RMG_Issue41_small by RELEVANT Media Group

REGINA SPEKTOR | ANTHONY HAMILTON | TECHNOLOGY & YOUR SOUL

GOD. LIFE. PROGRESSIVE CULTURE.

The Winding Spiritual Road of Jeff Tweedy &

WILCO THE NOT GOING BACK TO SCHOOL GUIDE 58 THINGS YOU CAN DO WHEN COLLEGE IS NO LONGER AN OPTION p. 72

PAPER ROUTE p. 68 HOPE IN AFRICA

NEW EVIDENCE THE FIGHT AGAINST DISEASE IS WORKING p. 52

ALWAYS NOW PRINTED PRINTED ON ON RECYCLED PAPER

WRESTLING WITH FADED FAITH p. 54

ISSUE 41 | SEPTEMBER_OCTOBER 2009 | $4.95

“A smart, redemptive approach to songwriting and insanely catchy melodies.” –Christianity Today on Peters’ album Scarce

CHROME The new album from critically acclaimed singer/songwriter Eric Peters

Available at

ericpeters.net

www.squarepegalliance.com

“Jason Boyett’s Pocket Guides are smart and hilarious. And they’re sneaky too: You don’t realize how much you’re learning because you’re having so much fun.” –AJ Jacobs, author of The Year of Living Biblically

HOLY HILARITY

Available at bookstores nationwide

CONTENTS

Any chance the government might expand the “Cash for Clunkers” program? We have a few articles we could unload.

MISC.

06 FIRST WORD

Cameron Strang

08 LETTERS 12 SLICES 22 WORLDVIEW Spotlight

24 DEEPER WALK Frontliner

26 REJECT/ APATHY Spotlight

28 REJECT/ APATHY

60 / RELEVANT_/MONTHMONT 09

FOR THE LOVE One very secular student dares to go undercover at one of America’s most conservative colleges.

Frontliner

30 THE DROP

Cover story

Zee Avi, Niamaj, The Low Anthem, Brooke Waggoner

WILCO

38 WINE TO WATER

Frontman Jeff Tweedy doesn’t leave anything off the table.

Doc Hendley is putting a twist on Jesus’ ﬁrst miracle

52 THE TIDE IS TURNING

Evidence our ﬁght against disease is actually working

TECHNOLOGY & YOUR SOUL Your laptop, your iPod, your cell phone ... all within arm’s reach. But what’s all that convenience really doing to you and to your faith?

58 REGINA

SPEKTOR

THE NOT GOING BACK TO SCHOOL GUIDE What to do when fall is no longer the start of the school year.

The Russian songstress is rediscovering myth

66 ANTHONY

HAMILTON

This soul singer is about more than just heartbreak

78 RELEVANT

RECOMMENDS

Our favorite music, DVDs and books

GLUTTONY One of the seven deadly sins is not simply about eating too much.

FADED FAITH The spiritual life is one of highs and lows—we all know that. But how do you relate to God in the low times? How do you keep the faith when your spiritual fervor is only a distant memory?

PAPER ROUTE

God is there,

GOD. LIFE. PROGRESSIVE CULTURE. RELEVANT magazine September/October 2009, Issue 41

even when you

We’ll ﬁx the typos in post.

EDITOR, PUBLISHER & CEO

don’t hear anything

. . . . Right?

Cameron Strang > cameron@relevantmediagroup.com

Editorial Director | Roxanne Wieman > roxanne@relevantmediagroup.com Associate Editor | Ashley Emert > ashley@relevantmediagroup.com Associate Editor | Ryan Hamm > ryan@relevantmediagroup.com Contributing Editor | Adam Smith > adams@relevantmediagroup.com EDITORIAL INTERNS: Lindsey Cressey, Curt Devine, Mallory McCall CONTRIBUTING WRITERS: Anthony Barr-Jeffrey, Jason Boyett, John Brandon, Jeff Cook, Kate Cremisino, Robert Ham, Shane Hipps, Adam and Christine Jeske, David Johnson, Shannon Kozee, Andrew Marin, Brett McCracken, Jonathan Merritt, John Pattison, Adam Phillips, Kevin Roose, Kevin Selders, Sara Sterley Designer/Project Manager | Amy Duty > amy@relevantmediagroup.com Designer | Tim Dikun > tim@relevantmediagroup.com Designer | Jesse Penico > jesse@relevantmediagroup.com Design Assistant | Justin Mezzell > justinm@relevantmediagroup.com DESIGN INTERNS: Teresa Cunningham, Andy Olson, Tess Steube CONTRIBUTING PHOTOGRAPHERS: LaVan E. Anderson, Brandon Chesbro, Patrick Dentler, Fontejon Photography, Jeremiah Guelzo, MacDonaldPhotography.com, Paul Sherar, Jon Warren/ World Vision, Autumn de Wilde Executive Publisher | Josh Babyar > josh@relevantmediagroup.com Director of Business Development | Philip Self > philip@relevantmediagroup.com East Coast Account Manager | John Scalise > john@relevantmediagroup.com Senior Marketing Manager | Hemarie Vazquez > hemarie@relevantmediagroup.com Marketing Manager | Brandi Michelle Rhodes > brandimichelle@relevantmediagroup.com Field Coordinator | Colleen Watson > colleen@relevantmediagroup.com MARKETING INTERNS: Lisbeny Duran, Wes Jakacki Sales & Finance Manager | Joanne Garcia > joanne@relevantmediagroup.com Payroll Manager | Maya Strang > mstrang@relevantmediagroup.com Exec. Assistant/Project Manager | Theresa Dobritch > theresa@relevantmediagroup.com Fulﬁllment Manager | Rachel Gittens > rachel@relevantmediagroup.com Assistant Fulﬁllment Manager | Richard Butcher SALES INTERN: Brad Ulrich FOR ADVERTISING INQUIRIES, PLEASE CONTACT Philip Self (407) 660-1411 x 104

TO SUBSCRIBE If you’re looking for a book to move your stagnant faith, to stir the dry bones, and to bring truth to your life, you’ve got the right book.” —Michael Franzese, author of I’ll Make You an Offer You Can’t Refuse

A. J. GREGORY is an accomplished

freelance writer and the author of Messy Faith. Gregory is not afraid to seek out and expose the truth of the inner life—the good, bad, and ugly.

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REPRINTS & PERMISSIONS

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RELEVANT Issue #41 September/October 2009 (ISSN: 1543-317X) is published 6 times a year in January, March, May, July, September, and November for $14.95 per year by RELEVANT Media Group, Inc., 1220 Alden Road, Orlando, FL 32803. Periodicals postage paid at Orlando, FL, and at additional mailing ofﬁces.

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MEDIA GROUP

FIRST WORD

Embracing The Real > CAMERON STRANG

et to know me, and you’ll quickly learn I have a fairly short attention span. Not ADD/what’s-wrong-with-him short, but short enough that over the years, despite very noble intentions, I’ve found it virtually impossible to, say, sustain blogging with any regularity. I also have little tolerance for those books that take one thought and basically stretch it out for 200 pages. So when Twitter came along a few years ago, I perked up. A social networking thingy that’s on my phone and limited to 140-character updates is something that fits me as good as Husky pants did back in fourth grade. If I have an occasional pithy thought or funny picture that might interest some people, I can say it with brevity, rather than having to fill a blog. I can also keep tabs on people who interest me, whether it be friends, political figures, athletes or even faith leaders. The national figures who actually “tweet” themselves (rather than using it for promotion) can be fascinating. I’m noticing, however, the more prevalent Twitter gets, the more its dynamics are changing. Mind you, I’m not one of those early adopters who likes something when it’s new and then looks down his nose at it once it gets popular (at least I don’t think I am). But little by little, Twitter is starting to resemble a high school popularity contest, where people campaign for votes and can tangibly see how liked they are by how many people follow them or respond to what they say. As more celebrities and important people have come to the party (fashionably late, of course), they see their peers already have tons of followers, so they feel they should too. There is open campaigning to “RT this” or straight-up asking for people to help them get more followers. Left and right, even normal users are signing up for Twitter sites that guarantee to get you “400 new followers a day.” (Just so you know, you can’t do this without people knowing—it sends out a tweet in your name to everyone saying you’ve signed up.) I’ve even seen pastors sign up for those. Which begs the obvious question—why? This Twitter shift is adding fuel to the MySpace/Facebook culture that places value (and for some, a means of self-worth) in the number of followers you can accumulate, even if 90 percent of them are incognito spambots. I actually read a website recently that lauded how innovative certain faith leaders are, and ranked their impact based on how many Twitter followers they have. The article then bemoaned as archaic those leaders who choose not to use Twitter as a communication channel. The site questioned whether the latter’s national influence is eroding because they don’t have as many online followers. Is this really the road we’re going down? To wrestle with these questions, there’s a section in this issue we’ve dubbed Technology & Your Soul. Yes, we get the irony of a media company

6 / RELEVANT_SEPT/OCT 09

raising questions about possible negative ramifications technology and this culture of hype might be having on our generation’s spiritual condition, but it’s a look in the mirror we all need to have. At the recommendation of an author I greatly respect, I recently read Shane Hipps’ book, Flickering Pixels. In it, Hipps unpacks how media affects our communication, lives and spiritual condition more than we realize. He’s not a technophobe, but he very convincingly sounds an alarm about the technology-riddled me-first world that’s emerging. We are creating a culture of superficial self-worth, where hype is valued over reality. All we’re really doing is spreading ourselves thinner and thinner, getting more distracted, and creating more life noise that keeps us, ultimately, from hearing the still, small voice of God. It’s a sad and hollow road, and I want off. So, over the last nine months, I’ve started putting intentional margins into my life. I’ve set boundaries on how much I’ll work. I have designated times when I unplug the gadgets, no matter how useful they may be. I intentionally turn the TV off when before I might’ve kept it on as background noise while I did something else. I fight the urge to check my phone any time I’m sitting around. What’s happened is that the noose technology had on me is loosening. Sure, I’m still a gadget freak who podcasts and twitters. But I have a newfound appreciation that real life is found in the space where those things are turned off, when I actually can be silent, connect meaningfully with people and know God is God. We were created for connection and relationship, but rather than looking for it in artificial, fleeting ways, let’s choose to chart a different course. After all, it’s not about how many online followers you have—real influence and connection happens in more than 140 characters. Let’s be aware of how technology can affect us. Let’s choose to set aside narcissistic ego-fueling things, and choose a life of Christ-centered humility. If we’re being drawn to hype and popularity—it’s human nature, after all—let’s challenge ourselves to walk the other way. You know, do the opposite of everyone else.

We are creating a culture of superﬁcial self-worth, where hype is valued over reality.

CAMERON STRANG is the founder and publisher of RELEVANT. Ironically, you can still connect with him at Twitter.com/CameronStrang and Facebook.com/CameronStrang.

COMMENTS, CONCERNS, SMART REMARKS > Write us at feedback@RELEVANTmagazine.com

LETTERS I loved the Zooey Deschanel feature. She seems so down-toearth. Again, RELEVANT has taken an incredible artist and really honed in on the things that matter! This article makes me respect Zooey even more, not just for her quirky movie characters and timeless music, but for her maturity, sincerity and humility. We need more Zooeys in this world! – SHAE BENITAR / Austin, TX

couple of hours, my copy of RELEVANT looks about twice its size and is totally wavy. Nice new look! Maybe it’s the extra ﬁber this month. —NICHOLE SCHWEPPE / Fenton, MO We would’ve ﬁshed you out, too.

As fans of Douglas Adams, we commend you for cleverly positioning the Zooey Deschanel article on page 42. Even if you weren't aware of your own ingenuity, the answer to the question of life, the universe and everything was easily found in proper connection with Hitchhiker's Trillian. It was nice to see an interview with one of our favorite under-appreciated actresses. —THAD & FELICE SALMON / Lexington, KY We have no idea what you’re talking about. I loved "Abortion Reduction" [July/August 2009]. I’m staunchly pro-life, but reading the article really made me think. One would think the obvious answer to abortion is to make it so women wouldn't want one, but everyone is so focused on the debate, that the one true answer gets lost. —SALINA YARBROUGH / Colorado Springs, CO Ironic that there is very little merit to Jonathan Merritt’s decidedly liberal (and grossly misinformed) invective about abortion reduction. I believe ardently that abortion isn’t something to merely be reduced, but eliminated. Just as slavery was a human travesty, the inherent nature of abortion is the same; otherwise, why in the world are we even trying to reduce it? —RYAN SCOTT BOMBERGER / Atlanta, GA As I was sitting by the pool reading the July/ August issue, the sun moved. I got up to move my lounge chair and left RELEVANT sitting on it. As I carefully repositioned my lounger, in the middle of the move, my beloved RELEVANT slid into the water. I quickly risked my life by ﬁshing it out and right away the front and back cover came off (weird). After it sat in the sun for a

8 / RELEVANT_SEPT/OCT 09

I appreciated Chris Haw’s article “Just A Phone?” [July/August 2009] a lot. The iPhone has become a symbol of my generation’s opulent, entertainment-obsessed, narcissism. —CADE LOVEN / Decorah, Iowa Sorry, what were you saying? We got distracted playing Hold ‘Em on our iPhone. While I agree that Christianity is, or should be, a robust culture that allows radical questioning, I found David Dark’s claim to “agnosticism” contradictory to the claim of being a Christfollower [“Insert Soul Here,” July/August 2009]. An agnostic believes we cannot know for certain whether God and heaven exist. It seems to me that Genesis 1:1 clears that up. I believe things I can’t understand, but I don’t believe things I cannot know. —BRENDA MCELROY / Madera, CA Thank you for publishing "Insert Soul Here" by David Dark. Dark was able to put into words all of the questions and ideas I have pinned in my head over the last few years. Not only does he speak about doubts and questions in a journey for belief, but he also speaks with a tone full of humility. Knowing others have some of the same ideas and opinions I possess comforts me in knowing that I am not alone in this pursuit. — NATHAN BARNETT / Huntsville, AL Thank you for your innovativeness. More speciﬁcally, placing your Contents page at the end of your magazine comes in handy for those of us who have the peculiar habit of reading magazines from back to front. —SARAH MINOR / Albuquerque, NM You wouldn’t believe the things we’ve put throughout the magazine for people with other peculiar habits.

RELETWEETS You can ﬁnd us at twitter.com/RELEVANTmag. (You follow us, we’ll follow you.) Here’s some of what you think of us, in 140 characters or less:

Brilliant column about Christians and iPhones in the new RELEVANT Magazine. God bless @RELEVANTmag —FRJONATHAN

I was disappointed with the article on Zooey Deschanel—not much substance to it. Bad cover article following Kings of Leon. —JESSEMEDINA

@RELEVANTmag is awesome! Just found it yesterday, and read it cover to cover. Even the ads were cool. Love it!!!!! —SYDNEYDAY

The latest issue of RELEVANT (w/ Zooey Deschanel cover) is worth picking-up just for the “Abortion Reduction” article alone. Well written. —BRIANAYERS

Interesting article in the latest @RELEVANTmag edition. Social networking people “are among the loneliest” (high cost of friendship). —MIKE_CAMPBELL

Listening to the @RELEVANTmag podcast... ALWAYS makes me happy.... giddy even... —TRCATINDIG

Catching up on @RELEVANTMag podcast. How else am I suppose to know what’s been going on in the world while I was away? —DLWALTER1

SLICES

a Slices, now with 73% more monsters.

MOVIES: WHERE YOUR CHILDHOOD MEMORIES ARE

12 / RELEVANT_SEPT/OCT 09

> Where

the Wild Things Are is easily one of the most anticipated releases of the fall, despite its somewhat controversial past. Co-written by Dave Eggers (A Heartbreaking Work of Staggering Genius) and directed by Spike Jonze (Being John Malkovich), the film has already stunned audiences with its visual audacity, whimsy and a killer trailer set to an Arcade Fire song. There’s also been some controversy over edits made to an early cut that was said to be too frightening for kids. But Maurice Sendak, the author of the beloved children’s book from which the film is adapted, is excited. “Spike is doing his Where the Wild Things Are,” Sendak said in a recent interview. “He’s turned it into his without giving up mine—embodying mine with Spike Jonze. I’ve never seen a movie that looked or felt like this. He’s a real artist that lets it come through the work. [The film] takes nothing from my book, but enhances and enriches my book.”

MISC.

> NOSTALGIA—IN A THEATER NEAR YOU Where the Wild Things Are isn’t the only highly anticipated remake of beloved children’s classics due out in the near future. Here are a few more that will surely mess with our childhood memories: ALICE IN WONDERLAND Nothing seems to make more sense than Tim Burton bringing his macabre whimsy to the classic kid’s tale of weirdness, Alice in Wonderland. Johnny Depp as the Mad Hatter? Yes, please. Add some crazy visuals, a terrifying Tweedledee and Tweedledum, and a perfectlooking Alice (newcomer Mia Wasikowska), and this movie is already high on the list for 2010.

FANTASTIC MR. FOX Wes Anderson makes really good movies. Roald Dahl wrote really good books. So it’s really good the director picked one of Dahl’s classics to adapt as his first children’s film. Filmed in stop-motion animation, Fox promises to be visually sumptuous with stars behind every voice—including George Clooney, Meryl Streep and Anderson mainstay Bill Murray.

PONYO In the United States, Hayao Miyazaki is woefully underknown. A superstar in Japan famous for his films Princess Mononoke and Spirited Away, Miyazaki is back this fall with his very loosely retold version of The Little Mermaid. If you can’t handle subtitles, you’ll be relieved to know this film is actually dubbed with the voice talents of Tina Fey, Matt Damon and Cate Blanchett.

SHERLOCK HOLMES Robert Downey Jr. takes off his Iron Man costume (briefly) to portray the famous detective. Directed by Guy Ritchie (Lock, Stock, and Two Smoking Barrels), the film also stars Jude Law as Holmes’ trusty sidekick, Watson, and Rachel McAdams as the “only woman to have ever bested Sherlock Holmes,” Irene Adler.

WHO FRAMED ROGER RABBIT? Put this one in the hoped-for rumor category. Robert Zemeckis recently told MTV he’s been thinking about remaking Roger Rabbit with a whole new plot idea. What does that mean? Who knows, but if it even comes close to the original in its marriage of zany cartoon imagery with film noire satire, it’ll be an easy sell.

> A 79-year-old inventor has come up with a passwordprotected device to limit kids’ video game playing time. The timer will shut off power to the console after a set time of game play. Of course, the kids could just unplug the console from the timer and plug it into the wall. Nah, they’d never think of that ... > A new study has shown that low-fat chocolate milk is just as good as sports drinks for helping athletes recover from exercise. It’s probably not as good for quenching thirst during sports. In that case, it’s a great vomit-inducer ...

BE CAREFUL HANDLING THE TRUTH. THE PLATE IS HOT.

Do That One Moore Time Saying a Michael Moore film will draw controversy is like saying pizza-flavored Combos are delicious. It’s obvious. About his new film, though, even Moore’s apologists are saying he’s jumped the shark. In the film, he decides to take on the global financial crisis. Moore blames the wealthy, saying: “At some point [they] decided they didn’t have enough wealth. So they systematically set about to fleece the American people.” Detractors are saying this seems like an over-simplification of a complex issue. Moore will pull an audience, but has he gone from a filmmaker who raises important questions—even among those who disagree with him—to a bullying demagogue?

Get Off Sony’s Lawn The venerable Sony Walkman, the once-ubiquitous tape player credited with starting a revolution of portable music, turned 30 this year. In celebration of the Walkman, the BBC asked a 13-year-old to swap his iPod for the classic Sony for one week. The kid’s reaction? It took him three days to ﬁgure out there was another side to the tape. Darn kids with their MP3s and their torn jeans and their Fall Out Boy!

RELEVANTMAGAZINE.COM / 13

SLICES

f You think that ceramic statue of Jesus being tackled by a kid is bad? Have you seen the baseball one?

MISC.

ANALOG TV. VINTAGE.

