says. “I was academic ... either doing loads of sport or doing work.”

for the most part, by men. From the beginning, Låpsley strikes you as someone who isn’t going to put up with being treated like a second-class citizen or condescended to because of her gender. “I’ve been brought up by a strong woman ... my mum is a lawyer,” she says. “So from the moment I step in the room, I’m so comfortable with my own voice that even if they tried [to condescend to me], it’s so ridiculous it’s just laughable. I can see right through it.” Låpsley possesses a sense of comfort with herself that not all women in the music industry do. “You have to fight for your own worth,” she says, “even within [record] labels ... You have to carve your path and it is more difficult being a female producer than it is for a male.” Låpsley’s sense of self also found its roots in her mother’s record collection. “My mum always played strong, independent females like Bjork, Stevie Nicks and Kate Bush,” she says. “Especially if you’re a female writer, that’s a really good precedent to set.” It’s no coincidence that the women she names have all had successful, longlasting careers with multiple phases and collaborators. Låpsley’s burgeoning career is a testament to the power of talent and hard work—and a little bit of luck. Music “was never something I thought I would do. And then I got offered a publishing deal and I was thinking, ‘I can always go back to university—I might as well switch my work ethic from my academics and use it to make music.’” And make music she has. Long Way Home is both LONG WAY HOME ethereal and strong, Låpsley tackles much like the artist the complexity— herself. A career like and pain—or Adele’s isn’t the goal, relationships. but it seems inevitable at this point.

“MY PERSONALITY IS VERY DIFFERENT FROM THE WAY I WRITE. I’M VERY LOUD AND WRITING BALANCES ME OUT.” Her father’s job in sustainable development and her parents’ record collection piqued Låpsley’s curiosity in the place where music and science meet. “People would say ‘If I was as good at science as you, I would be doing science’ ... but I also enjoyed music and art,” she says. “If you’re good at two things that are very contradicting, it’s very difficult.” Låpsley was drawn to electronic music from an early age. Although classically trained in piano, guitar and oboe, when she stumbled onto musicians like James Blake and The xx, it was over. “I was fascinated with the sound of [electronic music] and the use of space— the emotion without words and without classical instruments.” A few years of late-night music writing led to an extended play called MONDAY, recorded in her bedroom and released on Soundcloud.

THE FIGHT FOR WORTH Science and electronic music share something else in common: They are worlds run,

L AUR A TURNER is a writer and blogger who lives in the Bay Area. You can follow her at @lkoturner.

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BY JAMES DW YER

F R O M T H E O U T S I D E , L O N D O N ’ S H O LY T R I N I T Y B R O M P T O N A N G L I C A N C H U R C H L O O K S L I K E A T R A D I T I O N A L C AT H E D R A L , B U T B E H I N D I T S WA L L S , A R E V O L U T I O N I S H A P P E N I N G . C A N T H E CH U RCH K NOW N A S ‘H T B’ T R A NSFOR M ON E OF T H E MOST SEC U L A R S O C I E T I E S I N T H E W O R L D?

or American eyes, Holy Trinity Brompton, a church in the heart of London, looks stunning and powerful. Tucked away off of the city’s busy Brompton Road, its historic, cathedral-like architecture and affluent Knightsbridge district surroundings give it an iconic, distinctly British feel. But behind its walls, something truly remarkable is happening: There, in the heart of a country seeing Christianity become less and less influential, a resurgence is taking place. Last year, the former Archbishop of Canterbury, Lord George Carey, told The Daily Mail that the church was “one generation away from extinction.” HTB is spearheading a revolution— they’re bringing Christianity back to English culture, and might just be reversing the trend.

SOMETHING DIFFERENT HERE When you enter a service at HTB, you could be forgiven if you forget you’re in an Anglican church. You can’t help but notice the lack of formality. Instead, you see all of the hallmarks of a contemporary church, from big screens to the decided lack of pulpit. The congregation is diverse in age, race and class, though you wouldn’t know it based on how everyone interacts with one another. Of course, you won’t walk away without being struck by HTB’s charismatic vicar, Nicky Gumbel, who assumed the leadership of HTB in 2005. The 61-year-old is humble and open. His own sincerity and passion bleeds over into the church he leads: Since 2005, it has exploded into a megachurch, with four campuses—they call them “centres”—spread out around London and a truly global reach. This year alone, HTB has plans to plant another four churches outside of London. And for a generation of Christians who grew

up in more traditional church settings, Gumbel is doing something different. He’s not just trying to bring people to church. He’s bringing the church to the people. “I heard somewhere that 2 percent of people like classical music, and 98 percent like modern music,” Gumbel says, using the metaphor to explain how he and HTB go about reaching the culture. The Church of England, in Gumbel’s eyes, has things the wrong way around. The emphasis needs to shift from being “out of sync” and entirely foreign to culture. And although he says there is nothing wrong with the “classical music” model of the traditional church, leaders need to be willing to adapt in order to reach this generation and actually engage the culture around them. “If you are going to appeal to most people, you have to have modern music,” he says. It’s a kind of music that culture is desperate to hear.

THE CHURCH IN CRISIS MODE The Christian community in England has historically been one of the most influential voices in the global Church. For more than 1,400 years, Christianity informed almost all aspects of life in English culture. But in recent years, a crisis has been unfolding. The Church of England is declining at freefall speeds. According to reports that came out this spring, the Anglican church loses 12 followers for every one conversion. And even among the Roman Catholic Church, the trend holds: They lose about 10 members for every conversion. These figures illustrate the challenge facing a church whose congregations are aging as the millennial generation increasingly spurns

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The congregation at Holy Trinity Brompton gathers for Good Friday service.

GUMBEL HAS LED HTB TO THINK HARD ABOUT HOW IT CAN REACH A GENERATION MANY CHURCHES AROUND THEM ARE SIMPLY MISSING.

organized religion. Anyone who follows church trends is aware that so-called “nones,” who don’t identify with a religion, are on the rise. The most recent study of England and Wales (2014) reported the percentage of nones at 48.5 percent, compared to 43.8 percent of the population that reported affiliation with Anglicans, Catholics and other denominations. Pew Research found virtually the same is true in the United States. In May, the Church of England’s finance chief, John Spence, said the church’s decline is expected to continue for decades. An 81-year-old, he said, is eight times more likely to attend church than a 21-year-old. If Christianity is going to survive in

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the U.K. for another generation, millennials will have to re-embrace the faith, even if it looks different than their parents’ church experience. And redefining the church experience is exactly what HTB has set out to do.

A NEW KIND OF CHURCH? Gumbel has led HTB to think hard about how it can reach a generation many churches around them are simply missing. But what’s perhaps most distinct about HTB isn’t what’s different about it, but what’s familiar. For Gumbel, it’s not about innovation or presenting a certain image— it’s about finding the “right way to present the unchanging message,” he says. Gumbel pioneered the widely used

Alpha course, a set of resources and curricula that explore the Christian faith (typically over 11 weeks). Today you can find Alpha running in cafés, churches, universities, homes and bars around the U.K. Much like the church it comes from, Alpha is not like anything you’d normally associate with church curriculum—which is why it has exploded with over 29 million people participating globally. The courses are based on down-toearth conversations about Jesus and faith, not just theology lessons. Like many things HTB does, Alpha is about speaking the language of the culture, instead of forcing the culture to conform to old traditions. HTB has embraced social activism and campaigns to help those in need in their communities. They put an emphasis on evangelism. They’ve converted traditional prayer and worship services to evangelical-style musical gatherings. But, all of the change isn’t without its critics. One of the things that you’ll often hear thrown around at churches such as HTB is

that their desire to relate to culture winds up with services that end up looking like concerts. For some, the worry is the church will begin to lose some of the traditions and roots it has grown over the centuries, and the message of the Gospel will be watered down and replaced by lights and fog machines. But Gumbel is adamant that everything HTB does is grounded in Scripture and a correct understanding of God. That’s because despite his status as a global church leader, Gumbel fundamentally views himself as no more than a local church pastor. “The bit I love most is ... being part of a local staff team at a local church,” he says. “HTB is like a volcano—all these ministries come out, but we need to keep the heat going here. The local church is key.”

UNITING THE DIVIDED Gumbel’s commitment to the unchanging message of the Gospel means that he and HTB have come to the conclusion that in order to reach people, the historically fractured church in Western Europe needs to unify. “What is the barrier to the re-evangelization of the nation?” he asks. “Everyone fighting each other. If we are going to do it we have got to work together, and it’s just not going to happen if the churches are fighting each other.” That’s why he’s spent the better part of the last several years calling for a “truce” between formerly bitter factions of the church. Nowhere was this on display more than last year’s HTB Leadership Conference. There, Gumbel shared a stage with Raniero Cantalamessa, a Catholic priest, and Joyce Meyer, a speaker and author with ties to the American Charismatic movement. In an unprecedented move, they, along with others, called for unity among different streams of Christianity. Gumbel doesn’t deny that theological and traditional distinctions are important, but he urgently believes that “what unites us is stronger than what divides.”

THE LONDON REVOLUTION HTB isn’t alone in its efforts to bring Christianity back to prominence in London. Hillsong London and Jesus House are both large churches within the capital. Elsewhere in the country, churches such

Despite meeting in formal-looking, historic spaces, the HTB experience is as cuttingedge as any.

as Audacious Church Manchester, Life Church Bradford and Trent Vineyard are seeing more and more people come through their doors. The rise in large churches throughout the city reinforces the principle Gumbel has driven into HTB: The church needs to speak a language that its culture will listen to. And it appears that’s happening. A survey of greater London by the Brierley consultancy, published in 2013, found that since 2005—the very year Gumbel became vicar at HTB—average church attendance in the capital had risen from 620,000 to 720,000, and the number of places of Christian worship had grown by 17 percent, too. Christianity in the U.K. is still in need of revitalization, but the numbers seem to confirm something Gumbel truly believes about the spiritual revolution currently happening in London: “We are at the start of something amazing.” JAMES DW YER is a writer and worship leader living near London. He tweets at @jamesrdwyer.

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A NEW DAY

ANDRA DAY’S GRAMMY-NOMINATED SONG ‘RISE UP‘ WAS THE SONG OF THE SPRING. HER ACCLAIMED ALBUM ALSO EARNED A GRAMMY NOMINATION, SHE’S RELEASED COLABORATIONS WITH CREATIVES LIKE SPIKE LEE AND M. NIGHT SHYAMALAN. BUT BEFORE DAY COULD RISE TO THE TOP OF THE R&B WORLD, SHE HAD TO FALL.

B Y E R I C VA N VA L I N PHOTOS BY M YR IAM SANTOS

he past year saw the rise of R&B artist Andra Day. It all started when the legendary Stevie Wonder got his hands on a recording of Day’s performance at a Malibu strip mall and was so impressed he reached out to her. The connection with Wonder led to a record deal with Warner Bros. and the release of her intensely intimate debut album, Cheers to the Fall. Since the album’s release, she has toured the U.S., made music videos directed by Spike Lee and M. Night Shyamalan, received nominations for two Grammys and performed at the Grammys and the White House. Her breakout song, “Rise Up,” has elevated her to a near-household name. But all of this almost never happened. Not much longer than year ago, Day was at the lowest point of her life: “I was smoking weed, drinking, heavily into promiscuity— cheating on whoever I was with—just doing things selfishly, and doing music for my own sort of vain persona,” she says. “I didn’t have a job, completely broke, sleeping on my mom’s couch in her tiny little apartment. And any deal I had at the time basically fell through.” In the world of music, these aren’t necessarily uncommon circumstances. But her’s is nothing like the typical celebrity success story: “It was a low point,” she says, “but it was the greatest point in my life.” Why? Her whole life turned upside down when her breaking point led her to faith in Jesus Christ. For the first time since her rocket-like rise to fame, Day talks openly about hitting rock bottom, finding faith and living vulnerably—even in the brightest of spotlights.

Can you tell us how you got to where you are right now? My mother converted to Christianity when we were very young. When I got into my teen years and into my younger adulthood it was, “Yeah, yeah, I believe.” But I was smoking weed, drinking, heavily into promiscuity—cheating on whoever I was with—just doing things selfishly, and doing music for my own sort of vain persona.

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“I REGRET HURTING SOMEONE, BUT I’M GRATEFUL FOR WHO I HAVE BECOME AND HOW CLOSE I’VE BEEN ABLE TO GROW IN CHRIST.”

I ended up moving out to New York ... but my conscience just started to catch up with me. I told Him everything I had done, I told my family everything I had done. Dealing with the guilt and the shame, you know, it was a very low point in my life. I didn’t have a job, completely broke, sleeping on my mom’s couch in her tiny little apartment. And any deal I had at the time basically fell through. It was a low point, but it was the greatest point in my life. I rededicated my life to Christ. I was like, “I’m not playing games anymore, I’m not lukewarm, I’m not doing that anymore.” I regret hurting someone, but I’m grateful for who I have become and how close I’ve been able to grow in Christ, because of all of that. I always say “those years” were formative years. When I came back to San Diego, I literally told Him, “God if you want me to do this, I’ll do this. If you want me to teach, I’ll be a teacher. If you want me to panhandle on the corner for you, I’ll do that.” From there, that’s when the door with Stevie Wonder opened. When things that weren’t supposed to be there came through. Eventually he introduced me to the producer I did the record with, Adrian Gurvitz. And so from that moment we met and I got into the studio, I told myself, “Tell the truth, talk about everything. Talk about the heartbreak you inflicted, talk about the heartbreak you experienced. What you’ve learned, how you’ve grown, how you continue to try and grow.” Cheers to the Fall delves into these deep parts of your story—your “fall.” Was there any hesitancy to release such a personal album? I think in the beginning it was like “Do people say these things in songs,” but I was kind of like, if I don’t say this and this is true, then what else am I going to say?

It is Christ who empowered me to be able to say those things. You’re not trying to prove yourself anymore. All you are doing is being obedient, and that really lifts the burden and the worry of people’s opinions. If everyone received it terribly, that’s OK, I still did what I was called to do. The whole label process has been one of compromise, not who I am, but being collaborative, not compromising who I am at my core. And it’s been a lot of putting my foot down, “No this is who I am, this why I am here, this is what’s going to be talked about and this is how it’s going to be delivered.” Would you consider yourself a vessel? You know it’s funny, I had a conversation with Lauryn Hill one time and she said, “We’re witnesses at the end of the day, that’s it.” And that is true, witnesses to His grace, His gift, His sacrifice and to our testimony and experience. I do a Bible Study with friends, and we talk about how you don’t have to beat people over the head with the love of Christ. You just have to live it, and love Him, let Him dwell with you every day.

The video for your hit single “Rise Up” depicts an incredibly moving story of a quadriplegic husband and the wife who takes care of him. How did this become the idea for the video? At the time I was really just praying about the director, and what story was supposed to be told. I was reading a book, it was called God Always Has A Plan B for Women. I remember first reading the book and thinking, “What kind of title is this?” At the end of the book there’s a very simple story where a man is writing a letter … he gives it to his son. And the father is

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“REALLY, MY DESIRE IS TO COMMUNICATE HOW POWERFUL AND HOW LIFE-CHANGING THE LOVE OF CHRIST IS.”

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Andra Day performing at the 2016 Grammy Awards

basically explaining how extraordinary his son’s mother is. He decides to tell the story of how he wants to take his mother on a date. He tells his son, “I want to take your mother out because she’s amazing.” And as he’s telling the story, we begin to see that in order for her to take him on a date she has to actually get him up in the morning, she has get him into his chair, and get his legs into the tub, has to bathe him, brush his teeth, comb his hair. Get him in the car, and you see other couples in and out in 20 seconds. And it takes them 20 minutes. The story literally hit me in the face, “This is the one you need to tell.” It’s based on a true story. I think the message, this one in particular, is not just for people who are quadriplegic, but people who have to persevere every single day. This family will have to do this every single day, but I wanted to show in this video that there is no love lost. She doesn’t do this out of pity, she does this because she loves him just like any other functioning couple. We wanted to keep it positive, where they are not breaking down. No, they’re in love, they’re going on a date. How did M. Night Shyamalan end up directing the video? M. Night Shyamalan was literally brought into my life. We had a few directors lined up for the video. And I prayed, “Now that I

have a story, who’s my director gonna be?” The next day I get a tweet from him, “Just heard this song, I’d love to do a video with you. #NightandDay let’s do it.” It turns out his whole family had been introduced to my music right before then and loved it. He did the video, by the way, for zero fee. When he heard the vision of what I wanted to talk about and the book that it came from, he read it. He said, “It’s amazing, I want to tell it exactly like you want to tell it.” Where did the inspiration for the song itself come from? You know, I pray about everything, and this song was no different. So it was kind of like, “God what do you want to talk about today?” The girl I did it with, Jenn Decilveo, she was playing the piano, and I said, “Play and I’ll sing and just see what comes out.” And literally the bulk of the song, lyrically, “Rise Up, do it a thousand times again,” came out in that first take. And I knew, OK, this is a gift, this is something special. And that’s really what it is—a reminder to persevere in hope. For not just yourself, but for other people.

In the video Spike Lee directed for

“Forever Mine,” we see you spending time reading the Bible and in prayer. With the craziness of the past year and a half—has it been harder to maintain your faith? It’s definitely gotten busier, crazier. It definitely has been challenging. Any time a day or two go by, I can feel it. You know He’s there, but it’s like trying to hear someone speak while you’re walking away from them. You’ve got to stay in that place. It’s definitely a process, holding people accountable, making mistakes all the time and going back to my foundation. Your live shows seem like very intimate experiences where you really connect with an audience. What are you trying to communicate to an audience when you’re on stage? My band and I pray every time before we go on stage, that “His will is done.” Really, my desire is to communicate how powerful and how life-changing the love of Christ is. ... Without knowing Christ, you don’t know your potential—how big you really are, how powerful you really are. And I talk about being vulnerable, because you can’t be at His feet without being vulnerable. ERIC VANVALIN is a writer and filmmaker living in LA. Find more on his blog, pickingupshells.com

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shamed

PU BL IC SH A M I NG ON L I N E COU L D DEST ROY YOU R L I F E W I T H A S I N G L E T W E E T. H E R E ’ S H O W W E C A N S T O P I T.

BY JESSE CAR EY

t’s been two and a half years since a tweet upended Suey Park’s life. At the time, Park was a relatively well-known Asian-American activist who used her Twitter profile— which had about 23,000 followers at the time—to call attention to incidents of racial bias and stereotypes in culture. Her writing was frequently controversial, but until a fateful night in March 2014, she’d never been the target of large-scale outrage. When an account managed by Comedy Central tweeted, “I am willing to show #Asian community I care by introducing the Ching-Chong Ding-Dong Foundation for Sensitivity to Orientals or Whatever” from @ColbertReport, Park took the offensive. Within hours of the tweet, Park encouraged her followers to get #CancelColbert trending. It ended up being the number one trending topic in America. The joke, of course, was part of a larger satirical bit Colbert performed on The Colbert Report making fun of a cluelessly insensitive charity run by Washington Redskins owner Dan Snyder. But, as Colbert would later concede on the show, the meaning was easily lost in translation: “Who would have thought a means of communication limited to 140 characters would ever create misunderstandings?” he joked. Colbert’s fans took umbrage with Park’s outrage about a joke. Thousands of people she’d never met attacked her online. She received death and rape threats. She was doxed. She lost speaking jobs. As she would later describe on the aptly titled show, The Internet Ruined My Life, she was forced to move cities, change her appearance and essentially live on the run. The mob has never fully let up. Stories like hers are becoming increasingly familiar.