HALLOWEEN COSTUME IDEAS ON THE CHEAP Halloween is fast approaching, and it’s the one time of the year you can dress as a ﬁctional character without bringing upon you the scorn and derision of everyone you know. Odds are there are some costume parties in your future. So, here are some ideas for costumes high on creativity and low on cost. Go as an Adam Sandler Character Adam Sandler was a wellspring of zero-effort costume ideas during his tenure on SNL. Who can forget Crazy Pickle Chin or Crazy Sneaker Hand? It’s a retro cultural reference, costs nothing and you can spend the night saying things like: “I got a sneaker for a hand! If that doesn’t warrant candy, I don’t know what does!”

> After immersing himself in his role for Public Enemies, Christian Bale frightened his young daughter by speaking in a Southern accent 24 hours a day. You think she’s frightened now? Wait until she walks through his shot ... > A group of Orthodox Jews has launched Koogle, a new kosher search engine. The search engine will filter out items that ultraOrthodox observants aren’t allowed to have in their homes. Also, it won’t work on the Sabbath. As we know, you don’t search the Internet, and you certainly don’t roll on shomer shabbas! ... > Shia LeBeouf has confirmed that Steven Spielberg and George Lucas are gearing up for an Indiana Jones 5. It will be tentatively titled, Indiana Jones and the Denny’s Early Bird Special ...

It’s Good to Have Goals A new website, beforeidieiwantto.org, asks people from around the U.S. and India what they most want to achieve before they die. In the tradition of slice-of-life sites like PostSecret, respondents send in Polaroids of themselves with their ambition written at the bottom. They range from achievable goals (“Before I die I want to go to Australia”) to idealism (“Before I die I want to see peace in our time”) to the ridiculous (“Before I die I want to eat a tarantula”). It got us thinking about our life goals. Before we die, we want to start a viral website that asks people an open-ended question and presents their answers in an artsy format.

Pick Something Topical Walk around stretching a spring and claim to be the tension between North Korea and the international community. Carry a bucket and tell people you’re the government bailout. Adorn a white T-shirt with a pithy, 140-character sentence and say you’re Twitter. The possibilities are endless, and—in the right setting—it just might get you beaten up for being a dork.

Boxes are a Treasure Trove Cut head and arm holes in a box, plaster the front with a print-out of static and, bang, you’re analog television. A multicolored pattern of squares and you become a Rubik’s Cube. Or, you can just be a box. There’s no shame in that.

Make Use of Garbage Tape refuse to a sweater and you can be just about anything. A gutter, a landﬁll, the ﬂoor of a movie theater. Just be prepared for people to avoid you due to the smell.

14 / RELEVANT_

ISN’T THAT CALLED PRAYER? A new study shows Jesus is the person Britons would most like to communicate with from beyond the grave. Jesus was followed in the survey by Princess Di and William Shakespeare. A spokesman for the study said, “These results show that Jesus Christ will always be the British public’s ‘Superstar.’” OBAMA NAME-DROPS JESUS Pundits have pointed out that President Obama invokes Jesus during his speeches even more than

former President George W. Bush. However, Obama’s speeches also mention people of other faiths as well as atheists. UCLA COMMENCES WITH FREE SPEECH UCLA decided that a graduate could speciﬁcally thank Jesus Christ during her commencement speech. After controversy surrounded the university’s original decision to censor the speech, they allowed graduate Christina Popa to include the phrase “Lord and Savior Jesus Christ.”

IMAGINE THE IMPACT WHEN CHURCH AND FAMILY COLLIDE

Two combined influences can make a greater impact than just two influences. Start making radical changes in your church and join author Reggie Joiner on a powerful journey to rethink the way we do ministry for children and youth.

THINK ORANGE.

“If churches and families practiced the ideas in this book,

our entire culture could be regenerated.” Donald Miller author of Blue Like Jazz

ar you

Coming to a city ne

ur 2009 Orange Tora ngetour.org For details www.o

Minneapolis, MN San Francisco, CA Los Angeles, CA Phoenix, AZ Albuquerque, NM Grand Rapids, MI Buffalo, NY Toronto, ON, Canada Nashville, TN Cincinnati, OH Denver, CO Atlanta, GA Dallas, TX Orlando, FL

Sept 11 Sept 18 Sept 24 Sept 28 Oct 2 Oct 15 Oct 20 Oct 21 Oct 27 Oct 29 Nov 5 Nov 19 TBD TBD

Available online at DavidCCook.com or at your local Christian bookstore.

SLICES MISC.

> Hammer, The Cable Guy, a dated picture of Matt Damon— c’mon, how can you say RELEVANT isn’t fresh!

PUT ON A BATHING SUIT ‘CAUSE YOU’LL BE CHANNEL SURFING IN NO TIME!

>A 15-year-old Iowa girl has won the record of the nation’s fastest texter. She simultaneously won the record for the nation’s worst spelling, grammar and punctuation ... >A new website has partnered with Martin Scorsese to put classic art house cinema online for free. Sadly, most Americans will still choose to rent Paul Blart: Mall Cop ...

>It looks like His Royal Badness, Prince, needs a double hip replacement. However, due to his beliefs as a Jehovah’s Witness, he’s ery. refusing the surgery. It just shows that es sultry dance moves like Prince’s catch up t, to you. Watch out, Justin Timberlake ...

> Analog television has gone the way of Betamax players, but the new digital TV may be hot on its heels, according to CNN.com. The site recently ran a piece about the impact of sites like Hulu, Veoh and Joost on regular television. With times being tough ﬁnancially, people start tightening their budgets—and cable is ending up as one of the ﬁrst luxuries on the chopping block. Online video consumption is way up, with Internet users in the U.S. watching a record 14.3 billion videos in December of last year. It was a 13 percent increase on the month before, and the trend is only increasing. A recent poll showed that 20 percent of

television viewers did at least some of their viewing online. Moreover, with webto-television services like Netﬂix’s Roku and AppleTV, viewers can watch shows on demand and on a large screen. Don’t expect traditional television to die off soon, though. Web-based TV is still not widely available to those without some level of tech savvy, and most consumers still want a traditional television experience rather than watching their favorite shows on an 11-inch screen. However, many tech consultants believe that within the next six to 10 years, online television viewing will begin to wage serious war on the good old idiot box.

We Got to Pay Just to Make It Today MC Hammer is back in a big way. OK, maybe it’s not a big way. It’s reality television, which tends to be the last ﬂeeting grasp people make at fame. Still, the rapper who stormed the music industry in the late ‘80s and early ‘90s ended up having to ﬁle for bankruptcy in 1993 after burning through $33 million, and his show, Hammertime, aired this summer documenting his adjustment to a thoroughly middle-class lifestyle. It brought to mind some other notable music bankruptcies:

Willie Nelson

TLC

Meat Loaf

> Willie Nelson made a long and glorious career out of not paying his taxes. The country music legend finally got caught by the IRS in 1990, to the tune of $16.7 million in back taxes. Somehow, he managed to dig himself out and get back on the right track.

> The victims of a bad record deal and a lawsuit against member Lisa “Left Eye” Lopes for arson, TLC ended up $3.5 million in debt. Before the band could release their fourth album to pull themselves out of the financial mire, Lopes was killed in a car crash.

> Despite a hit record (Bat out of Hell), Meat Loaf was forced to declare bankruptcy in 1981 after ﬁnding out his managers were stealing from him. His “comeback” album in 1986 was a failure—driving him to a second bankruptcy.

Matt Damon is best known for his Bourne ﬁlms and screenwriting Oscar for Good Will Hunting. But he is increasingly known for his humanitarian work—including Water.org, a charity he started with Gary White. Water.org works with local partners to bring clean water to areas that need it, with a goal of delivering long-term solutions. Damon recently posted a video at ONE.org to thank those who signed a petition for Congress to pass the Save Water for the World Act. “I’m talking to you from a [slum] in Hyderabad, India. It’s a big celebration today because a bunch of people here in this slum just got safe clean water piped to their house for the ﬁrst time today. If you could just see the effect that this has and the lives that will change and be affected in such a positive way. Take the moment and pass the message on to your friends.” “I wanted to say thank you if you signed the petition for the Save Water for the World Act at ONE.org. We [have] over 100,000 [signatures], and we’d love to get to 150,000. Please encourage your friends to sign.” “This bill, if passed and funded, will reach 100,000,000 people by 2015. That’s just a staggering number of lives that can be changed in a wonderful way.” Source: www.ONE.org

16 / RELEVANT_SEPT/OCT 09

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SLICES

mPlease don’t write us about omitting Austin City Limits, which is taking bold steps to go green this year. ACL is on our Flavor of the Bi-Month list, and we couldn’t give too much love.

MISC. THIS ONE’S FOR YOU, MAMA EARTH!

concerts with a conscience BUMBERSHOOT This Seattle festival is committed to changing the community. In addition to giving away tickets to nonprofit organizations, Bumbershoot offers concertgoers the chance to send underprivileged kids to the fest for $15.

>Job-seekers are getting creative in trying to catch the attention of employers. Some people seeking employment are washing cars in the company parking lot, handing out personalized coffee cups and staging a sit-in in the company lobby. It’s a fine line between creativity and stalking ... >According to the chairman of the IAC, which operates more than 30 Internet sites with a revenue of $1.5 billion, the Internet will become a paid system within the next five years. This means within the next five years and one day, someone will figure out how to hijack it for free ...

SUMMER FLING WITH A PURPOSE Most 14-year-olds spend their summer sleeping in and desperately trying to forget they have years of soul-crushing education ahead of them. For Florida teenager David Ashby, however, this summer was spent on something with a higher purpose. The Orlando high school student walked from his home to Washington, D.C., to raise awareness about homeless children. Sleeping on the street and eating only what he could ﬁnd, Ashby set out to draw attention to the 1.4 million homeless children in the United States. The walk was a total of 1,100 miles, and Ashby chronicled the experience on his blog at www.helpingstepbystep.com. To think, when we were his age our greatest concern was whether mowing the lawn for Dad would cut into our necessary eight hours of daily pool time.

BONAROO This Tennessee music festival may be the heaviest hitter when it comes to community involvement, having pumped $3 million into health and social services, youth centers and nonprofits like Doctors Without Borders.

OXJAM Oxjam is a unique experiment. The month-long impromptu festival allows artists to sign on and hold their own gigs to benefit Oxfam. Local artists in different areas set up shows and raise money to end poverty and global injustice.

CHARITY PARTNERS This isn’t a festival per se. Rather, it’s a project to scalp tickets for charity. Artists like James Taylor and The Rolling Stones partner with the organization to sell tickets above their face value. The profits then support charities.

FARM AID Farm Aid has been helping family farms since 1985, holding a fundraising concert every year with artists like Willie Nelson, Bob Dylan and Wilco. Money is raised to help local and organic food and to fight the spread of factory farms.

18 / RELEVANT_SEPT/OCT 09

THANK YOU FOR STEALING Fleet Foxes had perhaps the most critically acclaimed debut album in recent memory. Pitchfork practically hailed them as the second coming of music. The band’s frontman, Robin Pecknold, credits their success to illegal downloading. Indeed, Fleet Foxes were already a buzz band before their ﬁrst release as a result of their tracks making the rounds on peer-to-peer sites. But he says it’s not only people downloading their

stuff that’s made them a success— it’s his own history of stealing music. “It’s how I was exposed to almost all of the music that I love ... that’s the easiest way to ﬁnd really obscure stuff,” he said in a BBC interview. He also doesn’t care if people steal his music. “I’ve downloaded hundreds and hundreds of records—why would I care if somebody downloads ours?” he said. Thanks, Robin! We’ll get right on that.

SLICES

mDid you know RELEVANT Twitters? You can ﬁnd our behind-the-scenes updates, twitpics, news and general randomness at twitter.com/RELEVANTmag.

MISC.

WHERE THE WILD THINGS ARE 69.2% COMMUNITY (JOEL MCHALE’S NEW SHOW) 17% THE APPLE TABLET COMPUTER 16% JAY-Z’S THE BLUEPRINT 3 3.2% DAN BROWN’S NEW NOVEL, THE LOST SYMBOL 1.9% JOIN IN ON THE FUN! GO TO RELEVANTMAGAZINE.COM AND VOTE IN OUR WEEKLY POLLS

20 / RELEVANT_SEPT/OCT 09

SEPTEMBER 7

SEPTEMBER & OCTOBER

LABOR DAY

SAN FRANCISCO FRINGE FESTIVAL

> Live theater doesn’t get the attention it should, and the San Francisco Fringe Festival casts a spotlight (pun intended) on some avant-garde, edgy and independent productions. Featuring theater troupes from around the globe, it’s a refreshing dose of culture. But be warned: it can also get pretty raw.

TORONTO INTERNATIONAL FILM FESTIVAL

> Founded in 1976, this ﬁlm festival has been called second only to Cannes in its star power. More than any other festival, this one starts the Oscar buzz. Academy Award winners like Ray and Slumdog Millionaire have premiered at the Toronto International Film Festival in the past, so it’s a great place to catch ﬁlms that will be collecting statues next year.

AUSTIN CITY LIMITS

> It’s one of the greatest music festivals out there. Headliners like Andrew Bird and Kings of Leon are backed up by indie darlings like The Decemberists and Bon Iver.

CATALYST ATLANTA

> The Catalyst Conference this year features thought leaders like Rob Bell and Malcolm Gladwell, along with mainstays Andy Stanley and Chuck Swindoll. It’s a mix of church leaders, social justice entrepreneurs and cutting-edge thinkers.

OCTOBER 2-4

WHAT RELEASE ARE YOU MOST ANTICIPATING THIS FALL?

>Universal Pictures, who has already made the puzzling (no pun intended) decision to adapt board games such as Monopoly, Candy Land and Battleship into films, is now taking on Where’s Waldo? We imagine the entire film being a large crowd shot with absolutely no dialogue. When you find him, you can leave ...

ATTENTION TO IN

> What we all need after the cruel, cruel summer is a bit more time off. Labor Day falls on the ﬁrst Monday in September, and provides us with the much-needed opportunity to eat hot dogs until we feel sick, then fall asleep in a deck chair. If you’re up for something more lively, you could always check out Washington D.C.’s Blues Festival on Sept. 5.

SEPTEMBER 10-19

California playwright Jeremy Gable unfolded a 60-day play entirely composed of Twitter updates. All the action and dialogue took place in the form of 140-character updates. 140: A Twitter Performance essentially chronicles a Twitter feed between teenage friends and a single mother in a small Idaho town. Somehow, in 140 characters it manages to capture small town malaise, the pains of adolescence and the fear of aging. This is just one example, of course, in a long line of people ﬁnding creative uses for Twitter. If, as Shakespeare said, brevity is the soul of wit, Twitter is hilarious.

FIVE THINGS TO PAY

SEPTEMBER 9-20

A Tweetcar Named Desire

>Russian police trying to combat speeding have dressed cardboard cutouts of Brad Pitt as a trafﬁc cop and placed them at dangerous intersections. Speeding has been curbed, but there’s been a sharp spike in people crashing their cars while pointing and yelling, “It’s Brad Pitt!” ...

FLAVOR OF THE BI-MONTH

OCTOBER 7-9

>A man in Taiwan has been sentenced to ﬁve months in jail for tearing the toupee off a Taiwanese legislator. The judge said the man deprived the MP of his freedom to look good. Jail time seems a bit harsh. We think the judge wigged out on this one ...

PULSE

WORLDVIEW

Finding God in Boystown > ANDREW MARIN

od doesn’t only work when I know what the outcome is going to be. As a straight, conservative, evangelical, 28-year-old male incarnationally living within the broader gay, lesbian, bisexual and transgender (GLBT) community in Chicago, I’ve had to remind myself of this numerous times. It seems simple enough. Yet, intellectualizing faith and living it out are two completely different things. The difficult part for the body of Christ is that “not knowing the outcome” is an acceptable means to building bridges with every other population except the GLBT community. With them, we need to definitively know the end of the journey before we even begin because it’s just too political. It’s just too agenda-driven. It’s just too foreign of a “lifestyle” to live out one of the cores of our belief system. Or is it? I was raised in a Christian home in a conservative suburb of Chicago and grew up in a large evangelical church. I wanted absolutely nothing to do with the GLBT community. Looking back, I don’t remember hearing anything explicitly defaming them—from either my church or my parents. Homosexuality grossed me out and I wasn’t about to have an in-depth conversation with my pastor or my parents about the subject. I just knew my beliefs were right because I saw gay people on TV and saw strange pictures of cross-dressers in magazines. For the first 19 years of my life, I was the biggest Bible-banging, homophobic person I knew. I constantly used derogatory language about gay people without ever thinking twice about what I believed or said. I didn’t care about the gay community, nor did I ever want to care about them. That is, until the summer after my freshman year when everything changed. During the course of three consecutive months, my three best friends all came out to me. Yes, you read that right. Three best friends. With each of their admissions, I forcefully removed myself from their lives as they told me their truths for the first time. I didn’t know what to say. I didn’t know how to react. So I ran. Life was much cleaner and more comfortable living in the structure of the old hierarchy. But what I didn’t realize in my crippling fear was that there are very few times in life when truly sacred moments are shared between people. “I’m gay” or “I have cancer” or “We lost the baby” or “I’m getting married”—all brief moments when a person chooses to speak their life-changing revelation out loud. Participating in such a moment is an eternal bond regardless of what happens from that moment forward. If we desecrate that trust and violate that moment by turning the focus onto ourselves, we have lost much of what our faith allows us to be.

22 / RELEVANT_SEPT/OCT 09

I lost what my faith allowed me to be—and I didn’t care. I blindly kept praying, “Lord, why me?” I read books, I searched Scripture and I talked to whoever would listen to my horrible story searching for the answer. I would like to say each book, Scripture or person I talked to pointed me back to love. But in each situation my filter just pointed me back to being justified in my own woes. After a few months of not finding my answer, I heard in my spirit: “Instead of asking ‘why me,’ you should ask yourself what it must have been like for them to grow up with a Bible-banging homophobe as their best friend.” Ouch. That single moment encompassed more spiritual conviction than I had felt my entire life. For the first time, I knew what I needed to do—go back, apologize, and learn how to live and love. This was my chance for a countercultural love. It was tangible, and consisted of a radical love in which I was absolved from my own selfinflicted oppression by the cultural burdens I had placed upon my perceptions of what I thought was a good (i.e. “safe”) Christian life. I realized I could hold on to my theological beliefs and yet be the person of faith who I so boldly claimed myself to be. There’s a time and a place for ethereal knowledge, and that time and place had passed me long ago. Now was the time to act, live and love. The only way I knew how was to just go—to get involved somehow, someway. So I immersed myself in Chicago’s large GLBT community in a neighborhood called Boystown. Nine years later, my wife and I are still in Boystown, and still learning how to love in the uncomfortable gray areas encompassing faith, sexuality and culture. People often ask me what is the one piece of advice I have for starting a bridge-building path with the GLBT community. It’s to become the most unique icebreaker by doing nothing other than going somewhere you don’t belong. Stick out like a sore thumb and humbly walk in the knowledge that God doesn’t only work when we know what the outcome is going to be. And then watch the Lord move in ways humanity thinks impossible.

During the course of three months, my three best friends all came out to me.

ANDREW MARIN is the author of Love Is an Orientation (InterVarsity Press). He and his wife live in Boystown, a predominantly GLBT neighborhood in Chicago. Find out more at www.themarinfoundation.org and love-is-an-orientation.blogspot.com.