When Justine Sacco boarded an international flight to visit her family in South Africa, she had no idea that by the time she landed, her life would have changed forever. Moments before boarding, Sacco sent a tweet to her 170 followers, who were mostly friends and colleagues accustomed to her biting, ironic and at times politically incorrect sense of humor. The message was 12 words that would destroy her life. “Going to Africa. Hope I don’t get AIDS. Just kidding. I’m white!” The tweet was a bad joke, the kind posted every day on the Internet. Many people who knew her—and her family’s work with impoverished communities in South Africa—recognized that she was attempting to show the absurdity of privileged, white tourists seeing AIDS as only an “African problem.” She was trying—very poorly—to show why that racist mindset was so fun-

reputation and even relationships within her own family. The convergence of online outrage, social media virality and old-fashioned mob mentality created a system in which a life could be ruined in a matter of hours, and almost nothing could stop it.

THE SHAMING EPIDEMIC When journalist and author Jon Ronson began examining the history of public shamings in America, he made a startling realization: Officially sanctioned public shaming—from witch trials and scarlet letters, to town-square stocks and even open-air executions—weren’t discontinued because they were ineffective. They were put to an end by church leaders and government officials because they turned otherwise well-mannered, moral, Christian people into monsters.

The broad strokes of online outrage fail to capture the thoughtfulness needed to engage in a productive theological debate. damentally ridiculous. But for the hundreds of thousands of people who read her tweet while she slept on the plane, unaware she’d become a global trending topic, any underlying commentary or good intention was lost to her delivery. In the hours she flew from New York to South Africa, that single tweet led a massive online mob—almost entirely comprised of people who’d never met Sacco—to publicly shame her on an almost inconceivable scale. Within hours, Sacco’s poorly constructed joke made her the villain of dozens of news stories around the world. In a single day, she’d lost her job, her

Ronson’s brand of journalism—featured in books including Them, The Men Who Stare at Goats, The Psychopath Test, his regular contributions to This American Life and a series of BBC investigative documentaries—specializes in uncovering the psychological undercurrents of human behavior. Why do otherwise rational people behave in ways that are, at times, so irrational? While researching his latest book, So You’ve Been Publicly Shamed, Ronson visited public archives in Massachusetts, where newspapers documenting life in 19th century Puritan America are preserved on micro-film. His goal was to once

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The masses—not a team of editors and producers—decide what matters. And that becomes the story.

again examine why shamings turn nice people so hostile. “I assumed that [public shamings] fell out of favor because they were getting to be kind of useless after the industrial revolution, because a shamed person could just lose themselves in a crowd and it was kind of pointless,” he says. “I didn’t find a single document that said ‘We need to stop these public shamings because they’re useless.’ But I found a lot of documents from religious leaders, from the court, and founding fathers all of whom were saying ‘We need to stop this stuff, it’s monstrous.’ Good people in the crowd were becoming brutal—the punishments were disproportionate to the crimes.” It turns out, dragging someone out in front of their entire community and publicly punishing them is an extremely effective means of judicial punitive action. Humility is a powerful deterrent. But its side effects began to outweigh its benefits. “I would find preachers from Connecticut [who said], ‘Will you stop being so cheerful at executions? This is not good

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stuff,’” Ronson explains. “I did not find a single document that called for public punishments to be outlawed because they were pointless. But I found a lot of documents that called for them to be outlawed because they were so brutal, and because well-meaning people lose their compassion in a crowd when somebody is being punished.” 2016 America may no longer have large, public squares that are home to public executions. But it does have something that fuels the intoxication of collective outrage even more powerfully: the connective power of the Internet.

A VIRAL MACHINE The Internet has become one of the most powerful social forces in human history. It has the ability to unite millions of unconnected people around the globe with a singular cause, almost instantaneously. The masses—not a team of editors and producers—decide what matters. And that becomes the story. Ronson says that if you want to

understand the resurgence of public shaming online, you have to first understand the complicated ways the two types of media now work together. “It’s really interesting to kind of trace the evolution of the relationship between the mainstream media and social media,” he says. “In the beginning, the mainstream media just thought, ‘OK we’ll ignore Twitter. It will go away. It’s not a problem. Just ignore it. It will go away,’ and then it didn’t go away.” Soon though, Twitter was giving power and a platform to personalities that otherwise had no voice in the media landscape. “Twitter’s power outgrew the mainstream media, and the mainstream media realized it couldn’t control Twitter,” Ronson explains. The problem is that—unlike traditional media, which relies on editorial standards, fact-checking and journalistic ethics of fair-mindedness—on social media, emotion moves the needle. And there’s no emotion more powerful than outrage. Twitter’s capacity to create online mobs that target these others with little

information is a dangerous—and unpredictable—cultural force. But what happens when it bleeds into the Church? What happens when values of grace, forgiveness and kindness are put to the test by Twitter’s power to humiliate and shame others?

CASTING THE FIRST STONE Ronson, who describes himself as a humanist, said that while researching the history and psychology of public shaming the Christian connections were on his mind. “Maybe it’s what social media was like at the very beginning with people admitting shameful secrets about themselves and other people saying, ‘OMG! that’s me too,’ but it’s certainly not like it anymore,” Ronson says. “Now it’s a stressful place where everybody is trying to be kind of outraged by everybody else and unforgiving and defining people by their flaws instead of putting their flaws into a wider human context.” For many Christians who get drawn into adding to the online shaming of fallen leaders or disgraced pastors, the impulse may start as a positive one. The notions of “protecting” the Church, rooting out heresy or exposing hypocrisy, on the surface, seem like noble pursuits. “It’s the desire to do good that leads people to do harmful things,” Ronson says. But the problem is that using social media to do this has two major risks: It can contribute to a mob mentality and is often incapable of capturing the nuance needed to discuss complex ideas and issues. Ronson thinks that the call for nuance, or simply trying to unpack the intention behind the accused’s words or actions can turn the mob against individuals perceived to be “defending” the accused. “Not only does Twitter ignore nuance; sometimes Twitter actually acts like nuance is the enemy.” The broad strokes of online outrage also fail to capture the thoughtfulness needed to engage in a productive theological debate. Ronson says, “There’s a kind of performance outrage on Twitter. We want to show the people that are following us how outraged we can be.”

OUTRAGE FOR GOOD The Internet’s lure to bring back the public shamings of long ago is a powerful one. But Ronson believes there are ways to use the collective power to expose injustice as a positive one. “While all of this terrible stuff is happening, a lot of really good stuff is happening,” he says. “I think Black Lives Matter is going to be looked

back on as a really important moment in society and a real civil rights battlefield and will change things.” There have been incidents where social media has helped expose abuse in the Church, come to the aid of victims and has been a real force for justice. But knowing the difference between fighting real social evils and heaping on humiliation and shame is sometimes a fine line that requires a commitment to getting the facts right and embracing nuance. It’s a lesson that even Park has embraced. Months after the #CancelColbert incident, she briefly returned to Twitter. But, this time, her tone had changed. “I so very much regret contributing to a culture in which knee jerk reactions and call-outs became synonymous with social justice education,” she tweeted. “It feels good to be a member of mob mentality until you’ve been on the receiving end of it. I no longer feel bad for myself knowing this.” For Ronson, the key is not only recognizing when the impulse to shame people becomes misplaced, but also embracing a community that engages ideas instead of attacking them. “The fact that we surround ourselves around people who feel the same way we do, that makes us more enraged when somebody transgressive comes along,” he says. “Maybe this is something that goes on in Christian communities as well. If you surround yourself with people who feel exactly the same way as you do, that’s kind of undemocratic. When somebody comes around that feels differently to the way you do, you’re more likely to tear them to pieces because you see them as so outlandish compared to the mutual approval machine of your Twitter followers or your church community.” Combating the public shaming epidemic may also come down to embodying a principle that made Jesus’ message so culturally subversive in the first place. It’s the idea that led Him to say “Let he who is without sin cast the first stone” to the crowd attacking the woman caught in adultery: grace. “When I see Christians acting with grace and compassion and openness, it’s so heartwarming,” Ronson says. “This is the way to make things better. When you see Christians acting in this way, it’s so delightful.”

JESSE CARE Y is an senior editor at RELEVANT. He lives in Virginia Beach with his wife and two kids.

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BY ANDR EA LUCA DO

JUL_AUG 2016

T H IS N E W YOR K ROC K OU T FI T W EN T FROM COL L EGE BU DDIES TO R A D I O DA R L I N G S O V E R N I G H T— I T J U S T T O O K 1 0 Y E A R S . W E TA L K E D W ITH THE BA ND A BOU T THE T UR NING POIN T OF T H E I R S T O R Y.

the last year, Brooklyn-based X Ambassadors has gone from opening act to household name. Their soulful alt-rock single “Renegades” was already becoming a break-out hit last year, but when it appeared in a Jeep commercial, the band’s fame rocketed to a new level. The record went platinum and had one of the quickest rises on Billboard’s alternative charts, hitting No. 1 after just eight weeks—the fastest climb since Fastball’s “The Way” in 1998. The song is part of X Ambassadors debut full-length album, VHS, which also features the hits “Unsteady” and “Jungle,” but no song on the album broke out to the level “Renegades” did. For the band—made up of Sam Harris on lead vocals, Casey Harris (who has been blind from birth) on keys, Noah Feldshuh on guitar and Adam Levin on drums— the chart-topping success “happened fast, but also gradually at the same time,” according to Levin. It may look like X Ambassadors enjoyed overnight success, but they were ready for their moment in the spotlight due to years of consistent, hard work. “We played our first show around 2008,” Levin recalls, “and from 2008 to about 2013 we were just playing any show we could get. We were working jobs and taking money out of the ATM to put in the gas tank to pay our own way to play these shows, where we made no money.” Levin admits that sounds depressing, but he says they wouldn’t trade those years of playing bad gigs for anything. “It’s kind of a beautiful thing to look back on … When

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VHS

The genre-mixing 2015 album hit No. 1 after just eight weeks.

JUL_AUG 2016

you’re a young kid and all you want to do is go on tour, when you finally get to do that, even if the shows are really bad or there are only five people there, it’s still rewarding to know you’re doing it to some degree.” Now, having completed two headlining tours—not to mention touring with the likes of Muse and The Lumineers—they are certainly more than “doing it to some degree.”

WHEN EVERYTHING CHANGED A pivotal moment for X Ambassadors goes back to a radio station in Norfolk, Virginia. In 2012, when a program director at 96X heard their track “Litost” from an older extended play and started playing it on-air, it quickly became the station’s most requested song. Just as “Litost” was getting buzz, the frontman for Imagine Dragons, Dan

Reynolds, happened across their song “Unconsolable.” Reynolds played it for label head and producer Alex Da Kid, who signed the group to his label KIDinaKORNER in 2013. Reynolds and Da Kid co-produced two EPs with X Ambassadors, Love Songs Drug Songs (2013) and The Reason (2014), before putting out VHS, the album that pushed the band over the top.

THE ‘NUMBER ONE THING’ Aside from “Renegades,” this entire collection is chock full of diverse hits that are attracting a huge audience. From the emotional “Unsteady” to the upbeat, Princeesque pop song “Gorgeous” to the poweranthem “B.I.G.,” X Ambassadors can’t be pigeonholed by genre. Though the band members say they’re

sometimes it’s a vocal section Sam Harris hears in his head. “There are so many different ways it happens. If you go through the same process, you’re going to come out with similarsounding results all the time. Doing a different process produces different results.” Music style isn’t the only way X Ambassadors connect with their enormous following. Their songs are honest, sometimes in a painful way and sometimes in a lighthearted way. “Unsteady” contemplates the effects of divorce and its emotional toll. Drawn partly from Harris’ experience with his and Casey’s parents’ separation, the song applies to people who have seen their worlds rocked in an unexpected way. The more fun and catchy tune “Naked” is about honesty in love and friendship, opening with Sam Harris singing, “I ain’t no Ken and you ain’t no Barbie / Ain’t none of my friends have a perfect body.” When it comes down to it, relatability is what X Ambassadors is all about. As Levin says, “The best thing we hear from people about our music is that it helps them either get through a hard time or helps them understand that they’re not alone. When you hear a band or musician talking about something that you relate to or something that affects you in your life, it reminds you that you’re not the only one dealing with these problems. “I think that’s the number one thing for us, is for people to be able to relate on a personal level.”

mostly ripped from old VHS tapes (hence the title). These give listeners vignettes from the early days of the Harris household, where Sam and Casey grew up. In one of the interludes, the boys’ father asks Sam, “Where do you think you’ll be in 15 years from now, the year 2015?” Like any adolescent might, the boy answers, “I will not be here. I will be far away.” But unlike most kids, Sam Harris was right.

IF YOU GO THROUGH THE SAME PROCESS, YOU’RE GOING TO COME OUT WITH SIMILAR-SOUNDING RESULTS ALL THE TIME.

From left: Adam Levin, Sam Harris, Casey Harris and Noah Feldshuh

just a rock band, influences of hip-hop, R&B, moody pop and hard rock all make appearances on the album. On one of the tracks, a gospel choir makes an appearance. The eclectic mix has made X Ambassadors more than a one-hit success, but rather a rock band that’s accomplishing the rare feat of appealing to the masses. They’re as accessible as they are eclectic. “It’s not like avant-garde jazz, where you listen and you’re like, ‘What the heck is that?’” says Levin about the band’s sound. “It’s digestible enough, but there are a lot of things that make it different from everything else you hear on the radio.” Levin explains that they’ve been able to accomplish such diversity by never sitting down to write in the same way twice. Sometimes a song will start with a beat that Levin has, sometimes it’s a riff and

Today, the band is focusing on the summer festival circuit before they sit down to finish their next full-length album, which is well in the making at this point and will release some time in 2017. Levin can’t divulge too many details but if they continue on the path they paved thus far, the new work will be innovative but accessible, catchy and diverse. If you were to ask the guys in X Ambassadors today where they’ll be in 15 years, the answer would be that they don’t intend to go anywhere. They’ll be right where they are now, making music that connects with people all around the world. “Hopefully we’ll be on album six or seven by then,” says Levin. “It’s really hard to think that far ahead, but we hope we’re able to keep doing this thing for as long as possible.”

A PROPHETIC INTERLUDE? On VHS, the band includes an altogether unique collection of tracks. They call them “interludes”—brief, candid recordings

ANDREA LUCADO is a freelance writer living in Nashville, Tennessee. Follow her on Twitter @andrealucado.

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HOW TO HAVE THE

BEST SUMMER EVER

JUL_AUG 2016

BY ROB FEE

ummer is that wonderful time of year when kids are out of school, the sun feels like it’s going to melt the earth and you truly realize how vitamin D-deficient you’ve become. It’s easy to wake up one day and realize summer’s coming to an end and you wasted the entire time doing absolutely nothing, but we’re not going to let that happen. You see, the most important thing to do during the summer is to make the most of it. Spend days staying so busy

that sleeping in the next day feels more like a reward than slowly morphing into a human slug. Build traditions, make memories and most important, don’t try to beat my high score on Tetris because you will fail miserably. Not sure where to start (other than not Tetris)? We got you covered. Here’s a very simple guide to making sure you have the absolute best summer of your life. Seriously, the kids on The Sandlot and The Goonies didn’t have as good of a summer as the one you’re about to experience.

2. VISIT A WEIRD FESTIVAL Now the obvious choice here is a music festival. Instead of hitting up multiple concerts all year, you can see all your favorite bands and future favorite bands in one place. But don’t limit yourself to only music.

1. CLEANSE YOURSELF

Get a local newspaper or find a community bulletin board and check out the niche, bizarre, local festivals in your area. You’d be amazed at how great some of them can be. Ever been to a pancake festival in rural Indiana? I have! The more unusual the

WE’VE ALL MADE JOKES ABOUT OUR

festival, the better. Be sure to bring a solid group of friends along

who won’t stop talk-

because, no matter if it’s a train wreck of a festival, or the greatest

FRIENDS

ing about their cleanse, but

thing ever, you’re going to make some incredible memories at the Corn

there’s a reason they won’t

on the Cob Festival in Plainview, Minnesota, or whatever gem you find.

stop talking about them. They’re wonderful. Just don’t combine your cleanse with

SHE GETS IT

a day at the beach because your body is not going to appreciate that combination of events. What a dilemma. (That’s a Nelly reference, by the way. A very good Nelly reference at that.)

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CHANGE UP YOUR BEACH DAY (WAIT FOR IT)

3. CATCH A BALLGAME

YOU’RE PROBABLY GOING TO THE BEACH at some point this summer, right? Here’s an idea that will really make that trip something to remember. You ready for this? You go to the beach, but you leave your phone in the car. Believe it or not, you can look at the ocean without staring at it through your iPhone cam-

LOOK, MOST PEOPLE DON’T REALLY ENJOY sitting there watching a

random baseball game for hours at a time. But going to a baseball game doesn’t really have to be about watching baseball. It’s such a fun experience that you’ll love it even if you don’t know the first thing about sports. Get a group of friends together, buy a section of tickets in whatever price range you can and enjoy a beautiful day at the park where you’ll never be judged for buying carnival foods and hot dogs on a stick. You might even fool around and accidentally become a fan—but even if not, where else can you get delicious $8 cotton candy?

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era. Remember, no one has ever said, “Boy, I sure am glad my friend posted 900 snaps of my feet in the sand and 3200 overly filtered Instagram pics of the ocean.” Have you seen the ocean? It doesn’t need a filter. Your eyes haven’t had a break from staring at a screen since 2004, and, believe it or not, you can enjoy an activity without posting about it on Facebook. I know, right?

5. LEARN A NEW SKILL Sure, you could take a class and spend a bunch of money learning how to do something new—but then again, the Internet exists. So while you’re in the backseat of the car riding to Carlsbad for your family vacation, pull up YouTube and learn a skill instead of playing Tetris for 11 hours. You don’t even have to learn a useful skill. One time I took an hour of a trip and learned how to win at that triangle peg jump game they have on the tables at Cracker Barrel. I don’t want to say that it changed my life forever, but it absolutely changed my life forever.

6. DO SOMETHING NEW

7. STAY ON A SCHEDULE

Have you always wanted to swim with dolphins?

HEAR ME OUT...

Then buddy, you save up your money and go

No matter if you’re off from school or you’re taking vacation from work, it can be very easy to waste so much of your time. And no one has ever looked back at their life and thought, “Boy, I really wish I’d spent more time sleeping until noon like a ghoul and doing absolutely nothing for weeks at a time.” You don’t have to get up and milk goats at dawn every morning, but it’s amazing what a little structure will do for your day. Make plans and stick to them, even if it’s just going to Taco Bell with your pals every Tuesday night. Honestly, a weekly planned trip to Taco Bell is a great idea for any time of the year, not just summer. ... What I’m saying is go eat some tacos right now.

swim with that dolphin until your heart is content. Now by no means am I saying you should live your life like a Katy Perry song. It’s easy to sing about spending your rent money on parties when YOU’RE A MILLIONAIRE! But if you start a little fund for yourself you’d be amazed how fast you can pull it off. You only get to live once, and there’s not a lot of time for you to do all the things you want to do, so why not just go for it? If that means you don’t get to eat out for a few weeks and cook meals at home, then whatever. Would you rather tell your kids stories of you swimming with dolphins or about all the mozzarella sticks you enjoyed at T.G.I. Friday’s?

8. TAKE A ROAD TRIP GOING ON A ROAD TRIP IS AN ESSENTIAL PART OF SUMMER, but instead of going

to some giant city to do standard tourist activities; do something different. Find a random city that’s big enough to explore but not big enough to have Lyft drivers and spend a few days there. Once you’ve seen the Statue of Liberty you don’t really have to go back. It didn’t change. But what about a food tour in Fargo, North Dakota? Do some research on a smaller city and see what the locals love. You’ll meet incredible people and experience things you can’t find anywhere else in the world. Plus you’ll save a ton of money because the supply and demand of hotels in Las Vegas is a bit different than in Louisville, Kentucky. And trust me, I’ve had a much better time in Louisville than in Vegas. Sorry Vegas.

ROB FEE is a writer and comedian. Follow him on Twitter @RobFee for more jokes.