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DEEPER WALK

Highway to Heaven > JASON BOYETT

y kids have reached an age I remember well—Ellie is 9 and Owen is 6. They’ve experienced enough church that they’ve started asking hard questions. The latest ones are about heaven. They first started asking them a few years ago when their Mamaw died. The questions intensified after the deaths of Ellie’s two fish, Henry and Blue Steve. That’s when I realized Christianity has a heaven problem. In theory, answering their questions shouldn’t have been that hard for me. Having just finished a book called Pocket Guide to the Afterlife, I fancy myself better versed on heaven than the average dad. But there’s nothing like a child’s inquisition to crank down my self-regard a notch or two. Ellie: Are my fish in heaven with Mamaw? Can Mamaw see us now? Me: Um, Mamaw is in heaven. But the Bible doesn’t say much about pet fish. I don’t know if Mamaw can see us now. Some people hope so, but that’s pretty much a mystery. What do you think? Ellie: (Ignoring my counter question.) What do people do in heaven? Another mystery. I freeze. The biblical answers come to mind immediately. There are those weird “living creatures” in Revelation, covered with eyes and endlessly reciting, “Holy, holy, holy is the Lord God Almighty.” And I think of the great multitude in Revelation 7, wearing white robes and waving palm branches. They’re shouting, “Salvation belongs to our God.” Evocative images. Worshipful language. Only I doubt these scenarios would excite my children much as answers to their heaven questions. Well, kids, heaven seems like an eternity chanting Chris Tomlin lyrics and waving palm branches around. The folk beliefs of Christian culture don’t help either. This is where heaven gets littered with harps, rainbows and chubby angel babies. I want my kids to long for heaven, though, so I find myself wishing the Bible would borrow from other religions when it comes to the afterlife. It would be a whole lot easier to excite my kids with details from more vivid religious traditions. In Jannah, the Islamic post-death paradise, the Koran indicates that everyone will be 33 years old, dress in fine clothes and dwell in swanky palaces. The righteous residents of Jannah enjoy banquets filled with fruits, honey and non-intoxicating wine. Then there’s Valhalla, where fallen Norse warriors go when they die. These warriors spend their eternal days in violent combat with each other—painless, wound-free combat, mind you— and their nights getting drunk on mead served by gorgeous Valkyries. Other world religions have equally fascinating heaven-like realms. Aaru, the Field of Reeds in Egyptian mythology, was a fertile fishing and hunting ground with fields to till and crops to tend. In Swarga, a Hindu paradise, your soul hangs out between reincarnations in a blissful garden where you

24 / RELEVANT_SEPT/OCT 09

watch dance routines by celestial nymphs. Even the Mormons have their Celestial Kingdom, the upper level of which allows you to become a god-like being with your own planet to manage. Maybe I’m just a male intrigued by visions of prancing nymphs or planetary administration, but these traditions captivate me. These are active realms of paradise where people do stuff. Cool stuff, spelled out in detail. The biblical detail on heaven contains mostly environmental description: streets of gold, gates of pearl and walls glittering with precious stones. We also get some geography, as successive chapters in Hebrews indicate that heaven is either a mountain, a country or a city. Revelation tells us what will be missing from heaven (death, mourning, pain) and what will be new (really bright lighting, courtesy of the Lamb). Other descriptions are nebulous and churchy, using words like “glory” and “righteousness” and “joyful assembly.” But when it comes to our celestial activities, the Bible is largely silent. Our only hints are strange scenes of robed, crown-wearing saints in an eternal, repetitive worship service. If our family’s churchgoing experience is any indicator, this is probably the last thing kids are interested in. I’m a grown-up, and it doesn’t do much for me, either. To be honest, the sappy heaven of Christian culture inspires me less than it should. Part of this is because I’m a doubter and a cynic. But there’s another culprit, too: inaccuracy. Our traditional ideas about heaven are not nearly as biblical as we think they are. The heaven many Christians long for— the ultimate destination in which we ﬁnd ourselves “home,” disembodied yet somehow dancing at the feet of Jesus—is “a truncated and distorted version of the great biblical hope,” as N.T. Wright describes it in his excellent book Surprised by Hope: Rethinking Heaven, the Resurrection, and the Mission of the Church. Wright reinterprets the Bible’s focus on heaven as having far more to do with God renewing this world, via resurrection, than His beaming us up to a shiny, bejeweled home in the clouds after we die. I hope Wright is right. Because frankly, the days of Viking warfare and nights of mead-drinking sound way more desirable than the endless singing. Meanwhile, I still don’t know what to tell my kids.

Our traditional ideas about heaven are not nearly as biblical as we think they are.

JASON BOYETT is the author of the newly released books Pocket Guide to the Afterlife, Pocket Guide to Sainthood and Pocket Guide to the Bible (Jossey-Bass). He blogs about faith and culture at JasonBoyett.com.

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SPOTLIGHT

HOLISTIC RELIEF ASHLEY EMERT

B ONE PERSON’S VISION combined with the power of Jesus’ words can inspire a big change—which is how Life in Abundance International came to be. The organization was founded in 1993 by Dr. Florence Muindi, a Kenyan medical doctor who felt a call from God to serve Africa’s poor in a new way. Sixteen years later, her vision has taken shape in the mobilization, training and empowering of local churches to implement holistic ministries that focus on the poor and vulnerable. LIA considers the ministries holistic because they address every part of people’s well-being: physical, mental, social, economic and spiritual. “Through training and equipping, we empower partner churches to carry out sustainable community initiatives that will continue long after LIA has moved on,” says Justin Narducci, the director of Life in Abundance. LIA has ongoing work in seven countries in Northeast Africa, and 75 communities have been trained and empowered for holistic ministry. There are many factors affecting the war-torn region, and LIA has ﬁve focus areas: orphans and street children (community-based solutions); HIV/AIDS (awareness, support groups); economic empowerment (micro-enterprise, skills training, co-ops); primary health care (training in preventative medicine, public health); and community development (water and sanitation facilities, early childhood education). One of the programs LIA is dedicated to is disaster relief—including helping those who are displaced in Sudan and Somalia. They also offered reconciliation training and food relief after the Kenya election violence at the end of 2007. LIA also works extensively with street children who are abandoned due to poverty or as a result of war. Abebech, a woman in Ethiopia, had given two of her daughters over to orphanages and her son was living on the streets because she was not able to care for him. LIA began helping her son through its street children program. Once the LIA staff learned of Abebech’s situation, they offered her food and medical support along with her son. The health trainers noticed that Abebech was getting sick frequently. Upon being tested, Abebech was conﬁrmed HIV positive, and LIA began helping her through its AIDS support program. Abebech has a talent for embroidery, and LIA offered her a small micro-loan and training to start her own business. Now, her dressmaking business is successful, she’s on anti-retroviral medication—and she’s given her life to Christ. “I am thankful for a new life and a way to support my family with my business,” Abebech says. “I feel pride in what I am able to do and for who I am. I am also now a follower of Jesus—and that is my biggest praise.” A

GO DEEPER LIFE IN ABUNDANCE

URBAN AND RURAL HOPE

LIFE IN ABUNDANCE BLOG

www.liaint.org

http://urbanandruralhope.org

http://blog.liaint.org

> Visit the organization’s website to find out how you can help. Their programs include Boxes for Change and Call Out for Hope (spare change and old cell phone collecting programs, respectively). You can also host an AIDS awareness movie night—for $25, LIA supplies the movie, tools to advertise and Q&A discussion topics.

> Urban and Rural Hope is a book full of pictures that show the faces of those affected by AIDS, famine and disease—but it also shows there’s still hope. A portion of the proceeds from purchases of the book go toward Life in Abundance.

> Keep up with news about the organization posted by LIA workers themselves. Contributors to the blog include Muindi, Narducci and two members of LIA’s international staff. In addition to posting updates and photos of current projects, they also include news and commentary on global efforts for AIDS awareness.

26 / RELEVANT_SEPT/OCT 09

Some call inner-city L.A. hopeless. Kevin Young calls it home. KEVIN YOUNG, M.DIV. ’07

00:30

03:21

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00:25

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With a Master of Divinity degree from Azusa Pacific University, Kevin now ministers on the same streets he once sought to escape. To learn more about Kevin’s story and explore Azusa Pacific’s graduate theology programs:

CLICK

www.apu.edu/explore/theology

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FRONTLINER

LORI

SCHIERER MARINE REACH

THE MORNING RAYS STRETCH OVER THE COOLNESS of the beach as two small ﬁshing boats pull up to shore. Tumbling onto the sand are doctors, nurses and volunteers who arrived the evening before with the medical ship anchored just off the reef. Lori Schierer gives hugs while the Fijian children scamper excitedly around their visitors. Barefoot parents in sarongs and hand-me-down T-shirts wave hello, standing outside their shanty huts. Schierer is part of a missionary team from Marine Reach that sails to remote islands offering medical assistance and messages of hope. Schierer, a 25-year-old Canadian-born missionary, has led nearly seven years of service with Marine Reach—an arm of Youth With a Mission that uses medical ships to facilitate practical care to isolated islanders in the Paciﬁc. She currently lives aboard one of the ships, based out of New Zealand, with her new husband, the ship’s captain. They are living out a novel and extraordinary marriage as they carry the Marine Reach message of “our hands, God’s heart.” They frequently embark on these outreaches along with the ship’s crew, and volunteers such as dentists, ophthalmologists, optometrists, nurses, pastors and missions teams. Schierer has had her hands in everything, from leading youth teams and working as the ship’s purser, to assisting in the clinics and managing cooking for the entire group of crew and volunteers. While contributing to the operations of the medical ministry,

28 / RELEVANT_SEPT/OCT 09

she’s watched God’s love touch thousands of lives. “I have a great fear of failure, of not being successful at my ministry, at what I do,” she says. “But if all I have to do is concentrate on being faithful to what God asks me to do, it takes the pressure off to succeed. It gives me a different focus. And if I concentrate on being faithful, then I think success will follow.” Over her years on the islands, Schierer’s contact with the villagers has given her a taste of a simpler life: hand-washed clothing, fruit falling from trees, large communal meals, an open-air school, a slow-paced day spent with neighbors. “I marvel at the diversity and beauty found in different cultures and people groups,” she says. “It’s taught me ﬂexibility, and that sometimes relationship is more important than getting the job done.” Sharing an unconventional home with many others creates some frustrating moments, but in these sacriﬁces Schierer has learned to make the most of opportunities. Every time the ship drops anchor in these translucent “backyards,” exciting interactions await. As boats ferry locals from the shore to the boat for eye surgeries, Schierer says, “it’s taught me about loving people and making the most of every opportunity God puts in front of me to affect someone’s life. And not just waiting for the opportunities to walk up to me, but to also go out and look for them.” To learn more, visit MarineReach.com or YWAM.org.

THE DROP

To hear more emerging artists, check out The Drop at RELEVANTmagazine.com

Z A

Website:

www.zeeavi.com

MySpace:

myspace.com/zeeavi

For Fans of:

She & Him, Jolie Holland, Regina Spektor

30 / RELEVANT_SEPT/OCT 09

E V

E I

THOSE LISTENING TO ZEE AVI’S stripped-down, soft vocals may feel like it’s necessary to whisper a password through a speakeasy door before being allowed to enjoy her music. The Malaysian singer-songwriter draws inspiration for her 1930s sound from modern artists such as Daniel Johnston and Cat Power, as well as classic jazz singers Ella Fitzgerald and Billie Holiday. “They project the words into the styles they sing in, into the scales and the melodies,” says Avi, whose full name is Izyan Alirahman. While her songs sound like they’re from an earlier era, her discovery was purely 21st century. She got her musical start by posting videos of herself singing original songs on YouTube a few years ago. After getting thousands of hits, Patrick Keeler, The Raconteurs’ drummer, saw a video of her singing “No Christmas for Me” and sent it to Ian Montone, the founder of Monotone Records (Monotone Inc. manages Vampire Weekend, the Shins and Cold War Kids). The song was then included on a Christmas charity album, This Warm December, last year, and now her debut album is the first joint release from Monotone and Jack Johnson’s Brushfire Records. Avi’s soothing vocals and guitar strums may lull listeners, but her lyrics are more about the reality of relationships—including a boyfriend’s drug use and a cheating spouse. “I use modern issues with my own take of the issues and the words we use today with a vintage sound,” she says. “I like taking things back to the root. We’re lucky to have [Led Zeppelin and Bob Dylan] as our influences—who were their influences? That inspires me to bring music back to the root.” —ASHLEY EMERT

THE DROP

Website:

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MySpace:

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For Fans of:

Mos Def, Talib Kweli, Common

32 / RELEVANT_SEPT/OCT 09

AFTER 10 YEARS, A FEW DEMO EPs and being one of the first artists featured on iTunes’ “Indie Spotlight” page, Brooklyn, N.Y., native Niamaj hits the hip-hop scene with his full-length debut, It’s About Time. “The original concept for It’s About Time was about me finally finishing my first album, but it has evolved into a mission,” he says. That mission is to bring hip-hop back to its roots. “[Hip-hop] is turning into more of a trend than an art form. Pants are starting to sag lower and drug content is mad thicker; I think it takes the class away from hip-hop. Everyone follows the other and nothing is authentic. Hip-hop isn’t dead, it just took a vacation, and like all vacations, you have to come back sometime. What I bring is inspiration, a higher level of consciousness and relatedness.” It’s About Time was developed after Niamaj spent years on the underground level. His lyrics are littered with cultural reference—everything from Star Wars to Burt Bacharach—all while telling personal stories. “[My songs are] poetic life stories that are told through music,” he says. “Things I see or hear will trigger a thought that I build on and it turns into a verse, then a song. It’s easy to balance out those [pop culture] aspects because I know that different audiences are listening. The goal for me is to cater my music to the people from my parents’ era, all the way to the kids today.” His aptly titled album is, as he says, “just the beginning.” “You don’t have to wait any longer,” he says. “I’m calling out to all genres—rap, R&B, rock, soul, jazz—and whoever will listen to my message.” —CHAD PENDLETON

AT WILL HELP SH SHAA PE THE FUTURE OF THE SPIRIT EMPOWERED RED MOVEMENT AROUND ROUND THE WORLD. W

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THE DROP

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ANTHEM Website:

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MySpace:

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Great Lake Swimmers, Horse Feathers, J. Tillman

34 / RELEVANT_SEPT/OCT 09

WHAT DO A PROFESSIONAL PAINTER, a NASA technician and a baseball scholar have in common? In the low-fi folk band The Low Anthem, it’s a love for multi-instrumentalism, whisper-rock and well-honed chord progressions. The Rhode Island-based band sounds like a Tom Waits incantation, their murmurs and soft guitar strums wafting into sweet harmonies—thanks to Jocie Adams, the former NASA tech—and obscure literary references. The title track is a call for the long-dead Charles Darwin to pay reparations for his “survival of the fittest” theories they believe have led to countless wars. Like Anathallo and Sufjan Stevens, The Low Anthem slows down and pays attention to song structure and orchestration, choosing every note carefully and never showboating. “With folks Twittering, Facebooking, iPoding and MySpacing, everything has become about you, the fan,” Ben Knox Miller, the painter, says. “It’s not surprising that there’s this trend away from the extroversion of rock and roll toward the relative introversion of Bon Iver, Fleet Foxes and Grizzly Bear.” Miller says the band was influenced as much by John Steinbeck as Bob Dylan. Of course, even with their guttural, non-perfunctory folk-rock, there’s still an allure: Miller says the musicians exchanged instruments during their recording sessions and liven up the songs with unusual sounds—such as an antique music box on one song. The band is a little unpredictable. On three songs, they speed things up and add drums and electric guitar. On other songs, Miller—the chief songwriter—adds a spiritual undercurrent. “I am fascinated with the quest for faith, and that hollowness and the hunger that grows from it,” he says. “I am less interested in any faith-practice that seeks to quell doubt or replace hunger with absolutism.”—JOHN BRANDON

THE DROP

BROOKE WAGGONER Website:

www.brookewaggonermusic.com

MySpace:

myspace.com/brookewaggoner

For Fans of:

Rilo Kiley, Rosie Thomas, Brandi Carlile

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HOURS OF PLANNING, stacks of chord charts and pages of pre-written lyrics—this is not how Brooke Waggoner writes music.“I never think to myself, ‘I’m going to write a song today,’” Waggoner says. “For the most part, the songs I want to perform and record are the ones that come out completed in an hour—it’s that magic moment.” With two releases under her belt and an album on the way, Nashville’s Waggoner finds songwriting to be a natural process. Rather than mapping out song structures, she simply sits at her piano and plays whatever comes to mind. “If it gets too thought-out, it loses the point for me,” she says. “I like the idea of every song being its own thing.” Yet she admits lyrics are often difficult to come up with. “I don’t think in words as easily,” she says. “It’s always a challenge to keep the lyrics overt and obvious without making them cheesy—they need to be poetic.” Waggoner aims to spark conversation with her songs’ content, and she views her music as a creative outreach. “I’m big on challenging people and getting their wheels rolling,” she says. “The message is: don’t be a robot, really think things through.” While many musicians rely on other artists for inspiration, Waggoner’s influences are unconventional. “Honest to goodness, I don’t listen to music,” she says. “I pull a lot from my childhood. I grew up listening to Rogers and Hammerstein musicals and a lot of classical music, and that’s a huge influence in a bizarre way.” Waggoner considers her next album, in the works now, as a new beginning. “The process is different,” she says. “It’s less piano and more strings and flutes and oboes, like FernGully.” —CURT DEVINE

BRANDON CHESBRO

A r t i s t r y, P r o f e s s i o n a l i s m , M e a ning , a nd Pr a yer

HOLLYWOOD ABOVE THE LINE

Act One announces two new programs for Screen and Television writers “Every great production starts with the writer. Writers who are interested in the craft of writing should start with Act One!” – Ralph Winter, Executive Producer, Wolverine, X-Men and Fantastic Four.

ACT ONE’S 100+ FACULTY INCLUDE SHERYL J. ANDERSON Writer, Flash Gordon (SyFy); Charmed (WB) DEAN BATALI Writer, That ‘70s Show (Fox); Buffy the Vampire Slayer (WB)

Act One’s 2-Week Intensive Writing Seminar for Screen and Television Developed over ten years of training aspiring writers for mainstream ﬁlm and television, The Writing Seminar is Act One’s ﬂagship program now offered in a two-week residential retreat where students learn from writers and industry professionals, who literally step off studio lots to teach. The Writing Seminar grounds students in the Act One values of artistry, professionalism, meaning and prayer and includes over 100 hours of instruction in both the craft of writing and the spiritual journey of a Christian writer. January 4 – 16, 2010

June 21 – July 3, 2010

Act One’s 14-Month Certificate in Writing for Screen and Television Our new certificate program is designed to provide students with a strong foundation in writing for screen and television, in order to prepare them for Act One’s advanced feature film and television writing programs. Students in the 14-month certificate program will write two full-length scripts under the mentorship of professional writers. January 2010 through March 2011

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For Further Information Visit www.actoneprogram.com or email info@actoneprogram.com

SCOTT DERRICKSON Writer/director, The Exorcism of Emily Rose (2005), Director, The Day the Earth Stood Still (2008) JOCELYN DIAZ VP of Drama Series, HBO; Director of Drama Development, ABC (Lost, Pushing Daisies) MONICA MACER Writer, Lost (ABC); Prison Break (Fox) BILL MARSILII Co-writer, Déjà vu (2006), starring Denzel Washington; writer Captain Nemo (2010) DAVID MCFADZEAN Co-creator, Home Improvement (ABC), with Tim Allen BARBARA NICOLOSI VP of Development, Origin Entertainment; Founder and Board Chair, Act One GRANT NIEPORTE Writer, Seven Pounds (2008), starring Will Smith; and 8 Simple Rules for Dating My Teenage Daughter (ABC) GARY DAVID STRATTON, PhD Executive Director and CEO, Act One

Act One is a community of Hollywood professionals seeking to equip screen and television writers, producers, and entertainment executives in the values of artistry, excellence, meaning and Christian spirituality in order to create mainstream ﬁlm and television that shapes the life of the mind and the habits of the heart toward the good, the beautiful and the true.

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WINE TO

WATER BY SHANNON KOZEE AND ADAM SMITH

When Doc Hendley moved from Boone, N.C., to Darfur to serve as an aid worker, he learned about and experienced unspeakable atrocities, not the least being the desperate need for clean water. Hendley wanted to do something. So, he formed Wine To Water, an organization that doesn’t just provide water to people in developing nations, but gives them the means to solve their own water crisis in a sustainable way. Wine To Water partners with groups across the globe—from Africa to South Asia—on well projects including old well rehabilitation, emergency latrine construction, training and resource centers that build and distribute biosand ﬁlters, entire water system construction and new well drilling. “The idea is that people will forever be able to maintain access to clean water,” Hendley says. A former bartender, Hendley decided to fund his new venture in a unique way. “We consider ourselves a Christian organization because we try to operate in the way that

clean water for people who need it. “Some conservative Christians might be turned off by the whole idea because they think drinking is a bad thing, but I do not agree. There is nothing wrong with food, television or caffeine either, but any of those could be unhealthy if consumed in excess.” To Hendley, using wine to raise money for clean water seemed natural. In fact, Wine To Water is expanding their fundraising from just wine tastings to including their own brands. “My favorite one is actually the label we are working with right now,” Hendley says. “Our first official Wine To Water wine brand should be out by the end of the summer.” Providing water to such a wartorn region is no easy task. There are mortal dangers inherent in getting water to a people group who are the victims of genocide. Hendley has seen these dangers firsthand. “Two of my Sudanese staff members were killed,” he says. “One was shot execution style on his way back from taking the salary I had just paid him to his wife and children. He was killed by the Janjaweed militia group because they knew that he helped to rehabilitate wells in rebel-controlled areas.” Hendley’s passion has also put him in harm’s way. “[The Janjaweed] shot my truck full of bullet holes with their AK-47s. I suppose God was not ready for me to die yet. ... Either that, or they all had terrible aim.” a

“The idea is that people will forever be able to maintain access to clean water.” Jesus would have us operate,” Hendley says. “However, we tend to overturn the traditional paradigms, because our promotional events are wine tastings held in bars.” Wine tastings can raise eyebrows in conservative Christian circles, but Hendley defends his approach. “The ﬁrst miracle Jesus did was turning water into wine at a party when the host needed it,” he says. “We are just putting our own twist on it. We host parties with wine and collect donations that turn into

* Well-Being

b Nearly 1 billion people in the world today have no access to clean water, and millions of women and children spend several hours every day collecting water from distant, often polluted sources. b Water-related illnesses kill more children than HIV/AIDS, malaria and tuberculosis combined. b Every 15 seconds, a child dies from a water-related illness. Involved *ToGet host your own winetasting beneﬁt for Wine To Water, you can ﬁnd event tools (including invitations, brochures and fact sheets) at WineToWater.org. Doc Hendley was recently selected as a CNN Hero. You can vote for him to win the grand prize at CNN.com.

RELEVANTMAGAZINE.COM / 39

40 / RELEVANT_SEPT/OCT 09

FOR THE LOVE 5

love lessons I learned while undercover at the world’s largest evangelical college BY KEVIN ROOSE

During my sophomore year at Brown University, one of the nation’s most secular colleges, I decided to break out of my godless enclave and spend a semester studying undercover at Liberty University, the late Rev. Jerry Falwell’s “Bible Boot Camp” for young evangelicals, in order to learn about my conservative Christian peers ﬁrsthand. (I was—and still am—about as far from a typical Liberty student as possible, having grown up as a secular Quaker in a home with ultraliberal parents who once worked for consumer advocate Ralph Nader.) My semester at Liberty brought me onto the front lines of the American culture wars, taught me an amazing amount about the Bible and evangelical culture, and challenged my assumptions about ultra-conservative Christianity. I lived in a dorm with 60 Jesusfollowers, followed Liberty’s 46-page code of conduct and took courses in Evangelism 101 and young-earth creationist biology. (Sample test question: True or False—Noah’s Ark was big enough to accommodate various kinds of dinosaurs.) But of all the lessons I learned at Liberty, none were more fascinating—or disturbing—than the ones about love. Here are my top ﬁve:

The Roman Road is a terrible pickup line

Perhaps the hardest week of my life was when I decided to accompany a group of Liberty students on a mission trip to Daytona Beach, Fla. The goal of the trip—which was advertised as “battleground evangelism”—was to take

the Gospel to the partying masses, spreading a message of repentance in the sin capital of America—by any means necessary. This was no easy task. Over the course of a week of oneon-one evangelism, we dealt with angry bikers, drunken frat boys and a Girls Gone Wild-style film crew that pulled up next to us while we proselytized at a nightclub. (On the bright side, we got to hand out Gospel tracts after the girls finished lifting their tops for the cameras. Sort of a sin/repentance assembly line.) But without a doubt, the strangest encounter of the Daytona trip came while I was honing my skills on the beach. Midway through my first day as a battleground evangelist, I approached three girls tanning on their towels. They were good-looking girls, maybe a year or two out of college. One was reading a Patricia Cornwell mystery, and the other two were on their stomachs, listening to their iPods. “Hi there,” I said, trying to sound as peppy as possible. The Cornwell reader looked up from her book, eyebrows raised, and one of the iPod girls took out her earbuds. “I was just wondering if I could give you guys a million dollars,” I said. When our group was learning to evangelize, we were given several gimmicky ice-breakers to use when beginning conversations with strangers. This one was a fake “Million Dollar Bill” with a message on the back that began, “The milliondollar question is: Will you go to Heaven?” “Sure,” Cornwell girl said. “I’ll take one.” “But first,” I said, “I have to ask you the million-dollar question.” “Shoot.”

I took a deep breath. “Do you know Jesus Christ as your personal Lord?” The iPod girl’s eyes bulged. “Excuse me?” She poked her friend, who turned over onto her back, took out her earbuds and stared at me. “Um … do you know Jesus … as your Lord?” Cornwell girl said pointedly, “We’re Jewish.” “I’ll take that as a no?” I said. But they didn’t laugh. Not even the faintest trace of a smile. I turned and walked away, mumbling thanks under my breath, and as I went, I heard one girl give her verdict in a loud whisper: “What a creep.”

The physical stuff can wait

Not every experience involving the fairer sex was a disaster, though. In fact, in an attempt to understand the world of Christian dating, I went on several dates with Liberty girls, and found myself impressed with the results every time. It wasn’t easy, dating at a college whose rulebook punishes any romantic contact beyond handholding with four reprimands and a $10 ﬁne (even hugs lasting longer than three seconds are banned). My secular friends from Brown were immensely amused by my quest, and would send me text messages during my dates that said things like, “I hope you get to third base, aka rubbing her shoulder.” But oddly enough, I found Liberty’s strict prohibitions on kissing and canoodling could actually make the dating experience easier. In fact, having pre-ordained physical boundaries took a huge amount of pressure and anxiety out of my dates, and made for

RELEVANTMAGAZINE.COM / 41

MAYBE LOVING YOUR NEIGHBOR MEANS HELPING HIM THROUGH HIS STRUGGLES—EVEN IF THAT MEANS LISTENING TO STORIES ABOUT VOMIT. more meaningful interactions than I’d been accustomed to in secular hookup culture. Liberty’s rules—and the iron-clad commitment most Liberty students make to abstinence before marriage—meant even if I’d been Zac Efron, I wouldn’t have been able to get physical with these girls, so I stopped trying. And when I did, I was amazed at how intimate the conversations turned out to be, and how free I felt to let my guard down and be completely genuine—without acting like an amateur Don Juan or trying out my best wooing strategies. In the words of Joshua Harris, author of the Christian college staple I Kissed Dating Goodbye, my entire motivation in relationships was transformed. (Though, I’ll confess, not entirely transformed—I did end up rubbing a shoulder or two.)

All’s fair in self-love and war

Liberty’s Lynchburg, Va., campus is home to some strange phenomena—Christian hip-hop concerts, the Jerry Falwell Museum and a Facebook group called “I hope the Rapture comes before my student loans are due,” to name a few. But nothing came close to “Every Man’s Battle,” Liberty’s on-campus support group for chronic masturbators. Midway through my semester, I paid a visit to the group’s weekly meeting, both to curb my own struggles with lust and to find out how a bunch of hormone-filled college guys are able to silence their libidos at a school whose girls were once ranked second-hottest in the nation by Playboy. The group consisted of eight guys in a small, fluorescent-lit conference room, and shortly after I walked in, a mustachioed sophomore named Brett was telling the story of his most recent “fall,” the group’s euphemism of choice for succumbing to lust.

42 / RELEVANT_SEPT/OCT 09

“I got sick a week ago,” he said, “and laying in my bed, my thought-life started to go down the drain. On Saturday morning, I was praying, I was reading the Bible, but I knew something was missing. Then Saturday afternoon, I started feeling really, really sick. I ran to the toilet and started puking everywhere. I mean, I didn’t think God was punishing me or anything, but hey, if He has to stick me to the toilet with a stomach virus to get me to think about holy things, so be it.” Everyone at the table cheered Brett on and gave him tips to avoid temptation in the future. (Two good ones: keep your door open when you’re alone in your dorm room, and keep worship music playing on your stereo to remind you of your commitment to God.) And for the rest of the meeting, we continued on like this—telling stories, giving advice, promising to support each other. It was Alcoholics Anonymous without the sobriety chips. On my way out of the meeting, I felt conﬂicting emotions about what I’d just seen. On one hand, I was confused about the very existence of “Every Man’s Battle,” and disappointed that it seemed like Liberty’s strain of Christianity gives issues of personal sexuality much higher spiritual priority than helping the poor or living a life of service. On the other hand, I also felt a new sort of empathy. After all, given that these guys do want to stay pure and refrain from lust, it makes sense they’d seek out support. Maybe, I thought, the members of the group need each other, and maybe loving your neighbor means helping him through his struggles—even if that means listening to stories about vomit.

An unlikely friend One of the most mind-bending moments of my semester came in late April, when I

was given the chance to interview Jerry Falwell for Liberty’s campus newspaper. Before the interview, I decided to ask Dr. Falwell (as Liberty students called him) about the small personal details TIME and Newsweek would never have bothered with—the ones that have nothing to do with abortion, gay marriage or the American culture wars. Instead, I’d ask him questions about his everyday life. What’s his favorite ice cream ﬂavor? What does he do on the weekends? Does he have an iPod? Dr. Falwell and I talked for almost an hour, and I never came to understand or agree with his arch-conservative political and social views. (He was, you’ll remember, the Moral Majority leader who said of the terrorists attacks of Sept. 11, “I really believe that the pagans, and the abortionists, and the feminists, and the gays and the lesbians who are actively trying to make that an alternative lifestyle, the ACLU, People for the American Way—all of them who have tried to secularize America—I point the ﬁnger in their face and say, ‘You helped this happen.’”) But I did learn that far from a onedimensional caricature, Dr. Falwell was a highly complex individual, with a certain folksy humor that charmed friends and enemies alike. We talked about his grandchildren, his thoughts on Liberty’s dating atmosphere and his hopes for that year’s graduating seniors. He even told me stories of his practical jokes, a longstanding hobby that left him with a reputation as a master prankster. When he died two weeks after our interview, the investigators found three boxes of stinkbombs in his desk. Most importantly, my interview that day taught me it’s important to seek out the true nature of even those people with whom we disagree strongly, and avoid resorting to demonized stereotypes in forming our

JEREMIAH GUELZO

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opinions of them. Jerry Falwell’s bonhomie didn’t excuse his most offensive political statements, or make his years of open hostility to America’s gay community any more palatable, but it might have explained his huge following. Everyone has good traits, and love—real, universal love, the kind of love the Bible talks about—means giving our enemies a chance to show us their human sides, even as we oppose their views. (Oh, and for the record, he did not have an iPod.)

The God Divide is overrated

After my semester was over and I reenrolled at Brown, I went back to Liberty to tell my hallmates and friends—none of whom knew about my undercover writing project— who I really was and why I’d come to Liberty. I was nervous to confess my secrets, of course, and I expected to do a lot of apologizing. But one by one, I watched in awe as my Liberty friends forgave me—simply, quickly and unconditionally. They understood why I’d needed to go incognito, and they didn’t seem to hold a grudge. “How could I not forgive you,” one friend said, “when I’ve been forgiven for so much?”

My Liberty friends still want me to become a born-again Christian, of course, and they still pray for me, but they understand I’m piecing my own faith together bit by bit, on my own terms. And after a few months, when their conversion attempts slowed to a trickle, we were left yammering on about our lives, our grades, our career anxieties, our families. Finally, we were friends, with nothing left in the way. Did my semester at Christian college bridge the God Divide? Of course not. But it did help me realize the American culture gap isn’t nearly as big and forbidding as I’d once thought. The experiences I had at Liberty, and the friends I made there, gave me hope that even when they disagree on abortion, gay marriage or any number of other social and theological issues, secular liberals and conservative Christians can ﬁnd common ground—and maybe even get along with each other. All it takes is a little love. s

KEVIN ROOSE is the author of Unlikely Disciple (Grand Central Publishing). He’s a student at Brown University.

The one relationship that often gets forgotten in the craziness of everyday life is the most important one of all—the one you have with God. Alicia Chole guides you through 52 devotions on growing closer to God.

Available Wherever Books are Sold

44 / RELEVANT_SEPT/OCT 09

THE

COMPLICATED MIND BEHIND

WILCO Death. God. Religion. Wilco frontman Jeff Tweedy has something to say on just about everything. BY KEVIN SELDERS

RELEVANTMAGAZINE.COM / 45

STANDOUT SONG ON WILCO’S NEWEST ALBUM, WILCO (THE ALBUM), WAS ORIGINALLY WRITTEN AS A 14-VERSE LETTER FROM A CIVIL WAR SOLDIER PREDICTING THE LIKELY CIRCUMSTANCES OF HIS DEATH TO THE WEALTHY MAN BACK HOME WHO PAID FOR HIM TO FIGHT IN HIS PLACE. It’s a song you wouldn’t ﬁnd on very many albums—a type of song that is both story and morality lesson, beautifully lyrical and frighteningly morbid. It’s an ambitious endeavor, but that’s nothing new for Wilco fans. These are themes they’ve come to expect from the lyrics of the band’s singer and chief songwriter, Jeff Tweedy. “I think there are probably a few obsessions that, as a writer, have gone through almost all the records,” Tweedy says from downtown Chicago—the city he calls home—during a break on the band’s recent tour. “I tend to introspect a lot with identity, relationships and connections—the big picture stuff in a very small picture kind of way. That seems to be what I enjoy. Mortality would be a big picture thing I try to get across and is something I think about. Hopefully, I’ve developed a unique way of addressing it. That’s all you can hope for as a writer.” The song concludes with the soldier foretelling his death yet again—this time in spiritual terms. “And if I die/I’ll die alone like Jesus/On a cross/My faith cannot be tossed/And my life will not be lost/If my love comes across.” “I wasn’t trying to editorialize too much on either side,” Tweedy says of the song’s characters. “I think the rich man is painted as a coward—or more like a person who’s unattached in his life. The soldier, to me, was full of belief and passion and—whether I agree with it or whether I think it’s right or wrong—was fully engaged in his experience on this Earth.” Although Tweedy seems to be delving more and more often into the spiritual side—especially evident in Wilco’s music of late—he stresses it’s always been there to some degree. “I can’t remember a time where [spirituality] wasn’t something I thought about,” he says. “I feel like there’s something of an example of at least me ruminating on that subject on each record.”

Wilco (The Band) Wilco rose a decade-and-a-half ago from the ashes of the alt-country pioneering Uncle Tupelo. Following childhood friend and singer Jay Farrar’s bitter departure from the band, Tweedy retained the rest of the lineup and formed Wilco (short for “will comply” in radio-speak). Bassist John Stirratt is the only member besides Tweedy remaining from that original incarnation. Guitarist Nels Cline, drummer Glenn Kotche and multi-instrumentalists Pat Sansone and Mikael Jorgensen complete the band’s current lineup. With each album, Wilco has reached new levels of success, winning over critics and new fans at every stage. The band’s breakthrough album, 2002’s Yankee Hotel Foxtrot, emerged after being rejected by its former label,

46 / RELEVANT_SEPT/OCT 09

Reprise Records. To date, the album remains the band’s most successful release, selling more than 650,000 copies on the Nonesuch label—a label ironically owned by the same parent company as Reprise, Warner Bros. Records. The band’s follow-up, A Ghost is Born, won two Grammys in 2005, including Best Alternative Music Album. Along with varying levels of success, Tweedy and Co. have seen their share of turmoil, including multiple lineup changes, record label struggles and a bout with chemical dependency and depression. Most recently, in May, their former multi-instrumentalist, Jay Bennett, passed away unexpectedly. Only weeks before, Bennett had filed a lawsuit against Tweedy for breach of contract and sought unpaid royalties. “The news of Jay’s passing was obviously very sad for us and a little bit confusing given the nature of our relationship over the last eight years,” Tweedy says. “A certain amount of ambivalence was built up on top of that with the lawsuit that had just been filed. It was confusing, but I think the base emotion was a sense of loss, to be honest. It was tragic. Sadness is what we’re all feeling.” Wilco (The Album) debuted at No. 4 on the Billboard 200 in July, after selling nearly 99,000 copies—Wilco’s biggest-ever sales week. Praised by critics and fans, many believe the album is the band’s strongest work. “I think we’ve really tried to make records that we felt were the best record ever,” Tweedy says. “We wanted to make records we didn’t feel like we had in our record collections and records we didn’t think we’ve made.” The album’s final track, “Everlasting,” as well as the thoughtful “Solitaire,” point to a recurring theme in Tweedy’s writing—something bigger than self. On the latter, Tweedy sings, “Once I thought without a doubt I had it all figured out/A universe with hands unseen. I was cold as gasoline/It took too long, to see I was wrong/To believe in me only.”

Theologians don’t know nothing … Prior to releasing A Ghost is Born, Tweedy fought a well-documented addiction to painkillers he’d developed while battling migraines most of his life. Tweedy, who suffered from anxiety and panic disorder, entered treatment for chemical dependency and depression at a dual diagnosis center in Chicago. He’s called the experience a “beautiful” one. “It was the first step toward a significant change that needed to happen for me to live a rich life,” he says. “It was beautiful not just for myself, but to be in an environment where you’re watching other people get better.” As Tweedy has worked to overcome his demons, his lyrics seem to have grown more hopeful—including on the new album. “I think it probably comes across as more positive coinciding with my outlook on life, and not being active in my addiction and all the things that contribute to a fuller being,” he says. “I don’t think of all the other records as being overtly negative though.” “What Light” from the band’s last album, Sky Blue Sky, challenges those who are feeling down to look at what’s already good inside themselves. Spiritually, “One True Vine,” a B-side from the same project, appears to reflect how Christ described Himself in John 15. “I love the image as a writer of one true vine and I love the idea that there are constants in your life that are more than just one person,” he says. “Being someone who’s avoided reality, the only way I’ve been able to put things together and achieve some sobriety was knowing there’s a

“I love the image of one true vine ... that there are constants in your life that are more than just one person.”

WILCO (L-R): John Stirratt, Pat Sansone, Nels Cline, Jeff Tweedy, Mikael Jorgensen, Glenn Kotche

RELEVANTMAGAZINE.COM / 47

core group of people and whether or not that’s appropriating something from the Bible in a blasphemous way or not, I don’t know.”