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upside down

chuck klosterman wants to turn everything you know BY JESSE CAR EY

THE M A N W HO H AS M A DE A CA R EER OU T OF FINDING T R U T H S I N P O P C U LT U R E I S N O W C H A L L E N G I N G T H E V E R Y T H E N AT U R E O F T R U T H I T S E L F

What if everything you think you know for certain is wrong? What if the things we’re told by scientists, critics, academics and philosophers are completely off base? Global warming. The origins of the universe. Mainstream ideas about God. Which music, TV shows and movies really matter. What if in 200 years, historians will look back at the year 2016, and note how wrong we were about almost everything? Those are the questions writer Chuck Klosterman has been wrestling with. The culture critic who has made a career of finding the deep meaning in what others deem trivial has now tackled a bigger topic—the nature of truth itself. And what he’s found may help to reshape the way we think about it.

UNTRUE TRUTHS For years, Chuck Klosterman has written about finding deeper meaning in pop culture. From the social significance of KISS to how the rise of the NFL can be linked to a morally conflicted American outlook, Klosterman’s writings about big truths hiding in plain sight have become some of the most important works of pop culture writing in a generation. From his best-selling essay collections like Sex, Drugs, and Cocoa Puffs and Chuck Klosterman IV: A Decade of Curious People and Dangerous Ideas to his profiles of some of the most famous people on the planet (including Taylor Swift, Jonathan Franzen and Kobe Bryant) for magazines like GQ and Esquire, Klosterman’s career has been built on hearing the bigger ideas hidden in all of the pop culture noise. That’s why the premise of his latest

book, But What If We’re Wrong? is so groundbreaking: How do we know that “truth” is even truth? “We can’t think whatever we want, and we tell ourselves we can,” Klosterman tells RELEVANT. “We tell ourselves that we have freedom of thought, but we really don’t.” For Klosterman, this is the starting point for attempting to understand what truth is really all about: Recognizing that we all are biased and programmed—by culture, our upbringings, human nature—to think a certain way. “Some of these problems cannot be investigated until you first accept that notion—that we can’t think whatever we want,” he said. “We have to make ourselves do it sometimes.” In order to “make” himself do that, Klosterman conducted a thought experiment: How can he think about the present as if it’s the past? The idea is this: Only future generations are able to see the forest from the trees of past generations. For example, there was a time when the greatest minds in science believed with almost absolute certainty that the Earth was the center of the universe. Today, we know (with the same degree of absolute certainty) that that idea is absurd. When Herman Melville wrote Moby Dick, it was met with mixed reviews, sold very poorly and was deemed a completely forgettable novel. Today, it is remembered as one of the greatest works of fiction ever written. The things some of the world’s greatest minds believed to be true about gravity, time, art, race and many other important topics were seen by later generations to be

observably false. The “truths” of the present are often disproven by what we know in the future. So, in order to know real “truth,” can we start thinking about the present as the past? How do we do that? Part of it is to realize the problem with “truth” in today’s culture—a culture fueled by the Internet, cable news and social media. “[People] want information that basically supports their preexisting biases,” Klosterman says. “That really increases the likelihood of being wrong about something big. If you sort of make the unconscious or conscious decision that the only information you want to receive—the only people you want to follow on Facebook and Twitter, the only television channels you want to watch—are ones that seem to back up how you already feel, it’s going to govern every thought that you have regardless of how inaccurate it may or may not be.” This is what he means about the “freedom of thought.” We all desire to be right. And in an age of unlimited information, “If someone is inherently prone to having a very inflexible position and now you give them a limited amount of data that can be used to augment and support that position, they won’t be forced to consider anything else,” he says. Suddenly, seemingly small misconceptions end up becoming big “truths”—that may one day prove to be false. Add social media—which allows us to surround ourselves with only the people who confirm our own ideas about theology, politics or cultural taste—and we can receive constant confirmation, even if we’re wrong. Very wrong.

FEEDBACK LOOPS “Anybody who has any interaction with social media is aware that if you give people a medium to sort of say whatever they want, most of what they

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will say is how great they are, how great their life is and how right they are about how they’re living,” Klosterman says. Instead of exposing ourselves to new information that challenges ideas and the truths we believe in, Klosterman suggests the Internet can actually do the opposite: It helps us filter out opinions we don’t like, and only hear the ones that solidify our own personal beliefs. “One of the myths of the Internet is that it kind of creates a global village, but actually what we’re doing very often is making the world smaller,” he says. “It’s allowing people to live in a smaller world that feels big compared to the unknown world they used to experience.” If you want to believe in Reformed theology, you can follow writers and thinkers who confirm your beliefs and suggest any other theology is misplaced. If you think Radiohead is the greatest band in the world, you can choose to only read positive reviews of Radiohead records, and snarky posts about other bands. If you thought Batman v. Superman: Dawn of Justice sucked, there are plenty of reviews that will confirm your opinion. But, with the benefit of time, more information and a clearer view of certain ideas’ cultural impact, how will people think about these ideas in the future? The key to knowing, according to Klosterman, is embracing two big concepts that can reshape our understa nding of understanding: Wonder and Humility.

we could be wrong about what we think we know, because God’s truth is even bigger than we could imagine. For Klosterman, the same principle could be applied to even smaller ideas. There’s a widely-accepted principle called Occam’s razor. It’s the concept that the most obvious answer to a problem, the most clear answer to a mystery, the first hunch in a puzzle, is probably the right one. But, to think about truth in this new way, you have to be willing to approach things differently: By acknowledging that what you think you know is probably wrong. As he calls it, “Klosterman’s Razor. “With every problem you’re saying whatever seems like the reasonable answer is the first one I have to dis-

THROUGH A GLASS DARKLY

card,” Klosterman says. “That was probably philosophically the hardest thing about doing this. It was just any time I dealt with a question, the first thing I had to do was sort of isolate what seems like the obvious response and say, ‘It can’t be that though.’” Of course, to do that, Klosterman says that people must embrace wonder—to think that the world operates in ways that are even more spectacular than we

imagine—and humility—to be willing to admit we’re wrong. From there, tackling the “truths” we believe with certainty, becomes an exercise in what could be possible. Sometimes that means challenging the precepts on which we build the truths we believe. For his research, Klosterman spoke with astrophysicist Neil deGrasse Tyson about the possibility that his ideas about the universe are wrong, “that the scientific meth-

“Faith demands that there is an element of irrationality, that you’re believing something that can’t be proven.” —Klosterman

In 1 Corinthians, the Apostle Paul addresses knowledge of real truth like this: “For now we see through a glass, darkly; but then face to face: now I know in part; but then shall I know even as also I am known.” Paul is referencing the earthly limitations to understanding divine, eternal knowledge, but at the core of his statement is this: We must acknowledge that

JUL_AUG 2016

od is getting us on this track where everything we learn from here on out is just a refinement of what we knew before, and that there isn’t going to be another huge shift in thinking,” he explains. After all, if you’re building truth on preexisting truths, then can’t the whole thing just be a big lie? Tyson balked at the idea that discoveries made after the Copernican Revolution could be wrong (the Big Bang, space-time, evolution), but best-selling author and scientist Brian Green was more open-minded. “Brian Green is like, ‘Well the history of

STORIES OF TRUTH Looking at the present as if it were the past has afforded Klosterman a few insights into the “truths” that will matter in future generations. The kind of truths that transcend generations often have something additional attached to them: great stories. Compelling personal stories remain an outlier in an unpredictable landscape of ideas that will be sustained through time.

“Everything in Western culture is understood through story-telling,” Klosterman says. “That’s just the way our brain works. We need these stories. So the consequence of the life of an individual matters as much as the work he or she created because life is sort of the story.” Bob Dylan or Elvis may end up with a bigger legacy than the Beatles because their stories represent something big about rock ’n roll—in Dylan’s case, a nonconformist outsider making music that challenged the status quo, and in Elvis’, a career defined by pop commercialization and cultural appropriation. “When we think back on music, and we think back on rock music and when it really disappears from the culture there will probably be one person who will sort of represent it as shorthand,” he says. “We will use that person to explain what that music was, so that person’s life will matter as much as the music they made.” In theory, that same concept could apply to religion and explain why the teachings of Jesus have endured: His life embodied his message. The word became flesh. But, as Klosterman explains, religion is somewhat of an outlier, because it already takes the approach that involves a sense of wonder about what might be. “The central component of faith is the belief and the acceptance of something that inherently can’t be proven. It would obviously be very easy to be a religious person if it was easy to physically see God,” he says. “Faith demands that there is an element of irrationality, that you’re believing something that can’t be proven. It’s sort of like when every once in a while someone will give a speech and it will be called like ‘Scientific Proof of God’ or whatever and that’s really missing the point of real theology.”

EMBRACING THE QUESTIONS Klosterman knows that challenging people’s basic ideas about reality and truth can be unsettling, but, if the truth you believe is actually truth, then questions can’t shake it. The only things that fall apart are things that turned out not to be true in the first place. “I don’t want people to read this and be discomforted by it,” he says. “I just want them to sort of think about things that you usually don’t think about because they seem

obvious, but maybe they’re not obvious.” Because in the end, it’s not just about figuring out what’s true, it’s figuring out why we as individuals believe it is. “It’s spending a lot of time understanding how you feel and then trying to work backwards and figure out why you came to that potentially false feeling,” he explains. Because for those trapped by misconceptions and wrong ideas—if we can figure out how to get to the truth, then it’s the truth that will set us free.

essential

klosterman

ideas sort of suggests that’s going to happen at some point—there’s going to be a huge shift,” Klosterman recalls. Within the world of science, as we understand it, it seems like the things that are right or wrong are small. The bigger question is if the entire sort of trajectory we’re going on is incorrect, and that’s an impossible thing to know and an impossible thing to prove.” But, it’s one we have to be willing to accept if we are open to even bigger truths. Take pop culture. For the most part, acclaimed works of literature, modern art and design are thought of as the most endearing and important expressions of culture. But, what if trivial music and disposable TV are just as important? “I am of the belief that all of these things low-end or high culture alike have about the same chance of being remembered, have about the same chance of sort of moving beyond this period,” Klosterman says. “What really defines history are things that are selected arbitrarily and things that happen by accident, and that’s a hard thing to accept. “Because when you’re trying to convince yourself that the work, art and politics you’re consuming is meaningful, you don’t want to automatically inject it with the idea that what really matters is chance,” he says. “But chance is kind of everything.” In other words, what if The Walking Dead is just as remembered by future generations as the writings of Cormac McCarthy? What if The Life of Pablo is just as important as the work of Pablo Picasso? Suddenly, all culture matters. If, by some chance, your friend’s blog, an indie album or the work of a Twitter writer becomes the defining work of a generation, then everything should carry gravity, meaning and significance, because everything could determine how people formulate ideas about truth.

For more of Chuck Klosterman’s unique perspective on music and culture, check out these three books (in this order): FARGO ROCK CITY

Klosterman’s first book is a history of heavy metal music through its rise and demise. The book also includes some of his memories of growing up as a fan of heavy metal.

SEX, DRUGS AND COCOA PUFFS

This 2003 book is a collection of 18 comedic essays on popular culture ranging from music to TV to Christianity.

This pop culture commentary is divided into three sections: Things That Are True, Things That Might Be True and Something That Isn’t True At All.

JESSE CARE Y is an editor at RELEVANT. He lives in Virginia Beach with his wife and two kids.

RELEVANTMAGAZINE.COM

BY MARGO ROBINSON

ONE IN EVERY FOUR PREGNANCIES END IN ABORTION. A NE W GLOBA L ST U DY IS CHALLENGING M A N Y BASIC ASSU MP TIONS A BOU T T HE FIGH T TO END A BORTION. W ILL T HE PRO L IFE MOV EM EN T BE A BLE TO R ESPOND I N N E W WAY S?

That was one of the major findings released this spring in a report by the World Health Organization and the Guttmacher Institute, published in The Lancet, that’s reshaping how some advocates are thinking about abortion. It’s a staggering number. Globally, that comes out to more than 56 million abortions performed every year—a total that represents a steady rise over the course of the last 20 years. Perhaps even more surprising than the total number of abortions regularly being performed around the world, was data that indicated where they were increasing in prevalence, and where abortions are on the decline. And for people who consider themselves pro-life, understanding the nuances of the findings may actually provide deeper understandings into how to prevent abortion in the future.

CHALLENGING IDEAS At the core of the study was a finding that many in the pro-life movement may see as particularly challenging: Globally, laws restricting access to abortion don’t seem to prevent them from happening. Though, it should be noted, the study itself, and the research methods used to gather the data from “national representative studies,” has its critics. The conservative outlet The Federalist went as far as to call it “dubious,” and questioned its political motives. But the researchers say their methodology is “in line with methods used recently to estimate other global health indicators.” And, if it is an accurate representation of abortion trends globally—even if it’s not perfect—the research could offer a fresh

perspective on preventing more abortions. If outlawing abortions doesn’t actually stop them from happening in high numbers in some countries, is fighting for more antiabortion laws worth the resources if you are a pro-life advocate? Russell Moore, president of the Ethics & Religious Liberty Commission of the Southern Baptist Convention, believes it is, even if advocating for legislation is just a single facet of a more holistic approach to developing a pro-life ethic. “Working to protect vulnerable children and their mothers through the legal process is only one part of the pro-life movement, but it’s a necessary part,” he says. The group March for Life works in Washington and regularly engages in political activism, “trying to make an impact to help legislation that will build a culture of life,” says organization president Jeanne Mancini. Directly, this means fighting Roe v. Wade and similar legislation but that’s only a part of their pro-life strategy. Though many of the group’s activities revolve around advocating for anti-abortion legislation and working directly with lawmakers, Mancini says that to be truly effective, the group’s “primary thrust is to change culture to become a culture of life.” For Mancini, that’s an important distinction. “We’re pro-life from conception to natural death, so I mean there’s a whole lifespan here,” she says. Mancini points to programs like counseling sessions for women facing an unwanted pregnancy, advocating for effective adoption laws and the creation of programs that support new moms. In other words, being

pro-life is different than simply being anti-abortion. “I think the pro-life movement has been more effective than some other social conservative movements because they really have understood that this is not just about getting the right laws on the books,” Moore says. “It’s also about persuading people about the sanctity of life and ministering to people holistically.” And globally, understanding that holistic approach may be more important than ever. The Lancet report says that though abortion rates have fallen in developed countries like the United States, in many developing countries—even some where abortion is illegal—it’s growing at some of the highest rates in history. There, preventing abortions may require more than just passing new laws that restrict access to the procedure. It will take understanding the needs of young mothers, finding ways to help them and, in some cases, getting creative.

AND THOUGH PRO-LIFE ADVOCATES AND CHRISTIANS MAY DISAGREE ON HOW BEST TO TACKLE THEM, ONE THING IS CLEAR: IT’S GOING TO TAKE MORE THAN A SINGLE, SIMPLISTIC APPROACH.

NEW WAYS FORWARD? There’s a fire station in Indiana that has a small door that’s been installed in the side of the building. It opens to a cabinet-sized, temperature-controlled box that triggers a sensor to alert first responders if a baby is placed inside. It’s a place where mothers can drop off their babies and know that they will be safe. The idea behind “Baby Boxes” isn’t exactly a new concept, though the boxes themselves are just now appearing in the United States. (Currently, only two exist stateside.) Around the country, there are “Safe Haven” laws that allow mothers to drop off newborns to a medical professional at designated locations—like police stations and hospitals—with no questions asked. But, in many cases, mothers either don’t know about the laws, or as Pam Stenzel of Safe Haven Baby Boxes explains, the “mother just couldn’t bring herself to walk in and do that face-to-face interaction.” In those cases, babies are simply

JUL_AUG 2016

abandoned in a moment of maternal desperation. Nearly 100 newborns are abandoned like this every year, according to the group. Many only live for a few hours. One of those babies was named Amelia Grace Hope. “She was found December 28, 2014 frozen, wrapped in a sweatshirt in a park in Indianapolis,” Stenzel says. “In the coroner’s report—it’s so sad—the baby had been gnawed on by animals.” Before she was buried, they named her—the shirt had an aviation symbol on it—and the group decided that no more babies should end up like Amelia. “We just said, ‘Amelia is going to be that beam that says no more babies left in dumpsters and in parks and abandoned,’” Stenzel says. “But [instead] giving these

women who are in a horrible crisis and upset and scared and don’t know where else to turn, at least some other option.” Though the baby boxes are new to the U.S., they are common in some developing countries around the world. The idea is to give women an alternative to abandoning a child in a dangerous location, or even feeling forced to have an abortion. Yes, the baby boxes have their critics who feel that they encourage parents to abandon unwanted children. Lawmakers in some areas of Russia have even moved to ban them. However, their advocates see them not as a way of enabling abandonment, but rather, providing a way for desperate parents to still choose life, even if it means giving up their child.

MILLION MORE ABORTIONS PER YEAR OCCURRED WORLDWIDE BETWEEN 2010-2014

THAN BETWEEN THE YEARS 1990-1994

ABORTION RATES IN THE U.S. HAVE DROPPED

40% DESPITE THE GLOBAL TRENDS

Finding innovative solutions to help those in desperate circumstances could be a starting point. The Lancet report seems to indicate that economic circumstances are a primary factor in high abortion rates. Abortion remains far more common in developing nations than rich ones. The Safe Haven Baby Box may be somewhat of an extreme example of providing a compassionate alternative to abortion, but it’s not the only creative action being taken in some areas to help new mothers. For years, Finland has provided every new mother in the country with a box fully equipped with everything they’ll need during the baby’s first weeks of life—completely free of charge. It’s an idea that’s caught on in Phoenix, Arizona, where the Mountain Park Health Center now gives all new moms a box containing booties, blankets, a thermometer, an umbrella and other newborn supplies. The programs are part of the “holistic” approach to pro-life work that is about being more than just anti-abortion, Moore

says, it’s the type of nonjudgmental, compa ssion-f irst posture the Church should embrace. “A [holistic prolife approach] also means congregations where pregnant women in crisis are welcomed and ministered to,” he says. “Where the issue of unwanted pregnancy is addressed from the pulpit and in the teaching ministry of the church so that pregnant women who are in a time of crisis in their lives know that they are not going to receive judgment or condemnation if they come forward and ask for help.”

UNRAVELING THE NUANCE The Lancet study paints a complicated picture of the state of abortion around the world. On a global scale, there seem to be direct links to poverty and abortion. In light of the data, it’s not irrational to view anti-poverty measures as potential means of preventing abortion. For some, this could mean increased work from charities and faith-based groups, for others it could mean state social programs that help those in need. There are also indications that access to contraception is an important measure. The report says, “The level of unmet need for contraception is higher in countries with the most restrictive abortion laws than in countries with the most liberal laws, and this contributes to the incidence of abortion in countries with restrictive laws.” There are some Christians who may have morally conflicted views on the issue of contraception. And, it’s complicated further because the numbers in The Lancet show that married women are far

more likely to get abortions than unmarried ones. Ultimately, the report shows that around the world, abortion rates correlate to a variety of often complex factors. And though pro-life advocates and Christians may disagree on how best to tackle them, one thing is clear: It’s going to take more than a single, simplistic approach. Anna Paprocki, an attorney and staff counsel for the group Americans United for Life, disagrees with aspects of the study, including some of its methodology and its conclusions about contraception and the effectiveness of anti-abortion laws. But, even as a pro-life attorney who works to fight laws that allow abortion and advocates for ones that promote life, she recognizes that the issue of preventing abortion is about more than just one strategy. “I think focusing solely on the legal aspect is a mistake,” she said. “Obviously, the goal of our organization is comprehensive legal protection for all human life, but even the day after Roe v. Wade— when it’s overturned—there’s going to be a need to help and support pregnant women who feel like they don’t have hopeful solutions.” Because new research gives a closer look at why women choose abortion and how alternatives can more effectively be presented, those solutions are ones that the church can continue to embrace and develop. “I think a healthy church is one that not necessarily has a bullet point list of programs, although that can be helpful, but a congregation where the church is constantly reminding one another we have a responsibility to vulnerable women and children,” Moore says. “And every part of the body has to be involved in that, but we’re involved in different ways based upon diversity of different gifts.” For some, those gifts may be in helping women, children and families in ways that continue to expand what it means to be a pro-life advocate in the first place.