Loose Fur A lesser-known side project of Tweedy’s, Loose Fur, included Kotche and Wilco collaborator Jim O’Rourke. The band’s second album, 2006’s Born Again in the USA, took a biting look at religion in America, and those who manipulate it for their own gain. “Loose Fur was a pretty spontaneous project,” Tweedy says. “It’s made up of me and two lapsed Catholics. There was never any discussion about making that record, as a whole, a commentary on organized religion.” One song, “The Ruling Class,” has Jesus smoking crack and “having supper with the upper management of a new regime/he’s in a new tax bracket/sandals and a dark pair of jeans/he’s got deductions right on down the line/dippin’ ink cleans on all of mankind.” The track was inspired by the 1972 movie of the same name starring Peter O’Toole as a rich aristocratic son who believes he’s the Messiah. “I’ve always liked the notion that what Jesus represents—and what Jesus’ spirit represents to a lot of people—would be more evident in a homeless person than in a lot of the places I’ve found people to be looking much harder,” Tweedy says. “It’s my understanding of the Bible that that would be how a lot of His spirit would be overlooked—because of the packaging.” Tweedy is pleased with the album, regardless of any controversy. “I stand by a lot of things on that record as being theologically sound,” he says, “whether or not anyone agrees with me.” During the solo tours he takes while on break from Wilco, Tweedy often stops to play at Christian universities around the country. He says he’s as surprised by the visits as anybody. “They keep inviting me,” he jokes. “I don’t know. I think I’ve actually been invited back to one or two, which is amazing. It seems like Christian colleges have had an interest in what we’re doing and I’ve been warmly received on a number of occasions.” He’s even played Loose Fur tunes in such settings. “It’s interesting the reaction I get,” Tweedy says. “It’s generally pretty well-received. Nobody was throwing any rocks at me.” Tweedy admits in his own life he hasn’t found the same comfort in religion that he assumes others have. “I was confirmed in the Church of Christ,” he says. “I was not really keen on going back after that. That was the deal my parents had made: ‘Go and get confirmed and basically we’ll go on Easter and Christmas.’” Today, the majority of Tweedy’s experience with religion comes while spending time with his wife and sons and their Jewish congregation. “I don’t find myself in religious environments very often,” he says. “That’s the most organized my religious life ever gets.” Tweedy’s eldest son, Spencer, recently celebrated his bar mitzvah, with his rock star dad performing Bob Dylan’s “Forever Young.” Tweedy says he’s enjoyed spiritual conversations with members of the congregation and visiting college students studying religion, as well as those he’s had with Spencer as his son prepared for the big day. During his bar mitzvah speech, the younger Tweedy spoke about holiness and charity. “Those were big questions for a 13-year-old,” the elder Tweedy says.

“There’s certain things in this world you can’t do alone and they’re usually important things.”

48 / RELEVANT_SEPT/OCT 09

Despite the Christianity of his youth and the Judaism of his family, Tweedy says he doesn’t particularly identify with one faith. “I’m more inclined to see the similarities in the religious experience for all the different denominations and organized religions I come across, even philosophy,” he says. “I’m more inclined to try and find common ground than I am to single out any one to identify with. I’ve always been that way. I actually find a lot of joy in that.” He adds that he tends to shy away from religion when it’s used to remove the indefinite. “I think when religion is being used in a more spiritual manner, it’s being used in a way functionally to embrace ambiguity, as opposed to saying, ‘I know the true answers.’ That, to me, is intellectually dishonest. I think that’s dogmatic and destructive personally.” Tweedy says a main spiritual outlet takes place on stage with his band. “There is something spiritual about performing, especially when you’re placed in such a high regard and you’re sort of exalted,” he says. “You kind of need to take a step back, I think. Even at the level I’ve achieved, you have to realize it’s not just you up there.” He sees the atmosphere of a rock concert as being similar to many church settings: those in attendance losing themselves and becoming a part of something larger. “My most religious experience has those qualities,” he says. “That’s, to me, the point of people getting together once a week. It’s reminding everybody they’re part of a community. That’s part of a rock experience, too. A lot of people don’t get it anywhere else. You can’t download it.”

This Woody Guthrie is your Woody Guthrie Years ago, Woody Guthrie’s daughter, Nora Guthrie, asked Wilco and

“Wilco’s really tried to focus anything we do socially on making our community better.”

English singer/songwriter Billy Bragg to write and record music for some of her legendary folk singer father’s unheard lyrics. The results were 1998’s Mermaid Avenue and Mermaid Avenue, Vol. II in 2000. Tweedy was honored to be a part of the projects, having been inspired by the treasured American songwriter who penned “This Land is Your Land” and displayed the phrase “This Machine Kills Fascists” on his guitar. “As a songwriter, and as a person who’s trying to make sense of the world from a liberal standpoint all my life, Woody Guthrie’s a beacon,” he says. “I think there are a lot of things about the world that are very different from the world Woody Guthrie lived in. It’s really hard to imagine what his take on things would be today.” While Wilco selected songs covering a range of themes, they also

recorded music for some of Guthrie’s more spiritual songs, such as “Airline to Heaven” and “Blood of the Lamb” for Vol. II. “There’s a certain emotional quality—a starkness of emotion in those songs that I’m really drawn to,” he says. Earlier this year, Wilco again teamed up with Feist, who played additional percussion this time, to record their latest tribute to Guthrie, a cover of “The Jolly Banker.” Fans could download the song for free, but were asked to make a donation to the Woody Guthrie Foundation and Archives. The foundation is one of more than 50 charitable organizations—such as Oxfam, Habitat for Humanity and America’s Second Harvest— found on the “Causes” page of Wilco’s website, WilcoWorld.net. “I think as a band, as a citizen, Wilco’s really tried hard to focus anything we do socially, in terms of activism or social responsibility, on making our community better,” Tweedy says. “We just try to help out soup kitchens in Chicago or help out the places that have rehabilitative programs for homeless people and addicts, and when we’re on the road, we’re a part of those communities, too. When we come through a town, we try to find a charity … that we can donate our poster sales’ proceeds to. “If you’re going to go and be a part of a community and make people find a bunch of places to park, and stuff like that, I think it’s kind of an obligation to do something else. It’s a little bit, but it’s something.” Tweedy’s drive to make a difference in the world is as consistent as his questions about it. However, he also said knowing how to best make that difference is becoming increasingly difficult. “It’s definitely a struggle to come to terms with all the information that we have in our time regarding all the suffering of the world,” he says. “There’s never been a time when people were more immediately aware of all the world’s suffering on a moment’s notice than right now. I don’t think spiritually, emotionally or psychologically human beings have had a very easy time adjusting to that reality.” Like his lyrics though, Tweedy continues dealing with the big picture problems in his own small picture way. “I don’t know if there’s a good answer,” he says, “other than the simple equation to try to make the world immediately around you better.” A

Wilco (The Timeline) 1994

1998

2001

2009

2004

> Uncle Tupelo breaks

>Wilco releases

>Reprise Records

> Wilco releases A

> Wilco (the band)

up—Son Volt and Wilco are formed. Son Volt is briefly better. And then not.

Summerteeth. Everyone realizes they’re better than Son Volt.

realizes they’ve made a huge mistake.

Ghost Is Born. Jeff Tweedy checks into rehabilitation clinic for pain medication addiction.

releases Wilco (The Album) featuring “Wilco (The Song).”

1994

2001

2002

2007

> Wilco releases A.M.

> Yankee Hotel Foxtrot

> Wilco releases

and everyone says “This is OK, but Son Volt is better.”

is rejected by Reprise Records (a subsidiary of Warner Bros.) for not having any radio singles.

> Wilco releases

Yankee Hotel Foxtrot on Nonesuch Records (also a subsidiary of Warner Bros.). Critics swoon.

Sky Blue Sky. No one knows what to do with seemingly upbeat Jeff Tweedy songs.

50 / RELEVANT_SEPT/OCT 09

And so we plot and plan and exert all kinds of energy making sure our lives go just how we want them to, and then we’re endlessly disappointed when things don’t turn out how they’re “supposed” to…and so in the midst of the suffering or the unexpected trauma or the tragedy we say “I never would have imagined this….” The key word here is, of course, the word “imagine.” When things fall apart we have to create a new tomorrow, because the one we were counting on is gone. And so it’s hard and shocking and bloody and we would never have chosen this turn of events, and yet it’s forcing us to create a future we never would have cooked up on our own. In the soil of suffering you’ll often ﬁnd seeds of creativity. This is why cancer survivors often talk about how they’re living now more than ever. They went through something that changed everything. And so there are lots of books and wisdom and perspectives on why we suffer, but what about the “what” of suffering? The “now what?” question – the unexpected ways in which there’s art in the ache. That’s what drops like stars is about. That question. That perspective. That surprise.

NORTH AMERICAN TOUR CHICAGO, IL DES MOINES, IA MINNEAPOLIS, MN WINNIPEG, MANITOBA TORONTO, ONTARIO OTTAWA, ONTARIO BOSTON, MA PROVIDENCE, RI TAMPA, FL ATLANTA, GA CHARLOTTE, NC WASHINGTON, DC DENVER, CO KANSAS CITY, MO AUSTIN, TX GRAND PRAIRIE, TX NASHVILLE, TN COLUMBUS, OH INDIANAPOLIS, IN VANCOUVER, BC SEATTLE, WA PORTLAND, OR SAN FRANCISCO, CA LOS ANGELES, CA PHOENIX, AZ FOR TOUR INFORMATION, PLEASE VISIT

THE WORK OF ROB BELL http://www.robbell.com

52 / RELEVANT_SEPT/OCT 09

THE TIDE IS TURNING

Efforts to fight preventable disease in Africa have not been in vain BY ADAM PHILLIPS AGNES IS A MOTHER living with HIV/AIDS in Kampala, the capital of Uganda, in East Africa. It has been more than a decade since she lost her husband, Augustine, and youngest child, Christopher, to AIDS. Another son, Charles, ran away from home to escape the stigma of his disease-ridden family. But Agnes is not defined by victimhood. No, Agnes is much more than an AIDS survivor— she’s an AIDS savior. Today, Agnes works in Kampala as a nurse and activist at an organization called The AIDS Support Organization where she distributes simple, lifesaving pills to her neighbors and fellow mothers living with HIV. The pills are called antiretroviral drugs, or ARVs, and are paid for by the United States. She devotes her life to this cause so others don’t have to needlessly lose a spouse or a child, as she has, to this entirely preventable and treatable disease. “Two pills that cost only a few dollars a day can save a life,” Agnes says. “I know, because I take ARVs, and I remember how sick I was before and am amazed at how strong I am now.” It’s called the Lazarus Effect—borrowed from the story of Jesus raising Lazarus from the dead in the Gospel of John—and it happens when those sick with HIV/AIDS have access to and begin taking ARVs. They become strong, despite the disease. And Agnes is a living model: Not only is she flourishing, but she’s contributing to the health of her community around her. Sub-Saharan Africa remains at the center of the storm—not only when it comes to AIDS, but also malaria, tuberculosis, and countless other diseases we know how to treat and prevent. The statistics are heartbreaking, infuriating and mind-boggling: Every 40 seconds a child in sub-Saharan Africa dies from malaria, a disease eradicated in the U.S. in the 1940s. Tens of

thousands of children will lose their lives today for lack of the simplest medicines to treat diseases like measles, pneumonia or dehydration. There are more than 12 million AIDS orphans in Africa today, and there will be more tomorrow. But, to take a lesson from Agnes, now is not the time to wallow in negative news or be paralyzed by the size of it all. Now is the time to act. Today, like never before, there is the chance to make a historic, lifesaving, world-changing difference when it comes to global health. Thanks to advances in medicine, strong African leadership, better global initiatives and commitments from the U.S. and others, countless committed nonproﬁts and grassroots advocates, and an emerging global partnership for development, the thought of turning seemingly insurmountable statistics into monumental triumphs is no longer a dream. Never before have so many simple solutions in medicine and technology been so affordable. Ten years ago, a year’s worth of medicines and treatment for someone living with HIV cost $10,000. Today, a year’s worth of treatment is $140. Similarly, today a bed net that protects a child from contracting malaria from a mosquito costs only $10 to make and distribute, and treatment is down to $2 a dose. Just as critically, workers are learning how to put these solutions to work more effectively and efﬁciently. Thanks to countless African leaders and activists, such as Agnes, backed in part by smarter global health initiatives from the U.S. and others, these simple solutions are starting to deliver unprecedented results. Of course, there’s so much more to be done. The need still outpaces the advances. Millions still die needlessly. Ten years ago, Agnes lost two loved ones and learned she too had a death-sentence

“Two pills that cost only a few dollars a day can save a life.”—Agnes

disease. Today, Agnes is healthy, and there are new medicines available, new global efforts underway and a growing, worldwide movement of people devoted to seeing these needless deaths end. Now is the time for hope. A

*Hope in Africa

Here are some positive Africa stats that don’t get the spotlight they deserve:

b Since 2002, the number of Africans with access to lifesaving HIV/AIDS medication has increased from 50,000 (1 percent of those in need) to 2.1 million (31 percent of those in need). b In Eastern and Southern Africa, 43 percent of HIV-positive pregnant women received medication to prevent transmitting the HIV virus to their babies in 2007, up from only 11 percent in 2004. b Millions of people are surviving malaria thanks to the distribution of simple bed nets and treatments, in large part supported by the United States. In Rwanda and Ethiopia, for one example, deaths from malaria have been cut in half in two years.

b Every $1 spent on water and sanitation generates $8 as a result of saved time, increased productivity and reduced health care costs.

*Get Involved

Visit ONE.org for info on writing to your state representatives, engaging your local media and creating events to raise awareness about preventable disease.

RELEVANTMAGAZINE.COM / 53

What to do when your spiritual passion wanes BY ROXANNE WIEMAN

54 / RELEVANT_SEPT/OCT 09

The post-graduation slump

The song ends, the lights come on and the swaying mass drop their arms and settle into chairs. The pastor crosses the stage and starts his sermon: “One out of every two of you will fall away. In two, ﬁve, 10 years from now, half of you will stop believing. Your lives will look no different than anyone else’s.” The college students look left, then right. A great murmur can be heard as individually, students whisper: “Not me. Surely not I, Lord.” True story. I remember it well. And there was a time not that long ago when maybe

Though the cycle of spiritual peaks and valleys will go on indefinitely throughout life, for many, that first big drop happens right after college. According to Curt Harlow, the west coast area director for Chi Alpha Campus Ministries, people greatly underestimate how the transition from college to the “real world” affects their faith. “A lot of times you’re surrounded by such a strong community in those years,” Harlow says. “Then you find out that a lot of your devotional life was really inertia and the pure sort of momentum that you had from that community. You realize that college is a really rare moment in life, when you work with, and study with, and live with almost exclusively people who are all your peers.” We’ve all heard the real world speeches before, of course, but there’s some sense when you’re in college that it won’t happen to you—that you will be one of the few who is not “overtaken” by the world and all its worries, that you will continue on, the zealous missionary who counts all a loss to follow Christ. “It was over dinner with friends a few months ago when it really hit me,” says Allen Wilson, a 31-year-old computer programmer in Fort Collins, Colo. “We were talking about house appraisals and the state of the economy and our IRAs. Our IRAs! All of a sudden, I thought: ‘I’m that guy. The one I never wanted to be ... talking about this stuff I would have considered shallow and meaningless in college compared to the deeper, spiritual things we were always talking about back then.’” There are a few people who are called into full-time ministry, but the vast majority leave college and start careers in the secular

Why does God seem so distant? Am I even still a Christian? Was any of it real? I would have said: “I’ve fallen away. I never thought I’d be this far from God. This cynical. This hard-hearted.” I was ashamed and all I wanted was to get back to the spiritual fervor of that earlier time ... but I seriously doubted it would ever happen. If asked, any of us would readily admit the spiritual life is one of highs and lows, valleys and mountaintops. And yet, if pressed further, many of us would also admit to having despaired during a low time—to having given up on ever seeing a mountain peak again. So how are you supposed to carry on your faith during a low time? How do you survive and come out still believing?

workforce. And that time—the ﬁrst years in a new job and maybe a new city—can be extremely taxing on spiritual lives. Starting a career demands a time and dedication that college jobs and homework rarely ever do. And, of course, in our mid-20s many of us get married and start families. We buy cars, houses and barbecue grills. Suddenly, it’s three years after college and a spiritual life has taken a backseat to so many other concerns. “You know, campus ministry, and the things that happen spiritually in [college], like missions trips, your social justice group, your small group—it’s just a special time,” Harlow says. “When you are in your 30s, every group

is dominated by the question of ‘what are we going to do for child care?’ When you’re in your 20s, you’re asking, ‘What did Paul really mean? What does it look like to live out the beatitudes today, in this dorm?’ You know, ‘Let’s get a group of 20 people and live in an orphanage and ﬁgure out what it means to be in that part of the world.’ You’ve got this great incredible blessing of being able to do a lot of that.” After such a rich time of community and spiritual growth, the inevitable valley is that much more devastating. The questions that come along with it can truly rock your faith: Why does God seem so distant? Why is it so hard for me to connect with Him? Am I even still a Christian? Was any of what I experienced back then real? Why can’t I ﬁnd a church as alive as my community in college?

Grasping at straws The knee-jerk reaction to such questions is to try and ﬁgure out how to get back to those spiritual highs. And, as with so many things in life, the tangible and measurable are the easiest to remember: the hour-long daily quiet times, the Bible reading, the journaling, the every-other-day prayer meetings, the weekend retreats, the small groups, leadership groups, social justice groups. It’s easy to look back at the good times and feel like it was the forms—the activities—that made those times what they were and want to reengage them. According to Josh Loveless, pastor of STATUS Church in Orlando, Fla., such a pursuit is a dangerous one. “You have to stop trying to recreate what worked last year,” he says. “Stop playing that worship CD that ‘did it for you’ three years ago. “The danger is that your relationship with God can move into a relationship with religion rather than God,” Loveless continues. “You feel like you found a way to connect with God, but maybe you need to ask if there are other ways that God wants to meet with you.” To try and recreate the spiritual high by recreating the activities of that time can lead to frustration, burnout and legalism—ultimately decaying your relationship with God. “You’ll ﬁnd yourself going through the motions and doing what you’ve always done and wondering why it isn’t working,” Loveless says. “You’ll be the last to discover the ritual is empty and you’re doing it alone—God has moved on— because we have elevated the practice over His presence. And if we were in pursuit of intimacy with Him, we would recognize that just like in any other relationship, connecting via one or two safe and formulaic ways won’t sustain it.” It’s easy to forget it was because of God’s grace and His Spirit moving in your life that those spiritual forms and activities helped you

RELEVANTMAGAZINE.COM / 55

connect with Him in the past. Those activities ﬂowed from an intimacy and relationship with God ... not the other way around. To expect to kick-start your spiritual life again by simply reengaging in the activities of that time is to limit your intimacy with God and the evolution of your relationship with Him.

the prescribed means of ﬁnding God. However, there’s also a very real danger of simply doing nothing at all. It’s three years later and you realize you haven’t cracked your Bible open in months. Growing is never an easy thing, and the Christian call is one that requires living unselﬁshly—which means sometimes you really

And some of it was fake, some of it was our youthful idealism being carried away a little bit. But we need to be careful to not throw the baby out with the bath water.” As you question your past experiences, it is important to test their validity—to separate out what was real and what was hype. You’ll ﬁnd

“A lot of times we abandon the standard because we realize we have been doing it for the wrong reason.” —Curt Harlow “You limit the way in which God wants to work in your everyday life by believing that God will only come and visit you on this mountain in this way,” Loveless says. “What we need in the present is not the same thing we needed in the past. Intimacy can’t be recreated—it has to be new.”