MARGO ROBINSON is a writer and justice advocate living in Baltimore, Maryland.

RELEVANTMAGAZINE.COM

T H E

R E T U R N

O F

P E T E Y O R N B Y M AT T C O N N E R

IT’S BEEN SIX Y E A RS SINCE THE SINGER / SONGW R ITER H AS R ELEASED A N Y SOLO WOR K. NOW HE’S GE T T I NG BACK TO HIS ROOTS.

JUL_AUG 2016

t’s not that Pete Yorn needed a break. It’s just that he lost interest. The New Jersey-born and -raised songwriter had followed a straightforward path for the first half of his career, releasing one acclaimed solo album after another. From the moment musicforthemorningafter arrived in 2001, Yorn’s memorable melodies would become his trademark with hits like “Life on a Chain,” “Strange Condition” and “Come Back Home.” The sum total: five solo albums in 10 years. Since then, however, Yorn has shifted gears, following his creative energy where it takes him and refusing to force it when it’s not there. It’s

how he ended up recording a platinum one-off album with Scarlett Johansson in 2009, Break Up, and a short-lived collaboration with friend and multi-instrumentalist J.D. King called The Olms in 2013. Longtime fans wondered if the prodigiously gifted singer/songwriter would ever return to his solo roots, but he was never concerned with providing an answer. The question was irrelevant to him; if his interest brought him back, so be it. “I’ve made a lot of solo records,” Yorn says. “My instinct at the time was just to experiment a bit and get away from my stuff. Oftentimes when you do that, you’re able to get some space and

then re-approach what it is that you’re used to. “Working with J.D. and doing The Olms definitely served as a good experience that gave me the opportunity to come back to it with a fresh perspective. It wasn’t really a calculated thing where I thought through everything. I was just following my muse in the moment.” That’s par for the course for Yorn, who has always followed his heart musically whether or not it made sense. Sometimes those instincts have told him to lean on others, and for his selftitled fifth album, Yorn trusted Pixies frontman Frank Black to distill the songs down to their raw framework. “Sometimes my instinct is to let go of preconceived ideas of where I should be going. Other times the direction feels really strong,” he says. “Sometimes it doesn’t make any sense on the surface in the moment, but that’s where faith steps in. For instance, choosing to work with an unknown producer in a garage in Van Nuys to make my first record when I could have done it on a seemingly grander scale may have seemed

it,” he says. “There’s a mystery to it. I wouldn’t want to read too much into it, but there’s something that comes from another place that maybe already existed in some other realm and I’m just trying to pull it together. That’s what I like about it. I always like when I finish a song and then wonder, ‘Where the heck did that come from?’ “Sometimes I don’t even know what a song is about right away, but something about it will resonate with me,” he continues. “Some songs will come faster than others. Through it all, it’s always this process of feeling the inspiration, the moment, and then pouncing on it for a little bit. It’s acknowledging it and seeing if it stays. That’s how it usually works for me.” Despite Yorn’s relaxed posture to questions about his approach, ArrangingTime shows a savvy veteran craftsman at work on the album’s 12 tracks. Each song yields a strong melodic core and features Yorn’s signature builds—no surprise given his musical start as a drummer. “I believe in leaving it all on the field, so to

“I ALWAYS LIKE WHEN I FINISH A SONG AND THEN WONDER, ‘WHERE THE HECK DID THAT COME FROM?’”

ARRANGINGTIME

Yorn’s sixth solo album revisits the beautiful folk pop he is best known for.

odd at the time, but it just felt right.” Speaking of his first album, Yorn says he finds it hard to believe that he’s been making a full-time career out of music for as long as he has. musicforthemorningafter turned 15 years old this spring. “I feel like it was just a few months ago that we were putting together the 10-year anniversary package,” Yorn says. “That’s unreal to me that we’re at 15 years. It’s a really tough business with any creative endeavor. I feel really lucky to still be in the game, to be able to put out music and be able to tour and make an impact. I don’t think I think about it that much, but it is something that I remind myself to be grateful for because most musical careers don’t even get out of the driveway.” That perspective is what has allowed Yorn to abandon himself to his instincts rather than focus on what might keep him relevant with new listeners. When asked what he’s learned as a songwriter over his 15-plus years, Yorn laughs and admits so much of the process is as much of a mystery as ever. “Usually it’s kind of like this weird manifestation where I didn’t have anything to do with

speak,” he says. “I feel like I did that. I didn’t overcook things. There have been times when I’ve felt like I’ve worked on it so much that I lost the initial thing I liked about it. I was cautious with that. So just on an artistic level, I’m proud of myself for sticking to my guns in some respects there.” Whether following his creative interests or evaluating success, Yorn is a man who has learned to live in the moment. For ArrangingTime to be considered a success, Yorn says he’s not concerned with hits. Rather, after 15 years, the most important meter is an internal one. “It’s hard to gauge success these days,” Yorn says. “When it comes to record sales or how many people follow you or whatever, it’s hard to measure success anymore because people don’t buy records as much as they used to, at least for most artists. But when you get on stage and have these new songs to sing, are you cringing that you have to sing it or do you like singing them? I like singing them. I think that’s the most important thing.” MAT T CONNER is a freelance writer, editor-in-chief of Stereo Subversion and managing editor of PledgeMusic.

RELEVANTMAGAZINE.COM

C O N V E R S A T I O N

O S

G U I N N E S S

O N

B E I N G

I N

W I T H

C H R I S T I A N

R A P I D L Y

C H A N G I N G

W O R L D

BY A ARON HANBURY

HE WORLD IS LOUD WITH NEWS AND OPINIONS, and it's getting louder. For the vast majority of history, information has been a controlled substance. The few people who owned it—like newspapers or TV networks—distributed information to everyone else. But those days are long gone. With the advent of the Internet and social media, information no longer funnels down from a few sources to consumers—now it's from everyone, to everyone, all the time. And though new technology has led to the democratization of information, it also makes a culture noisy with constant communication. According to author Os Guinness, this has huge implications for the church. Guinness is a very influential social critic who has his fingerprints all over 20th- and 21st-century Christian thought (including writing presidential speeches, shaping public policy and penning more than 30 books). We sat down with him to talk about this new era and what it means for Christians—including the one skill he says Christians must recover.

YOU’VE SAID “EVERYONE IS AN APOLOGIST.” WHAT DO YOU MEAN BY THAT?

In the age of social media, everyone’s in the business of presenting. Presenting themselves, explaining themselves, selling themselves, you name it. And in that sense, this is the grand age of apologetics. But that’s not in a Christian sense. The tragedy is we who have apologetics in our DNA have lost what is really the center of it: the art of persuasion. And of course in a culture that is not only highly diverse but also increasingly hostile to the Christian faith, if ever we needed persuasion, it’s today. WHAT DO YOU HAVE IN MIND WHEN YOU SAY “PERSUASION”?

By persuasion I mean the capacity to

communicate to people who don’t share, or are even indifferent or hostile, to what we believe—and to communicate to them effectively so they see the point in what we’re saying. In other words, speaking to people whose minds and hearts are closed to what we’re saying. Evangelism is fine when people are open, but when people are closed you need apologetics. IF WE’VE LOST THE ART OF PERSUASION, HOW DO WE GET IT BACK?

We have to go back to seeing that that challenge, that problem, is actually there at the heart of Scripture. So we need to learn both the theology and the examples of how to [persuade people of the goodness of the Gospel] in a better way—starting with the fact we need to reject all formulas and recipes and 1-2-3 approaches. Our Lord never spoke to two people the same way, and nor should we. DO YOU HAVE IN MIND THE KINDS OF EVANGELISM METHODS THAT MANY OF US LEARNED IN A YOUTH GROUP?

Yes. America is crippled with methodology based on 1-2-3 recipes and formulas. Now, of course, ours is the age of technique—so you can do anything from evangelism to making an omelette to putting a man on the moon. Doing it (whatever “it” happens to be), running it through in reverse, reducing it to steps makes it sound easy. But things like evangelism and discipleship, they’re an art, not a science. Once in Switzerland, I was hitchhiking with a friend and he was an earnest evangelist. He started off giving the man who was driving us the four spiritual laws. He gave the first one and the Swiss man, who had obviously heard them before, gave two, three and four, and said, “But I’m not interested.” In other words, he was burned out and the gentleman who was witnessing to him didn’t bother to stop to talk

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GUINNESS ON DRAFT (Get it?) If there's one thing Os Guinness is known for, it's his evocative yet accessible writing. If you're looking for a place to start, we THE CALL

This guide helps readers understand the specific calling that God has for every single one of us and how your career, success and future play into that. THE GLOBAL PUBLIC SQUARE

Guinness puts forth his vision for the world to move forward in promoting freedom of religion and beliefs in a world full of religious conflict.

FOOLS TALK

This 2015 book sets up a comprehensive guide of the power and art of persuasion, specifically for Christians sharing the gospel with people who are generally uninterested.

to him, to listen to him, discover where his heart was. YOU’VE ALSO SAID THAT OUR CULTURE— LET’S CALL IT THE “DIGITAL AGE”—IS “SIMPLY THE GREATEST OPPORTUNITY FOR THE CHRISTIAN WITNESS SINCE THE TIME OF JESUS.” CAN YOU EXPLAIN THAT?

Christians have been wonderful at seizing, in innovative ways, all the opportunities presented by their generation. So, the early church used the Roman roads and the Greek language, and the Gospel spread like wildfire. Or in the 16th century, they used sailing ships, and in the 19th

century they used the Industrial Revolution to spur another huge expansion of the missionary movement. Now, take the Internet: Nothing is cheaper, more global in its reach and accessible to everyone than the Internet. So that gives us a tremendous launch forward in terms of opportunities.

IN A CULTURE THAT IS NOT ONLY HIGHLY DIVERSE BUT ALSO INCREASINGLY HOSTILE TO THE CHRISTIAN FAITH, IF EVER WE NEEDED PERSUASION; IT'S TODAY.