Only the real deal Of course, there is an opposite extreme to be wary of. In the avoidance of empty forms, it’s easy to simply do nothing. For many in our generation, the pursuit of authenticity has trumped all other pursuits. Above all else, we desire to be real. We relentlessly question our motives and the motives of others, testing them for any sign of falseness, for any indication of forced affectation. We don’t want to make ourselves do anything—we want to want to do it. Perhaps it’s a backlash against strict religious upbringings that tended toward legalism—a pendulum swing from the shepherding movement of the ‘70s. Or maybe it’s a revolution against an American ideal of success as equal to what you do and how busy your life is. Or it could be a simple wariness borne out of being constantly marketed to and offered a “solution” in the form of a product. But whatever the source, today’s young Christians have an almostparalyzing fear of doing anything for the wrong reasons. It’s a legitimate concern, of course, and one that can lead people to seek ways to connect with God during dry times that are outside of the box and

56 / RELEVANT_SEPT/OCT 09

do have to do things you don’t want to right in that moment. “There’s a sloppy thinking that starts when you realize there are some false motivations in your life,” Harlow says. “You go from, ‘This is not the right reason for doing it,’ to, ‘OK, then I am not going to do it,’ instead of asking: ‘What is the right way to do it? And how can I rediscover it?’ “So a lot of times we abandon the standard because we realize we have been doing it for the wrong reason. The right response is not to abandon the standard, but to have the standard birthed out of something more correct, more true, more authentic, more sustainable.” This kind of thinking can be especially harmful during an extended low period, as the rigorous pursuit of authenticity can lead to questioning and picking apart the high times. When you’re stuck in a dry period, wondering why God doesn’t seem to speak to you anymore, it’s natural to start to wonder if God really ever did speak to you in the first place. Were those good times really real, or were they simply products of hype? Paul Austin, the Big Sky Area director for Chi Alpha Campus Ministries, says it’s a common tendency—and maybe even a necessary one. “The truth is, you need to question it,” Austin says. “God is not offended by the questions. It’s in the questions you start to sort out what was emotion and what was the Spirit. But don’t do it alone—do it with people who are passionate about God and about you. There needs to be a purification of some of those high times, because how can you not go through a high time and let your flesh get excited?” Questioning your own authenticity—and that of those around you—is important and healthy, but without maintaining a sense of awe and a belief that God really can act, such questions have a tendency to lead to cynicism. “I think a lot of the questioning that we do in the dry time really has to do with the current stress, the current temptation that we are dealing with,” Harlow says. “And it colors everything in the path a little bit too harshly.

both. And you’ll also find the low times help you mature in such a way that “hype” will not dupe you so easily in the future. A spiritually low time can be a time of true, personal connection with God. The loss of a community—either because of physical relocation or just simply feeling more isolated— can actually lead you outside of the hype and help you figure out ways to personally and sustainably connect with the Lord. It’s a time to test the motivations of the past and pursue a more ... well, “authentic” relationship with God that is borne out of your own heart and temperament and not the expectation of others. “You have to figure out why you are having devotions,” Harlow says. “Why you want spiritual disciplines or why you want more intimacy with the Lord, apart from any other structure, leader or expectation that a small group or something has put upon you.” Harlow points to 1 Timothy 1:5: “The goal of this command is love, which comes from a pure heart, a good conscience and a sincere faith” (TNIV). It’s a reminder to remember our first love—the reason we follow Christ. “We need to get into a season every once in a while where we reevaluate faith and say, ‘The reason I’m doing this is based in gratitude,’” Harlow says. “That sense of gratitude is the only thing that has long-term sustaining power. Sincere faith, I think, is to rediscover the reason why you have faith again.”

It’s a both/and ... and then some So what to do? How do we discover these new ways of renewing our intimacy with the Lord? “You start by caring about the relationship,” Loveless says. “If you don’t care about your relationship with God eroding, then there’s nothing you can do to kick-start spiritual practices. If you care, then you need to embrace the instruments of spontaneity and structure—side-by-side. The sustainability of spiritual practices in our life hinges on the harmony of these two perspectives.” Loveless also encourages a holistic perspective on spiritual formation—one that

does not limit your relationship with God to only spiritual disciplines. “Instead we have to begin to look at our physical life, emotional life, ﬁnancial life, relational life, gifts and talents, and spiritual practices as equally valuable when it comes to our daily invitation to the Holy Spirit,” he says. “We need to see our relationship with God as something that demands the attention of every area of our life, not just our spiritual practices.” When we recognize God is part of—and working in—every area of our life, we rely on Him more and seek Him more often, not waiting until or relying on those prescribed forms of connecting. Nor are we so quick to think we’re failing in our relationship because we haven’t had a good “quiet time” in months. “Let’s not make the goal looking at the Bible for 10 minutes and praying,” Harlow says. “Let’s make the goal intimacy with the Lord. Let’s make the goal of the Christian walk more important than the form. Then that frees up a lot of different temperaments to access the devotional life. I think a lot of it is really just ﬁnding what works, what’s sustainable and how you stay connected to the Word of God.” Harlow recommends various practices for connecting to the Lord in new ways—and reminds Christians to recognize who they are and what types of methods work for their temperament. Harlow suggests mixing it up by listening to the Bible in audio form, going through the Stations of the Cross and meditating on the Passion of the Christ, and reading spiritual commentaries and apologetic pieces.

Loveless says. “Prayer is like the ocean, and all the other spiritual practices are ways you get to sail or ﬁsh or surf and experience all the ocean has to offer. You can lay aside some of the other practices for certain seasons, but the speaking and listening to the voice of God is like walking away from the ocean altogether. Even if you don’t feel like surﬁng anymore through an experience like the study of Scripture, you have to at least bring yourself to come back and swim in the water. Prayer is our lifeline to relationship.”

Childhood

The journey is the destination By even asking these questions of high times and low times, we seem to be admitting one is better than the other. There’s a desire to “get through” the low times in order to “get back” to the high times. But what if both times are equally good? And not just in a clichéd way that says the low times are pruning and prepping us for the bigger, better times ... but in a way that embraces the low times as some of our most precious times with God. “Are we comparing this and that instead of embracing that they both are what they’re supposed to be?” Austin asks. “And that might be the challenge we face—that we look at the dry times as a negative, instead of part of His journey with us.” The Psalms and Prophets are ﬁlled with praises and laments. The Israelites journeyed from the wilderness to the Promised Land to captivity and back again. Theirs was not a straight path, but it was characterized by their

“Intimacy can’t be recreated—it has to be new.” —Josh Loveless “If you just read Matthew 7 for the next 50 years of your life, you’ll develop a sort of anger towards the Bible. Like, ‘Oh, I have to read you again.’ There are so many great resources that are fascinating and will keep you thinking all day long about big questions. You start being engaged with theological issues. You start asking: ‘What do I believe about this? What are my convictions?’ Then it’s a real natural step from there to go, what does that mean for how I treat my co-workers and my spouse and my neighbors and my mom and dad, etc.” Even if you try new methods of connecting with God, it’s important to always remember why you are seeking God. Base your actions in gratitude—remembering God’s love and His sacriﬁce. It’s about the relationship. “Prayer is the one practice you can’t move away from when you’re in a season like this,”

Perfect

relationship with God. They never lost sight of their story as connected in covenant with the Almighty. The same must be true for us. “I’ve gotten to the point where I look forward to the dry times,” Austin says. “I know out of that is a time of freshening and renewal from Him. I’ve learned to enjoy the seasons I’ve got. Instead of lament them, enjoy them for what they are, because God’s got something different in each season for me.” Don’t look back at that last high season, and don’t lament your current dry season. Anticipate the next season God has for you, but engage with this season you’re in right now. Understand that it will change you and it will change your faith. You cannot go back. But you can move forward—tested, puriﬁed ... a little more grown-up. 3

978-0-8308-3627-7, $16.00

The Girl in the Orange Dress MARGOT STARBUCK Margot Starbuck’s story begins with a woman looking for her biological father. But it doesn’t end when she ﬁnds him. Instead, his rejection sends her on a different search—one that leads to a Father who never neglects to say, “I am for you.” “Margot Starbuck . . . narrates the Christian spiritual life with winsome humor and (occasionally scary) honesty.” —LAUREN F. WINNER, author of Girl Meets God

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issue41_reginaspektor_v2.indd 58

7/31/09 10:21 PM

LIKE USUAL,

IS CAUSING A STIR

BY KEVIN SELDERS

“LAUGHING WITH,” THE FIRST SINGLE FROM Regina Spektor’s new album, Far, has a lot of people wondering. The song talks about how no one laughs at God during hospital stays, wars or when their plane starts to suddenly shake, but He’s fair game at cocktail parties, among Godhating circles and following the empty promises of prosperity preachers. While people react differently to the song’s straightforward lyrics, Spektor herself says she ﬁnds it difﬁcult to discuss the track because she realizes each listener has their own personal meaning attached to it. “I’m sure to some people that song could be really patronizing, and for some it could be really happy, and for others it could be sad depending on what they’re going through in their life,” she says. “I think all songs are just a backdrop for people to project onto and try to get to know themselves better. It’s just like a love song, I guess. It depends on what’s happening in someone’s life at that time. It could be the happiest song or it could be the saddest song.” Spektor says the media is causing a minor stir around “Laughing With.” “The press has been more interested in it

than the fans,” she says. “It seems like people assumed it was kind of controversial, even though I haven’t felt it in my own life at all. I think sometimes the media just doesn’t give people credit for being smart, curious or openminded. If you write something that’s not, ‘I love you, you love me,’ all of a sudden it’s controversial.” Considering the song’s focus on God, Spektor says she’s actually proud of her record label, Sire Records, for choosing it as the album’s ﬁrst single. The track helped push the album to a No. 3 debut on the Billboard 200. “It’s really amazing,” she says. “I looked at them differently because I wouldn’t have ever thought they’d pick that song as the single. I’m really glad that was the ﬁrst thought off the record I got to share with people.” While the tune is maybe the album’s most obviously spiritual song, it’s not the only one touching on that theme. The character in “Man of a Thousand Faces” attempts to reach a place of no religion without “anyone’s sturdy instruction.” The main character in “Human of the Year,” Karl Projektorinski, is called up to the front of a cathedral to pick up his prestigious award.

“I think there’s a part of all religions that seem to be a sense of accomplishment,” Spektor says. “It’s sort of self-congratulatory. It’s as silly as congratulating yourself on: ‘Thank God I’m a man. I’m so proud I’m a man.’ You had nothing to do with that; you happened into it. When you start congratulating yourself or you become a little bit too proud of being something, then you naturally end up being condescending to someone who’s not that.” Spektor, a Russian Jew who came to the United States via the Bronx at the age of 9, says she believes God and faith should be addressed in music and art more often. “I just think everything belongs in music,” she says. “I don’t think there are things that are off-limits. Just like I don’t believe there are things that are off-limits to conversation. I think a lot of bad stuff comes out of people censoring themselves or trying to present an image of themselves or trying to be completely neutral or not even arguing.” Spektor says she still feels connected to her Jewish heritage and faith, but wrestles with her beliefs at the same time. “I guess I’m a very picky Jew,” she says. “There are certain things that are part of the

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“Songs are just a backdrop for people to project onto and try to get to know themselves better.”

* Inspired Art Spektor lists her top musical inﬂuences: b Mozart Spektor’s “Lacrimosa” from the album Begin to Hope pays tribute to the similarly titled sequence of Mozart’s “Requiem.” The words of the original ask God to grant a man mercy on judgement day.

b The Beatles This legendary band provided some of the only pop music Spektor knew while growing up in Moscow. The singer has said she listened to The Beatles before she learned English. Her favorite album: Rubber Soul.

b Bob Dylan For Spektor, it’s a toss-up between The Freewheelin’ Bob Dylan and Another Side of Bob Dylan when it comes to her favorite album by the famous folk artist. She likens the experience of listening to each to ingesting “life pills.” b Billie Holiday During her time at the State University of New York at Purchase Music Conservatory, Spektor was exposed to blues and jazz music, including Lady Day. “Lady” from Begin to Hope is her tribute to the jazz songstress.

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Judeo-Christian tradition that are hard for me to feel connected to. They don’t seem very much in line with my nature. I’m always walking the line when it comes to my love of a lot of the traditions and a lot of the rituals, a lot of the stories and a lot of the heritage and history. When I read the Bible, a lot of the time it’s been almost like a miniature ‘duck, duck, goose’ in my head. I said: ‘Yes, yes, yes, no. Yes, yes, yes, no.’ I definitely tend to reject a lot of the built-in discrimination and built-in sexism and all kinds of things.” In making Far, Spektor says she sat down with no lyrical agenda in mind. Some of the songs weren’t even written during her more recent writing sessions. “I’ve never written specifically for a record,” she says. “Even with Begin to Hope there were songs that were eight years old, there were songs that were a few months old. They’re just kind of all over the place. On Far, there’s some old songs and some new songs and they’re just kind of randomly put together.” Spektor did, however, have sonic goals in mind, including learning more about how certain sounds and tones are tied to certain feelings and emotions, and how the studio can be used more as an instrument. To learn these lessons of studio and sound, Spektor recruited the help of not one, but four producers: Mike Elizondo (Dr. Dre, Eminem), Jacknife Lee (U2, R.E.M.), Jeff Lynne (The Beatles, Tom Petty) and David Kahne (Paul McCartney, Stevie Nicks). Between albums, Spektor covered The Beatles’ “Real Love” for the benefit album Instant Karma: The Amnesty International Campaign to Save Darfur, and most recently wrote and recorded “The Call” for The Chronicles of Narnia: Prince Caspian. The song plays during the film’s final sequence. Its lyrics seem to touch on what it could be

like for someone to receive a call from God: “It started out as a feeling/Which then grew into a hope/Which then turned into a quiet thought/ Which then turned into a quiet word.” However, that’s not necessarily what Spektor intended. “Just because it’s not that to me doesn’t mean it’s not that to someone else,” she says. “That’s the great thing about feeling inspiration. You get certain feelings and certain words—and you don’t have to understand it either.” Spektor says she was originally unaware of the Christian inﬂuences on the ﬁlm’s story— penned decades ago by C.S. Lewis—when she wrote the song. “I never read the books so I knew nothing about Narnia,” she says. “I found out more about C.S. Lewis and started to see some of the Christian imagery; the biblical imagery. “I always loved the Christian imagery in a lot of amazing books and music. Tremendous amounts of artists, writers and composers were so inspired by Christianity—their work is saturated in it. I really love it. It’s very powerful myth-like imagery. “Wonderful movies like Narnia and books by C.S. Lewis are a good example of someone who’s still connected to the idea of faith connected to myth and the beauty of nature.” Spektor says she believes faith has lost much of that connection to creativity and use of its myth-like imagery in storytelling and art. “It seems like people try to hijack the Christian faith and are very non-creative, dogmatic, strict and judging,” she says. “But when you look at a lot of the ancient images of Christianity, a lot of it was magical and mystical just like Judaism—there’s a lot of prophecy, miracles, beauty and courage. Then you end up having these people who are like, ‘Give me $499 and I’ll give you a piece of burlap that will get your daughter out of cancer,’ and it just makes me want to cry.” A

IT’S NOT JUST ABOUT EATING TOO MUCH

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BY JEFF COOK

GLUTTONY IS ONE of those ambiguous seven deadly sins—a warning for people who eat too much. Not really something most of us think about on a regular basis. But it’s a sin of gauntness more than obesity—a sin that affects most of us more than we could ever guess. And it’s a sin that had its start in the Garden. The refusing to eat the fruit—which Adam and Eve may have done for many years—had been the primary demonstration of their love for God. By declining the poisoned fruit, Adam and Eve affirmed daily that the world God had made was good, that they desired inclusion in the life God gave them and that they cared for their Maker. Conversely, eating the fruit was a rejection of God, His world and a future married to Him. More than anything, eating the fruit was an act of divorce. Like adulterers seeking a new lover, Adam and Eve did not need the fruit hanging in the middle of the Garden. It was excessive. They chose it for an extra measure of satisfaction. Thus, the event in the Garden was not about sex or violence. It was not even about pride, as some have argued. Eating from the tree of the knowledge of good and evil was an act of gluttony. Adam and Eve took far more than they needed. They believed they could do whatever they wished with God’s creation for their own pleasure and benefit. These gluttonous desires drew humanity into the nothingness, and it took their lives. Notice how this deadly sin destroys. Gluttony is not about obesity; gluttony is about what we unite ourselves to. Gluttons wed themselves to meals over and above what is good for them— and by devouring more and more, they have less and less. The truth is, some who are physically overweight are not gluttons at all. They may have low metabolism or glandular problems or a job that requires them to spend all day sitting at a desk. More surprising still, an 80-pound anorexic may be a raging glutton. Weight is not a sure indicator of this sin. The skinny suffer from gluttony as easily and as often as the stout, for gluttony is, first and foremost, excessive. Gluttony is immoderation, and immoderation is not about having body

fat; it’s about having a gaunt soul. But like all expressions of sin, gluttony is primarily about separating ourselves from others. Gluttony is the temptation that most often succeeds in drawing us away from our duties. The deadly aspect of gluttony is always twofold. Immoderation not only emaciates our mind and heart; indirectly it lets someone else starve. Those who consume more than they need deny the access to others, and in a world like ours, where human beings die from lack of food, water and medicine, the gluttony of a culture or an individual can mean death for those who ache for our table scraps. Perhaps this is why gluttony has always been associated with food. In cultures where people starved to death, the moral priorities of a fat man would be evident to all. He ate over and above what he needed when he could have given the excess to those he saw begging. Jesus didn’t command the ascetic life, but He certainly didn’t frown on it. He once said, “Where your treasure is, there your heart will be also.” Follow the money in Western culture, and you will ﬁnd some of the shallowest and most worthless homes for our hearts. It has

good. It demands over and above what is natural. Immoderation is a lack of balance. Sin entered the world through the body of a man and a woman. And it would take the body of another man to remove it.

In the Garden In ancient times (and even today), rulers made images of themselves—normally statues or currency—and placed them in far-off cities so everyone would know what they looked like. We see this idea in Genesis 1. After God created the world, the last thing He made was a man in His own image. He placed him in the middle of His creation. Adam would reﬂect God’s likeness for the whole world to see. The Gospel writer Luke even called Adam “the son of God.” But God’s image had cracked. Adam, Eve and their children failed to fully reﬂect the God who made them, and all the ideas about God became confused. No one knew who God was anymore. Jesus was the new Adam, the last Adam necessary. Jesus picked up where Adam had failed. In the wilderness, Jesus was tempted by another serpent. Looking at

Like all expressions of sin, gluttony is primarily about separating ourselves from others. been noted in several studies that if American Christians gave away the traditional 10 percent of their income (rather than the current average of 2.6 percent), in a short amount of time the extra giving could nearly eliminate world hunger and unclean drinking water. The excessive lifestyle of just American Christians—very few of whom lack basic provisions—is indirectly starving the rest of our planet. The question, in light of our own gluttonous tendencies, is how much do you and I really need? What is a healthy basic lifestyle, and what is simply excessive? When gluttony takes root in our hearts, it divorces us from the life that God has made

each temptation, we notice that all of them are invitations to Jesus to destroy Himself— through separating Himself from God’s call, jumping from buildings and kneeling to evil. Like a nearby tree with forbidden fruit, these three temptations followed Jesus for the rest of His life on Earth. They accompanied Jesus even to His last hour. Yet by abstaining, Jesus did what Adam could not. He would be raised up so the world could see God again. On the night before His death, Jesus entered a new garden to wrestle with the same temptations that had been Adam’s downfall. As with Adam, Jesus’ thoughts were directed toward a tree. The

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question was not whether He would eat its fruit, but whether He would drink its cup. God’s Spirit led Jesus to this garden not to escape the world but to restart it, to be a new kind of human. Like gluttony, this event would take place in and through Jesus’ body. But instead of indulging self, Jesus would give Himself for others. It was an opposite and counteractive feat.

return to the ground.” And as Jesus thought of the tree from which He would hang, He began to sweat. The thorns and thistles of the sin-infected Earth would soon pierce His brow, and then His body would return to the ground. Like Adam, Jesus would receive into His body death, evil and all that separated humanity from what was good. But unlike Adam and his children in whose bodies sin lived, through

The question of gluttony is a question of marriage. What am I united to? What will I give everything for? In Jesus’ ﬂesh, the hole in God’s world would be mended. It would not be easy. In fact, Jesus prayed for God to take this cup from Him. Yet the curse was ﬁrm. God told Adam and his descendants, “By the sweat of your brow you will eat your food until you

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Jesus’ body sin and its fruit would die. It was then that Judas led the chief priests and temple guards to the Mount of Olives. Those with swords led the Son of God from the garden—like Adam before Him. In the morning, Jesus was raised over the Earth, and as God

had worked for six days to create the world, so Jesus hung on the cross six hours to restart it. Nailed to the cross, forgiving His killers, suffering for His beloved, Jesus succeeded where Adam and all of his lineage had failed, for on the cross all the world was again able to see God. With Jesus’ limp body hanging still, a soldier took a lance and pierced the ﬂesh next to Jesus’ heart. Jesus did not move—He was dead. Adam, too, had fallen into a deep sleep in the Garden, and God, in the stillness, had reached into his side and removed a rib. From that rib God fashioned for Adam a beautiful companion. And as the soldier’s lance slid from between Jesus’ ribs, “a sudden ﬂow of blood and water” burst from Jesus’ side. From that blood and water, Jesus would make for Himself His own eternal bride. In the ancient creation account, God made human beings on the sixth day—on Friday. A new Friday had passed, and as in days of old, God looked on that Friday, and He saw that it was good