WHAT ABOUT CHALLENGES? ISN’T THERE A DOWNSIDE, TOO?

You could pile up the challenges that [the digital age] also brings. For example, one scholar reckons that at the time of colonial New England, the average person listened to roughly 40 hours of Puritan preaching. And there were no other voices—no television, no radio, no whatever. But in the world we’re in today—now especially with the addition of a social media—you could say that everybody is speaking, but nobody’s listening. So the most precious commodity in our Western world is focused attention. So it’s actually harder to communicate the Gospel with people. You have to be more interesting, more brilliant in order to get across. IT SEEMS THAT A LOT OF THE PEOPLE WE MIGHT ATTEMPT TO PERSUADE SIMPLY AREN'T INTERESTED—AND EVEN IF THEY ARE CONVINCED THEY'RE "WRONG," THAT KNOWLEDGE DOESN'T AFFECT THEM.

I would say there are styles of apologetics. They are rather modernist in their approach and obviously we’ve got make people care about the gospel. So it’s not just a matter of throwing out a thousand evidences and so on. It's not that we switch from modernist to post-modernist—I think they’re both half right and half wrong. And I resist this idea that we give up this reasoning because we’re post-modernist. No. In the Scriptures you talk one way when people are open and another way when they’re closed. And so stories, narratives, questions

and parables and so on are very important today, and it’s not because we’re post-modern, it’s because people are closed and that’s the important point to say. When I talk about apologetics, I’m not talking about the old modernist approach. They simply don’t work with postmodern people. AS YOU LOOK AT THIS GENERATION, WHAT ARE THE THINGS YOU THINK WE NEED TO DO BETTER IN TERMS OF LIVING OUR FAITH IN PUBLIC?

Can the Christian faith prevail over the challenges of the advanced modern world? I believe it can, but I believe at the moment most of the church is not. So the current generation is incredibly important. Far too much talk about millennials focuses on how they’re different from the previous generations. What they also need to look at is what I call “generationalism.” In the old days, generations were biological, now they’re much more cultural. We’re shaped by the formative leadership, music and political experiences of our generations. In other words, we’re defined by our differences. I would challenge millennials to think through this problem of generationalism and recover a deeply healthy biblical view of how the faith passes on from one generation to the next.

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MUSIC

RADIOHEAD

A MOON SHAPED POOL [XL RECORDINGS]

Released as part of an anti-viral campaign, which meant the band deleted all of their social media accounts, the album represents an interesting turn for the band whose sound has seen evolutions from guitar rock to digital experimentation over the years. It manages to remain unmistakably Radiohead, though. With heavy and frequent orchestration, the record is concerned with dreamy soundscapes and droning strings that underscore an overall ominous tone. In true Radiohead fashion, the band leaves interpretation up to the listener.

SOCIAL CLUB MISFITS

RIVERS & ROBOTS

THE MISFIT GENERATION

ALL THINGS NEW

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[SET SAIL RECORDS]

Misfits rejoice! The Social Club is back as The Social Club Misfits and a five-track extended play that should hold fans over until their next full-length studio album. The rap duo returned with music featuring a more serious tone, including conscious rap and mentions of their personal lives throughout the EP.

This gentle album packs a lot of power in its beautiful harmonies and mesmorizing lyrics. The album sneaks in popular worship and Scriptural terms with a smooth delivery. Experimenting with different rhythms and themes, this album still manages to convey the message of God’s love.

JAMES BLAKE

THRICE

ESMÉ PATTERSON

DIIV

THE COLOUR IN ANYTHING

TO BE EVERYWHERE IS TO BE NOWHERE

WE WERE WILD

IS THE IS ARE

[GR AND JURY MUSIC]

[C AP TURED TR ACKS]

We Were Wild is the culmination of almost a year of recording to perfecting Esme Patterson’s sound. Patterson says she explored “deeper, more far out sonic spaces” for this album. The indie-pop artist has made her way closer to experimenting with rock ‘n’ roll sounds that add edge that the past music lacked.

Designed as a response to all of the controversy DIIV faced in the past three years, Is the Is Are answers all of the criticism he and the band have endured. With powerful, intentional lyrics, strong guitar riffs and something to prove—the band delivered on the call to make great, challenging music again.

[P O LY D O R R E C O R D S ]

[ VA G R A N T R E C O R D S]

A surprise release for fans, this album marked a shift in James Blake’s music where he allowed other artists to collaborate with him on it. But in every other sense, the album is still doing what Blake does best— singing about friendship, love and acceptance. The album is perfect for a rainy day.

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Returning with their first album since 2011, Thrice includes a political undertone in this album that past albums have not had. Lead singer Dustin Kenrue sings lyrics that touch on foreign policy, privacy issues, immigration and even his perspective on God and religion.

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MOVIES + BOOKS

MOVIES

RISEN

HAIL, CAESAR!

RACE

THE FAMILY FANG

KEVIN REYNOLDS

ETHAN AND JOEL COEN

STEPHEN HOPKINS

JASON BATEMAN

[COLUMBIA PICTURES]

[UNIVERSAL PICTURES]

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[STARZ DIGITAL]

Risen tells the story of a Roman tribune who have been tasked with finding out whether or not Jesus resurrected. Through the eyes of a nonbeliever simply interested in dispelling rumors, Risen gives viewers a different perspective on the world’s most famous story.

This British-American comedy set in 1951 features an ensemble cast of stars playing actors who are trying to crack the case of what happened to one of their fellow cast members who vanished during filming. The film follows real life character, Eddie Mannix, a Hollywood “fixer.”

Based on the real life of Jesse Owens, Race is about the African-American athlete who broke records at the 1936 Berlin Olympics by winning four gold medals. While in Berlin competing for his school and country, he encounters a different type of discrimination: Hitler’s vision of Aryan supremacy.

Based on the novel by the same title, the film follows a brother and sister who have to team up and return home to search for their famous parents who have gone missing. The film explores the theme of what happens when art and life aren’t kept as separate entities.

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BOOKS

ASSIMILATE OR GO HOME

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D.L. MAYFIELD

YAA GYASI

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Tracing the story of two halfsisters born in Ghana in the 1700s: one sister marries an Englishman and lives comfortably amidst the colonialists in Africa; the other sister is sold as a slave and eventually transported to America, where she and her descendants live amidst slavery and its aftermath.

Niequist offers us a series of brief meditative essays on the art of slowing down and finding a more meaningful life. Amid the breakneck pace of life in the 21st century, this is an important book. Although Present Over Perfect may make us uncomfortable, but it points us toward hope and healing.

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This winsome memoir captures the zeal and the vulnerability of Mayfield’s experience living and working among a community of Somali Bantu refugees in Portland. In spite of her evangelical intentions in this cross-cultural work, the main story here is of the author’s own transformation.

The basic idea that Jones offers is simple: White Protestants no longer dominate the shape of American culture. This book is essential for anyone who cares what the future of God’s people will look like in the more diverse, pluralistic America of the 21st century.

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ANDRA DAY

ZACH BOLEN

We took John Mark McMillan, Sarah Williams McMillan, William Matthews, and Stephen Roach from Songs of Water with us to Paris for COP21 to learn about this human rights crisis and to share songs of prayer and hope. #ForTheLoveOf is their story condensed into 20 minutes, featuring their candid opinions on their experiences.

Anandel released the video for their single, “Oslo,” and it’s a bit different from the average video. The video is a live music video features the band playing their music, feeding off of the vibes of each other and being very authentic as they play in separate settings to create the final product: an organic video for their fans.

Andra Day has teamed up with M. Night Shyamalan, to pair the power of her inspirational song, Rise Up, with equally powerful visuals. Touching on the powering of not only rising up, but also each individual’s inner strength, the video portrays a couple making it through daily life with their challenges.

Frontman of Citizens & Saints, Zach Bolen, releases a more darkly themed, black and white video for the spacious and moving “I Will Let You Down,” from his upcoming solo album “1001.” Mostly featuring Bolen alone doing introspection, this music video will make you think about your love life, and your life in general.

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contents

JUL/AUG 2016 ISSUE 82

FEATURES 32

WHAT WOULD JESUS BREW? This generation rethought what the Bible says about alcohol. But is “right or wrong” the right question?

WHAT MAKES LAPSLEY? The incredible singer of “Hurt Me” brings a whole new level of honesty to her art.

LONDON CALLING HTB might look like a normal church, but there’s nothing normal about its impact. (Anglophiles, contain yourselves.)

THE ONLINE SHAMING EPIDEMIC Public square shamings may no longer be the norm, but have we replaced the scarlet letter with 140 characters or less?

42 56

THE RISE OF ANDRA DAY

YOUR BEST SUMMER NOW How to avoid three months of couch sitting.

The Grammy-nominated artist behind the hit song “Rise Up” shares the story of how she hit bottom— and the faith that brought her back.

52 X AMBASSADORS

60 CHUCK KLOSTERMAN

THE NEW PRO-LIFE A new study illustrates why pro-lifers need to think outside the ballot box.

PETE YORN It’s been six years since we last heard solo work from the indie-rock artist. So why is he back now?

OS GUINNESS SAYS EVERYONE IS AN APOLOGIST We sat down with one of the most influential Christian thinkers to talk about what it means to be a Christian in a rapidly changing world.

FIR ST WOR D

FEEDBACK

THE DROP

Frankie Cosmos, Car Seat Headrest, Escondido, Wintersleep

JUL_AUG 2016

SLICES

Q&A with Christine Caine; dc Talk reunion cruise; The price of millennial happiness; David Oyelowo takes aim at gun violence; The biggest enemy of free speech; Joaquin Phoenix will be the next actor to play Jesus; Bible Emoji; The lab-grown meat that could save the world

R E J E C T A PAT H Y

Is Zika is threatening the Olympics?; There are more people living in slavery now than ever; The global water crisis; JUSTICE 74

R E L E VA N T R E C O M M E N D S

The music, movies, videos and books we’re excited about.

T H E N E W A L B U M F R O M S W I TC H F O OT F E AT U R I N G T H E S I N G L E S “ F L O AT ” + “ L I V E I T W E L L” AVA I L A B L E N OW