Fragrance Every building associated with my wedding has been gutted or leveled. The church where we were married is now a daycare. The city removed our reception hall and built an ice rink in its place. The university we attended bought my wife’s home and made it a parking lot. Everything about our world that day has been torn down and replaced with something else. It’s a telling picture of what happens in marriage. When we marry, we enter a new life. Our old life was meaningful and valuable, but it gets taken apart and united with another. The two truly do become one. My moods become her moods, my dreams become her dreams, my keys become her keys. Marriage is a total union. When we unite with our beloved, we become something fundamentally different. The Scriptures use marriage as a picture of our relationship to God. Jesus referred to Himself as a bridegroom, and His ministry is likened to a wedding feast ﬁlled with new wine, where no one fasts. One of the Bible’s last images is of a wedding where the faithful have made themselves ready and are united to God forever in the age to come. When Jesus said the kingdom of heaven is at hand, we should read this as, “The wedding has commenced.” Empty humanity is being fundamentally reconnected with God. People from all over the world are entering the chapel halls, and all four Gospel writers tell a similar story to show what the wedding looks like. Three days before Jesus’ death, a young woman named Mary pulled out her only treasure and broke it at His feet. The white jar ﬁlled with very expensive perfume had been her mother’s. It was the last thing she had to remember her by. It may have been her grandmother’s, perhaps even her greatgrandmother’s. The jar was her ancestry, and she had probably hoped to give it to a daughter of her own. More than anything else, the jar was her future. It held the precious perfume, representing Mary’s ability to gain a husband. Without the jar, she would have to live with her brother for the rest of her years. Without it, she would become an object of mockery at gatherings. Her lack of a husband would ring loudly in her mind as she entered the synagogue or observed celebrations and holidays alone. Without the jar and its contents, no one would see her as beautiful. No one would desire her. We might say that in the jar were Mary’s identity, her status and all her hopes of being united to a good man. The house was full when Mary entered. Her brother, Lazarus, was reclining at the table with Jesus. The disciples sat with one another, excited about the festival and the impending

revolution. Mary approached Jesus, and as she looked into His eyes, she broke the jar, pouring the precious perfume over His head. The party hushed as the room ﬁlled with the exquisite fragrance. Mary then let down her hair—shaming herself, her brother and her family—and began wiping Jesus’ feet with the oils. Everyone watched. No one approved. One man spoke for all, calling the act a waste. But Jesus silenced them. “Leave her alone. She has done a beautiful thing to me. She has prepared my body for burial.” His words pierced the gathering—not because of the rebuke but because everyone believed Jesus would soon take the throne of Israel. But Mary seemed to know what everyone else did not. This man who had done so much for her would soon die, and her knowledge made the gift even more profound. By breaking the jar, Mary wrote out her future as one consisting of a life of poverty, scorn and

Pride longs for applause, but gluttony needs to be a diva. Envy covets what others have, but gluttony counts every insignificant detail. It is not enough to be slothful; gluttony abandons virtue in excess. Gluttony is salt when the greedy taste their spoils. One million dollars isn’t enough; it must be 10 million. Five-yearold wine isn’t good enough; it must be 15 years old. Lust wants another woman; gluttony wants them all. Wrath wants revenge; gluttony wants the infliction of it to be creatively painful. At its most demonic, gluttony amplifies the other sins, enhancing their self-destructive power. The question of gluttony and the persecuted is a question of marriage. What am I united to? What will I give everything for? The glutton’s answer comes through addictive behaviors. Though we may say our first love is for God or for a set of human beings, our actions tell the real story. The glutton sells her soul for another hit, another car, another

Whereas the gluttonous unite themselves to what will ultimately kill them, the persecuted give up even what they need for the sake of their beloved. loneliness. She chose to die for the sake of the soon-to-be-dead man before her. But the jar, which represented her future union with a good man, fulﬁlled its true purpose. In dying to herself, Mary was united to Christ. Christ means “anointed one,” and it was in this act of total self-giving love that the anointing took place. Mary’s anointing of Jesus was not done by mere holy oils; the anointing of Jesus was done with an object fully representing the whole life of one who loved Jesus. The picture is one of Jesus and His church. This picture is one of the life of heaven— humanity united to God. When Jesus said, “Blessed are those who are persecuted because of righteousness, for theirs is the kingdom of heaven,” this is the image He had in mind. Whereas the gluttonous unite themselves to what will ultimately kill them, the persecuted, having been united to Christ, give up even what they need for the sake of their beloved. Those who are persecuted are blessed with union with God for they experience the hardship of a lover. Eden was union with God, but Adam and Eve sought divorce. Through the cross, Jesus restored Eden’s beauty and initiated a new proposal to everyone to be wed again.

round of trivial pleasures, a forbidden fruit. The persecuted, on the other hand, gives even what she needs for the sake of her lover. In 1 Corinthians 13, Paul ends his brilliant painting of love with this: “For now we see only a reﬂection as in a mirror; then we shall see face to face. Now I know in part; then I shall know fully, even as I am fully known. And now these three remain: faith, hope and love. But the greatest of these is love” (TNIV). The love Paul described is the love shared between Jesus and His church. We live in the time of trials, where we may be and often are forsaken by those we care about. We may lose friends and what we need for the sake of Jesus, but we also hear a distantly familiar voice: Do you believe? Do you commit? Do you unite? And soon, like the blind who see the face of their beloved for the ﬁrst time, we will enter life where we are united with God forever. 3 Adapted from Seven (Zondervan, 2008). Used by permission.

JEFF COOK is the author of Seven: The Deadly Sins and the Beatitudes (Zondervan). He teaches philosophy at the University of Northern Colorado.

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ANTTHO T

HAMILTON FILLING A VOID IN R&B BY ANTHONY BARR-JEFFREY

ON PAPER, ANTHONY HAMILTON’S RISE TO FAME sounds almost like a movie-of-the-week script. He grew up singing in a church choir in North Carolina. He then moved to New York City and signed with Uptown Records—the label run by Diddy’s former boss, Andre Harrell. It was there, earlier this decade, where he started getting noticed on a string of Billboard Top 20 hits with the likes of Nappy Roots, Young Jeezy and Al Green. Before long, he was a solo artist blowing away audiences on The Chapelle Show, winning a Grammy, and making his mark as an R&B innovator and throwback. In Hamilton, there’s the earthiness of soul legend Bobby Womack, the visceral lyricism of early Aretha Franklin and the funky social conscience of Curtis Mayfield, all fused with a distinctly unique modern sensibility. On his latest release, The Point of it All, Hamilton embraces these influences, and others, while perfectly drawing from the R&B and church worlds he knows so well. And yet, unlike so many other former choir-boys-turned-radio-stars, little seems contradictory about Hamilton in the church or the street. This feat has required a faith big enough to negotiate the battle between personal integrity and the rock star lifestyle that’s ruined many careers. “A balanced life, at the end of the day, is just better,” Hamilton says. “There are so many people in church who are so spiritually attuned they are no earthly good. You can love the Lord with all your heart, your life, soul and your time, but God wants us to deal with our relationships, our day-to-day lives, our work relationships—to allow His presence to be felt in them. A lot of people miss that.” That worldvie worldview is evident in The Point of It All. While he sings with tenderness about marriage and finding the love of his life, he’s just as honest about finding faith and how it affects all of life. Hamilton has a refreshing vulnerability and conviction that’s lacking in most mainstream R&B. “My music is filled with things that affect me and my family personally,” he explains. “I’m from the street, and I love the Lord. My wife saw things in me I needed to change, and I saw things in her she needed to let go. “She was so ‘churched ‘c out’ when we met. Over time, when we’d sit down and talk, she’d tell me, ‘You taught me tthat I can still be a Christian and enjoy my life again.’ She taught me that I don’t have to run from the church, that I can enjoy my life and church, and still enjoy being upright. A

few less cuss words thrown out [for me] and a few less Bible studies [for her].” But beyond helping him stay balanced, Hamilton’s wife is the strength that also helps

“There are so many people in church who are so spiritually attuned they are no earthly good.” him stay grounded despite all his success. “Yeah, every now and again you need a wall to run into,” he jokes. “You hit a part of your head that’s tender and you start thinking, ‘Maybe I don’t need to feel that again—come on, man, that’s tender!’” This year, Hamilton is taking his trademark R&B/soul sound on the road with fellow neosoul mainstay Musiq and newcomer Chrisette Michele. Refreshingly, Hamilton puts the same honesty into his shows that he does his albums. “I cry, I laugh; we sing, shout and pray,” he says. “I want to heal and mend. I feel like it’s my job. I feel like I was chosen to do this music, to meet someone in their misfortune, to ﬁll a hole or void.” A

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For decades, musicians have been drawn to Nashville, Tenn. At first, it was budding country and bluegrass players, all hoping to score that plum showcase at the Ryman Auditorium, home of the star-making Grand Ole Opry. Then, Nashville became the heart of the Christian music industry, home to the Dove Awards and labels, publishing houses and recording studios. It’s interesting—though not necessarily surprising—that Nashville is beginning to draw musicians of a more varied style. Some, like recent import Jack White (White Stripes, The Raconteurs), are attracted to the city’s musical legacy, hoping to absorb some inspiration from the town that spawned some of their favorite musicians. Others have come carrying a bevy of influences ranging from hardcore punk to hip-hop to glitchy electronica and a desire to put the town’s official motto— ”Music City”—to the test. One such group is Paper Route, an electrorock quartet that, since moving to Nashville a mere three years ago, has stirred up a deafening amount of buzz. Their dramatic, laptop-driven sound earned the group a major label contract (which resulted in the band’s impressively polished and mature debut fulllength, Absence), a spot on a cross-country tour with pop-punkers Paramore, and music spots on such taste-making TV shows as One Tree Hill and The City. But like many artists before them, Paper Route’s story didn’t begin in Nashville—instead, it begins in a small, southern Illinois town where the band formed in 2004. The three principal members of the group—vocalist/keyboardist Justin Thomas Daly, bassist/programmer Chad Howat and vocalist/guitarist Andy Smith—all met as students at Greenville College, a small Christian school. “I was an art major that spent way too much time in the recording studio,” Daly remembers. “Chad’s cousin would always be in the studio, and we’d record stuff together.” It’s a fitting place for the band to have begun, as the songs on Absence feel like pure studio creations, built from a foundation of laptop-created soundscapes and programmed beats overlaid with punchy guitars and loping basslines. But Paper Route manages to keep their songs from feeling sterile, instilling each song with a beating heart and an intimacy drawn from the members’ church upbringings and their own personal take on faith. “We aren’t a Christian band,” Daly says. “My personal artistic convictions don’t align with that industry. But the majority of what I write about is God. What I need to do is seek out that

truth and have it be my own. There’s that sense of longing all over this album.” One has only to crack open the album’s lyric booklet to see Daly and his fellow lyricist Smith struggling with and yearning for the love of God. The band went to great pains to recreate the sensation of those moments when you feel God’s presence. “For the song ‘No Sudden Revelations,’ I told Chad [the music] needed to feel as if we were being baptized,” Daly says. “The water swallowing us and we see God.” He says they worked to achieve this by using a guitar gently feeding back and then mixing in a slow, lingering piano line. Combined with Daly’s own murky vocals, the effect is engulﬁng, and comes as close as anything can to those brief seconds of peaceful submersion before getting pulled back out again. “It sounds ridiculous, but I’ve seen probably 100 people baptized in my life,” Daly says. “I see their faces when they emerge from the water. I want to feel, hear, see that.” Many of those baptismal experiences come from his childhood in the small farming community of Wellington, Ohio. Daly’s dad, a designer by trade, moonlighted in a number of

“The majority of what I write about is God. What I need to do is seek out that truth and have it be my own.” —Justin Thomas Daly bands and taught choir and guitar lessons. But being in a staunchly religious household meant he was only allowed to listen to Christian music. “My parents had all the right intentions, but it was deﬁnitely a struggle to ﬁnd things that I really connected with.” In spite of growing up in a musical environment, Daly didn’t really consider doing his own music until he came across a peculiar (for his household, at least) bit of inspiration.

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PAPER ROUTE (L-R) Chad Howat, Andy Smith, J.T. Daly, Gavin McDonald

“It wasn’t until I heard ‘Black Hole Sun’ by Soundgarden that I decided I had to be a singer. Somehow that album was family-approved and the ﬂoodgates were opened.” Like all good music geeks, Daly listened to and absorbed as much music as he could get his hands on. But what obviously resonated most with him, as suggested by the retro tone

melancholy that winds its way through the album. Even on the most upbeat of songs, they undercut the music with a haunting keyboard line or, as is often the case, with a plaintive vocal turn by one of the band’s two singers. For Daly’s songs, this quality comes right from his days singing in his local church. “I think there’s a mournful undertone to a lot of my favorite hymns,” Daly says. “Even though the subject might be that of hope, there’s still this heavy sobering resonance to it.” He acknowledges a similar strain running through his own material too, but mostly when someone else in the group brings it to his attention. “There have been times when I’ve turned in a song idea that I’ve found to be hopeful, and another band member will describe it as haunting or sad. I guess I’ve blurred the lines a bit there.” While moving to Nashville has yet to make Paper Route a household name, they are reaping the beneﬁts as citizens of one of the biggest music-minded towns in the world. One such

“Any audience can tell the difference between what’s real and what isn’t.” —Justin Thomas Daly of Paper Route’s work, is the glossy, gauzy pop that poured out of England during the 1980s. “I love the harmonies and mystique of a group like Cocteau Twins and how My Bloody Valentine feels like it’s from another world. And looking back on the ‘80s, that was such an incredible time of brilliant songwriters who were not only pushing themselves creatively but also pushing themselves to write a melody. Popular music was also creative music. So, I think it rubbed off on us.” What also comes to the fore is a distinct

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advantage has been the connections they’ve made with like-minded (though musically very dissimilar) bands, such as Paramore. The two groups became friends, vocally supporting each other’s efforts. And as Paramore’s star began to rise, they were kind enough to bring Paper Route along, signing them up as the opening act for an extensive U.S. tour, even though their sounds don’t necessarily mesh. Thankfully, such concerns didn’t seem to matter to the audience, Daly says. “What we noticed was that, even though their crowd was a little younger than what we’re used to, they were an audience that actually listened. After shows, we’d get people talking about speciﬁc lines in songs and how they cried when we sang it.” But, as Daly says, making connections like that is really the goal of any musician—no matter what kind of music they play or what town they call home. The key ingredient? “Authenticity.” “Any audience can tell the difference between what’s real and what isn’t. When someone is moved at a show or just listening to a song in general, it goes beyond what that songwriter has crafted. It goes beyond his/her/their abilities. It’s something spiritual.” a

MAYBE YOU DROPPED OUT. MAYBE YOU DON’T HAVE THE MONEY. OR MAYBE YOU GRADUATED. BUT THE BOTTOM LINE IS YOU’RE NOT GOING BACK TO SCHOOL THIS FALL. SO ... NOW WHAT? LET’S TAKE A LOOK AT YOUR LIFE OPTIONS, STARTING WITH THE MOST ORTHODOX AND PROGRESSING TO THE MORE IMAGINATIVE. WE’LL FIGURE IT OUT TOGETHER.

It’s not the most glamorous, but it needs to be said. “If a man will not work, he will not eat,” says the Good Book, and let’s face it, we all like to eat. If you’ve ﬁnished a degree, you’ve got options. You can search out openings that would use your new qualiﬁcation, assuming you haven’t done an airyfairy liberal arts degree like literature, anthropology or philosophy. (Yes, you are well-rounded. No, you are not trained to do anything. There is still hope, of course. A variety of sanitation positions have no lack

of business in this economy, for example.) You search “jobs” and pull up Monster, CareerBuilder, HotJobs and a guy named Steve with a new liver who likes apples. You can, of course, search the classiﬁeds in your local paper (or on their website), go to the career center at your alma mater or search through professional organizations in your ﬁeld. There are lots of resources for this. So let’s turn to other things to do when you’re not going back to school and don’t want a regular J-O-B.

Maybe you don’t want one job. Maybe you can’t find one job. How about 10 jobs? Or 20? With some skills and some gumption, get out there and convince people to hire you for this, that and the other. In this economy, organizations don’t want to hire additional staff (or full-time staff) because of the added burden of benefits. If they need a bit of extra labor, they’re much happier to pay some pleasant self-starter like yourself to bang out a project, be it shingling a roof, designing a brochure, cleaning the office, taking some photos, making phone calls, updating a website, reupholstering a couch, writing a report, picking pumpkins, playing piano for a kiddie production of Peter Pan, entering some data or changing the oil. Make yourself a nice business card. In fact, make yourself one thousand nice business cards, with your name, number, email and some inkling of something (or some things) you can do. Then see how fast you can give all of them away. If you can do it within a month, you’ll have more work than the USPS on Christmas Eve. A downside of this approach is you probably won’t have health insurance. So eat your vegetables. And check if you can stay on your parents’ plan, if you are poor enough to get Medicaid or if you earn enough to buy some. Or go without. (Yes, I said it. I’m sitting in South Africa, with my wife and kids, totally uninsured. Faith? Stupidity? Laziness? Risk? Fine for now? Intending to get it? Yes, maybe, yes, yes, yes, probably.)

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While you’re at it, you might come across some place that needs a gopher of sorts for their work but don’t have much money to offer. Talk yourself into an internship, even if the pay is lower than you might like from normal employment. Once you get beyond the initial stumbles and bumbles and ofﬁce topography, interning can be a real trip. As you’re hardly paid and you’re new, expectations can be very low. So you can suggest off-thewall ideas, ask stupid questions, make lots of mistakes and learn a ton about your area of choice. It might end up landing you a position in the same organization, or you might be headhunted by a competitor (which sounds cooler than it is). You may even learn the ﬁeld that seemed so intriguing from the outside is actually a mountain of unbearable tedium.

While in the midst of a serene brain numb TV bliss, your eyes may catch an ad for a sushi bar. You suddenly remember your dream growing up of learning to make sushi (or arranging ﬂowers, repairing motorcycles, writing children’s stories or playing tennis). You call your city rec department or the continuing ed arm of a college nearby and ﬁ nd they have a few dozen classes in everything from yoga to Yiddish. Yes, these informal classes will cost you something. But compared to a semester at Cornell, you’ll be tickled at the prospect of nearly free education that you actually want to do. And who knows—maybe one day your sushi skills will land you some paying gigs.

We ain’t gonna lie—it’s cliché. But so is lots of life, so stuff it in a backpack and roll out. Machu Picchu, Great Zimbabwe, the Great Wall, Giza, those huge Buddhas and Easter Island. New York, New Delhi, New Zealand and Newcastle. Chinese cuisine, Turkish bazaars, Thai massage, and Tiki bars. It’s the world, and it’s all out there waiting for you to see it and be it. If you’ve not traveled extensively, you might have the idea that it’s expensive. It can be, for sure, but it doesn’t have to be. Check out CouchSurﬁng.org for a fantastic

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accommodation networking service (and a super-cool example of a 501(c) nonproﬁt organization—see right). You may also be able to ﬁnd an environmental or agricultural tourism operation where you volunteer some service and get to stay somewhere cool for a week or month, while maybe learning, too. And in many places, if you travel like locals do, and eat like locals do, you don’t need to drop much jing. Plus, as you go, you might be able to freelance (see above) for organizations you happen across.

Let’s get real—all this talk of activity gets to be a bit much. So why not grab the remote, stretch out on the futon, crack open a bag of cheesy poofs and watch some Fresh Prince? It’s what all the cool kids do. Plus, you’ve been so busy with school, there are lots of stellar shows you’ve never even seen, and with TiVo you can see all of them! Pass the poofs!

In a few short years, you’ll likely have a spouse, a couple kids, a dog, a mortgage, a car and (worst of all) furniture, making it nearly impossible to take six months to hike the 2,175-mile Appalachian Trail (or the 2,650-mile Paciﬁc Crest Trail or the more mammoth 3,100-mile Continental Divide Trail). Even if you don’t have much money, if you already have the gear or can afford some reasonable outlay on that side (or you have a good friend not using their gear for the better part of a year), months of hiking seem like they end up being pretty affordable—you have to eat wherever you are anyway, you don’t pay rent, there’s no need to budget for gas money, you’re washing your drawers in streams without soap and you never change your clothes. Sweet! You get to travel; you don’t have to work; there are no papers to write; and you achieve this burly lumberjack aura (which I suppose isn’t so cool for you ladies out there, but whatever). And as you walk down the trail, your mind can spin around and around, joyfully, on, “No more pencils, no more books …”

That’s right, a nonprofit. Look it up and find it on wikihow, 501c3.org and StartingANonprofit.com, or go to the horse’s mouth at IRS.gov. How hard can it be? You decide on a purpose. You bring people together. You write bylaws. You have a little election. You each get a swank title. You ask some people for money for the cause, and you’re on your way! Oh, the places you’ll go! Really, this will seem intimidating at the outset as there are a lot of forms and rules. But it isn’t rocket science and there are resources to help you through. Ask around and you’ll likely even find someone who has started one—there are 1.5 million in the U.S., or one for every 200 people, according to the National Center for Charitable Statistics. What do those 1.5 million organizations do? Just about anything. “Nonprofit” might call to mind ministries, soup kitchens and political groups. But they can just as easily be educational institutions, groups around a common interest, a neighborhood association, a fundraiser for schools in Sudan or lots of fun stuff.

Why not? Municipal ordinances be darned, hang up a shingle, stir up some Kool-Aid and enjoy the fall weather while getting paid in nickels. Life is good. Or take it to the next level and start another business of some sort. A friend of mine was a youth pastor and got into Tupperware. Holy smokes! She was so good at it, they gave her a minivan. But if Pampered Chef and PartyLite Candles are not for your budget (or demographic), go one step better. Grab a legal pad, a nice pen and a big cup of coffee. Start writing and doodling about things you’d like to do. Get another big cup of coffee. Write faster and bigger. Draw some arrows. Think about marketing and pricing. Fill up one more cup of coffee. Start a new page, summarizing the other pages. You now have a business plan. If it’s not capital intensive, give it a try—you might be the next Sergey Brin.

You have a laptop. You have a camera. You have a cell phone. You are a citizen journalist! It’s like Harriet the Spy for grown-ups—put your tools in a cool bag (along with a ﬂashlight and some snacks), put on your favorite jeans and sneakers, and hit the streets to ﬁnd the story. I’ve often thought every person has a story. In fact, when I meet people, rather than ask, “What do you do?” or “Where are you from?” I often go for, “What’s your story?” This little trick has yielded some amazing tales, tales worthy to be told to a wide audience. You do need to be able to ask such people if you can record what they say and take their picture, and then turn around and pitch it to editors. But if you can, you can do the world the service of spreading stories worth telling—pay it forward and all that. Now to actually sell some of this stuff, Writer’s Market and Photographer’s Market are the old-school tools, but still with current application. But hit up Demotix, WorldAssignment, GroundReport, DigitalJournal and NowPublic, and you will feel cooler.

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Still Bored? Need a few more ideas to ﬁll the time between job interviews and The Deadliest Catch marathons? Try a few of these out ...

FIGHT FOREST FIRES MAKE UP RECIPES LEARN TO SWALLOW SWORDS COUNT CARDS IN BLACKJACK AUDITION FOR A PLAY READ SHAKESPEARE ANSWER PHONES FOR A TELETHON SELL YOUR ABSTRACT PAINTINGS AT AN ART FAIR TRY TO GET YOUR ORIGINAL MUSIC ON ITUNES TRAIN FOR A MARATHON LEARN TO MAKE SAUSAGE GO DUCK HUNTING ORGANIZE A SPELLING BEE COLOR GET ON E-HARMONY REUPHOLSTER YOUR COUCH SEE IF YOUR HIGH SCHOOL NEEDS A JANITOR START A PEZ DISPENSER COLLECTION HITCHHIKE SOMEWHERE WRITE A SONNET JOIN A SOFTBALL LEAGUE THROW POTS MAKE ELEGANT CAKES LEARN FARSI PRACTICE CLIMBING TREES AND APPLY WITH A LOCAL ARBORIST ROAST YOUR OWN COFFEE HAVE A RUMMAGE SALE MAKE A SHORT FILM ATTEND A CITY COUNCIL MEETING DESIGN A WEBSITE USE PLYOMETRICS TO INCREASE YOUR VERTICAL LEAP PRACTICE YO-YO TRICKS PICK UP TRASH ON THE STREET HELP AT A SOUP KITCHEN RESTORE AN OLD CAR WRITE RESTAURANT REVIEWS TIE-DYE MOST OF YOUR CLOTHES GROW A BEARD SHAVE YOUR HEAD OFFER TO BABYSIT FOR SOMEONE INVEST YOUR SAVINGS IN A SOCIALLY RESPONSIBLE MUTUAL FUND READ AN ENTIRE NEW YORK TIMES SUNDAY EDITION UNTANGLE YOUR SLINKY HOLD A BING AND GOOGLE GRUDGE MATCH START A RETREAT CENTER BREAK OUT TAI-BO ON VHS

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So, travel (see earlier) sounds good, but you’d feel a bit guilty about just floating around for fun. Your solution: make it meaningful. Peace Corps? OK, that’s going to be a bit of a wait—it typically takes nine months (or more) from when you apply to when you leave. If that timing sounds good, go ahead and check out PeaceCorps.gov. But there’s also lots of good stuff out there looking for strong backs, interested minds and humble hearts. There are a lot of missions organizations and churches putting together trips of various lengths and purposes, or you could put one together. Do your homework on Urbana.org/msearch, RightNow.org, Finishers.org, YWAM.org, ShortTermMissions.com, Adventures.org, Cafe1040.com or search online for more. Oh, and TheWorldRace.org has got to be one of the most interesting opportunities, making people pray things like, “God, please send me to the missions field, as long as it’s on the World Race!” Or if you just head off to many non-English speaking nations, you can begin speaking your fluent English and talk your way into an ESL teaching or tutoring gig. This can be stressful and challenging in some areas and the pay is often not fantastic, but it’s worked for many before you. For this or the kinds of opportunities above, you can arrange something before you go that’ll make you feel useful (and thus assuage your guilt), or you can just commit to finding something worthwhile once you’re on the road.

About 40 percent of the world’s population lives on less than two bucks a day. At $60 a month, you probably have enough laying around to last a while if you stick to that budget. Head to the cheapest bulk food store around and buy a big sack of beans, another of rice, and maybe a bit of ﬂour or cornmeal for tortillas or African porridge. Plant some seeds for additional nutrition. While you’re at it, sell your car and buy a handful of bus tickets. Or just walk. Write about your experiences (see “Become a Citizen Journalist”) in this experiment with truth.

5 days can change your life.

Sara Stephens , Urbana 03 alumnus, serving in Bangkok, Thailand As a student at University of Washington, Sara thought about the poor, only in an abstract way. At Urbana 03 she joined thousands of like-minded students, met hundreds of missionaries, and learned from Christian leaders from around the world. And she connected with folks from Servant Partners, the organization she now works with in the heart of a Bangkok slum. Now “the poor” aren’t just a demographic. Watch Sara’s Urbana story and register for your own at urbana09.org.

INTERVARSITY’S 22 ND STUDENT MISSIONS CONFERENCE DECEMBER 27-31, 2009 ST. LOUIS WWW.URBANA09.ORG

YOUR DIGITAL

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TECHNOLOGY & YOUR SOUL

DISEMBODIED MIND Shane Hipps, author of Flickering Pixels, talks about technology and how it’s shaping your faith BY LEE STONE

In your book, you challenge us to analyze the technology we use and how it affects us. Why? Most people go through life pretty oblivious to the ways we are being shaped—our minds, the message of the Gospel, even our souls, are being shaped by the things we consume. Not unlike the way your diet shapes your body, our technology shapes our minds. If you understand the way in which various technologies shape the brain and imagination, you’ll be better able to use those technologies rather than to be used by them.

You talk about this as if the media is everything. Is it really that big of a deal? Well, we have to deﬁne what we mean when we say “media.” I borrow my deﬁnition from Marshall McLuhan, a famous communications theorist in the ‘60s: A medium is “any extension of ourselves.” So that can be anything from eyeglasses to the clothes I am wearing, since clothes extend and amplify my skin. That means all these human-created artifacts are media.

How has the progression of technology affected our development as a society? In the book, I divide history into three basic eras and each of those eras is connected to the major communications technology that was introduced at that time. [See timeline on p. 82] The ﬁrst major era is the era of orality, which is basically any culture that does not have writing as a major part of its symbol system or way of communicating. They tend to be very tribal and communal cultures; the only way you can remember your thoughts is if someone else is there to repeat back the stories and narratives that shape your identity as a community. But once you introduce the technology of writing—which is the capacity to ﬁx one’s thoughts or ideas in time and space outside

the body—into one of those cultures, they experience the notion of individualism for the first time. In order to encode and decode and to read and to write, you have to be in isolation. So if you look at when printing was introduced into the Western world in about the 1500s, it gave rise to the intense individualism of the West, because there was this tremendous separation from the tribe. The tribe was no longer necessary because thoughts and ideas can be fixed in a page instead of residing in the oral memory of the community. The more recent human innovation was the introduction of the electronic age. Three major technologies—the telegraph, the photograph and the radio—harnessed the power of electricity and completely dissolved the communication structure in the West and reconstituted that in a completely new way. The electronic revolution actually returned us partly to an oral world—we are becoming increasingly tribalized again and that’s partly because of the way these technologies have interacted. You mention we’re in a very confused state of being right now ... Electronic culture creates a paradox of the previous two eras and we become a kind of “tribe of individuals.” A simple example is these two friends I have. They’re best friends and talk to each other at least 14 times a day on their cell phones. They live within two blocks from one another. When I last had lunch with one of them, he told me he had not seen the other guy in eight weeks. And the reason is because they experienced that kind of rapid-fire connectedness; it serves to inoculate your need to be together. So this really odd thing is happening:

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“In Jesus Christ, the ultimate revelation of God in the world, the medium and the message are perfectly united.”

They’re more connected in terms of their content but less connected in terms of their relationship. The reason I know that is because they both lamented to me that they don’t really feel they know the other person. They’re thrown together by these technologies, but they are being divided because they haven’t seen each other in eight weeks.

things anymore than I am opposed to ice cream. I’m just saying that ice cream should be used in more limited doses rather than used as the primary center of your diet.

Why do cell phones do that to us? Well, the main reason is because God made us embodied people. If you and I are in the same room, there are all kinds of frequencies you can’t measure, see, taste, hear or touch, but you know they’re happening. You can tell when someone is angry by your intuitive experience of that person. There are realities that happen when humans get together that are almost impossible to convey in any way other than physical presence. There are energetic components to the way humans interact; this interaction is much more of a dominant way that we are connected to one another than just our words. So any of these electronic interactions are like playing a guitar with one string. You can play music, you can probably have the full range of notes you need to have, but you’re missing all the other frequencies and it’s not going to be nearly as full or beautiful as a guitar with six strings. The electronic age has this natural bias to disembody us, to discarnate us and to leave us operating primarily in the realm of content. But we’re missing all of these other layers of human experience that make it so rich, powerful and, frankly, transformative. It’s the reason that God decided to embody Himself in the person of Jesus, because God understood that humans are created as beings that need to be together.

So why do we keep settling? The same reason that I eat ice cream and not broccoli: it goes down easier. It’s so much more convenient. Everything about our world is driven by a need to get more done in less time. These technologies actually deliver on that. That’s why we own and use them. The problem is they just happen to undermine other things that we’re just less aware of. So my interest is making us conscious to those things. Now, I’m not opposed to these

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Is this particularly important for Christians? Christianity is fundamentally a communication event. As a religion, Christianity is God revealing God’s self to the world. And in Jesus Christ, the ultimate revelation of God in the world, the medium and the message are perfectly united. There is something very powerful about that. Jesus’ very way of operating in the world is the revelation of God’s message to humanity. Here’s where the Church comes in: If Jesus is the ultimate revelation of God, and we are the body of Christ as the Church, then what I preach from my pulpit is almost irrelevant compared to the way that the community interacts with the powerless, the way we as a community make decisions and process things—the way we as a community deal with conﬂict within our own body, the way we as a community deal with our own hypocrisy. All of those things are the ways we offer hope and healing to a broken world. These are the things that are God’s revelation to the world. The more the Church understands itself in that way, the more accountable we are for the way we behave. You write in your book that TV and Internet create an empathy from a distance in us. We see starving children in Africa, war in the Middle East, ﬂoods in Asia and we want to help. But we can’t do much because we’re so far away. So we start to feel helpless and hopeless. Can we be that medium of God that you talked about? What you’re describing is another one of those paradoxes of the electronic age. Your tribal culture is very empathic and connected, but your literary culture tends to be more distant and detached. You feel tremendous pain and suffering, and you’re moved to act temporarily. And then you realize that the human soul is not capable of withstanding planetary suffering day in and day out, so it creates a reversal; you become numb and apathetic. That kind of numbness and apathy is a very dangerous spiritual illness. The way

TECHNOLOGY & YOUR SOUL

to reignite compassion in the heart is to be present with people who are suffering; this brings us right back to this issue of [presence]—there is something that happens when you’re with someone. If a person is suffering, you realize that your presence means more than anything else. We just did a funeral recently and the sanctuary was full. The grandson of the man who died kept coming up to me and saying: “I’ve seen Sunday mornings where it wasn’t this full. This is just so wonderful, that people came.” There was something about people being there, actually taking the time and energy for showing up, that was healing for him. When I talk about local compassion as a spiritual practice, it may be the practice of putting yourself where people are suffering and just being there. That is both a gift you give the world and something that heals us from that illness of empathy at a distance. You spend quite a bit of time in the book talking about the nature of conflict and how technology has even affected the way we fight with one another. Can you talk a little bit about that? I think that there is this new phenomenon happening, especially with young people: e-conflict. People have learned to have confrontations and conflicts digitally—usually on a blog or in an email or text message. I’ve interacted with people that have received really scathing emails that have been really painful and easily misunderstood. Then they’ve tried to write an email in response to that very painful email and they think that the great thing about email is they can write their thoughts down and think through exactly how to say it so they don’t say something they regret. So then they argue that email is actually better at mediating conflict than doing it face to face. But without fail, the email is always misinterpreted and it’s always more hurtful than it was intended. It’s because there are all these other realities to the way humans interact that have nothing to do with our conscious awareness, but have a huge impact on whether or not confl ict will be resolved or deepened.

For so long, the Bible has been the center of our teachings. How should the Church respond when there is a drop in biblical literacy in an image-rich culture? I was just at a two-day symposium, where the American Bible Society put on an event where we got together to discuss Bible engagement in the 21st century. The primary, fundamental issue we were addressing is that Bibles have never been more available, but biblical literacy is lower than it’s been in 500 years. We began to dream about things that might enable better Bible engagement. I think one of the first projects we need to do is to experiment with taking the Bible apart and putting it back together again in a new way—to de-modernize the Bible. So, for example, the introduction of chapters and verses is a very late, modern invention in our Bible. Most of us take it for granted and assume it’s always been there. One of the things that verses and chapters do is create a very bifurcated Bible that looks like a scientific document that is easily broken into discreet units. The problem with that is we are given to proof-texting—picking out little verses here and there that seem meaningful to us. But if you strip out the verses and the chapter references, you are forced to engage the Bible as it was originally created, which was as literature—as an unfolding narrative. You wouldn’t open a novel and just go to the middle part and find on page 28 some verse in a novel. You would probably need to start at the beginning and say, “What does this mean?” Now,

I don’t mean you have to start at the beginning of Genesis. I mean if you’re going to try to read Matthew, you would have to start at the beginning of Matthew and get a feel for the overall fl ow of Matthew. So that would be one thing I would do is work with that. Another idea is to re-organize the order of the books of the Bible to reflect how they were created. And if we do this, I think we might fi nd people finding the Bible interesting again, because there’s some sort of logic and reason. Right now it’s this really weird, discreet unit that is sort of broken up without a whole lot of meaning or explanation as to why things are where they are. In your book, you write: “When we claim the Gospel message is unchanging, we risk boasting the kind of omniscience in which we presume to know the totality of God’s mysteries and intentions. We presume to discover the one, simple and unchanging message for all time and all places.” Can you unpack that a little more? I actually do think there is an over-arching message, but I think it’s important for people to hear that part of what I had to say. I do think that something that isn’t going to change is that God is love. What I’m getting at is how that love gets embodied. How that love plays out in various cultures will look vastly different and in some cases will even appear contradictory. And the risk we have in the modern West is that we believe we have found the way that God’s love is best articulated and so should be done the same way in every other culture context. I’m merely suggesting a dose of humility in the way we understand the Gospel. Our God is a very dynamic and big God, and He is as unpredictable as the wind. The more humility we have, the better we are to catch that wind rather than miss it entirely.

You write that we are the message and the medium of Christ. What does that really look like? If you have breath coming into your body and your heart is beating, that’s a gift from God and you ought to be a gift to the world. It’s not just your mind—your entire being is a gift to be given. The electronic age seems to create us as sort of disembodied digital minds wandering the universe. The more that we get incarnated and embodied and in touch with the fact that our beings need to be with one another, the better we are all going to be. That’s particularly true for [younger people] because we are a generation that is increasingly raised on a disembodied kind of technology. I’m not against using those things, but I think there are times that we are addicted. We have to be intentional about practicing being physically present with others. There is a reason Jesus came as a drooling infant, not as some ethereal spirit hovering over the water. He was hungry and tired and thirsty; He had people touch Him and He touched other people and there are really powers in that. My hope is that we don’t forget that. It’s a spiritual practice of actually being together; its not just something that is nice but actually something that develops you as a person and offers your gift to the world.

SHANE HIPPS is the author of Flickering Pixels (Zondervan), and is the Lead Pastor of Trinity Mennonite Church in Phoenix, Arizona. Connect with him at ShaneHipps.com.

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SHORT ATTENTION

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TECHNOLOGY & YOUR SOUL

SPAN FAITH My TV has 500 channels. My iPod has 7,000 songs. My Internet has like 30 billion pages. I have a cell phone with Internet and email. I’m never more than a phone call away from my parents. There are about 60 ways I can communicate electronically with any given person. So why is it like pulling teeth to get me to spend more than a few minutes each day talking to the Creator of the universe? That’s what technology has done to us. Our sped-up, hyper-efficient, media-saturated world seems to be making it harder than ever to live pious, simple, disciplined Christian lives. There are just so many other options—a world of irrelevant and unimportant activity to engage in—and it’s all so terrifyingly accessible. Important things like real community, prayer and Bible reading often get crowded out. Quite simply: We’re all just too freaking busy. While most of our new technologies are in theory meant to save us time, our lives are becoming decidedly more busy and our free time is dwindling to almost nil. Why isn’t the ability to write emails on the bus helping to streamline our lives and make things simpler? Perhaps it’s because we can now write emails on the bus. We used to read books for fun on the bus. We used to just sit there and contemplate. Now, we can think of nothing better to do than stare down at our phone and try to think of a task that can be accomplished during this “downtime.” The thought of sitting still and doing nothing is unfathomable. The prospect of simply hanging out and thinking for an extended period of time—well, it’s just so unproductive. Unsurprisingly, this frenzied, obsessivecompulsive proclivity toward being digital busybodies has harmful effects on Christian disciplines like Bible study and prayer. After all, it’s pretty tedious to just sit and pray for an hour when there are Hulu videos to browse, “What Ninja Turtle are you?” quizzes to take and online “community” to cultivate. If we’re not wired, plugged in and communicating with the world at all times, it seems like such a waste of time.

In this environment, having the attention and focus to sit still and pray silently and single-mindedly for any amount of time is nearly impossible. “We’re always waiting for something to happen,” says Jenna Bartlo, a twentysomething PR professional from Los Angeles. “It’s hard to keep praying when we’re anxiously awaiting a text message.” Bartlo believes Christians have to be intentional about sitting down—distraction free—and carving out time for God on a daily basis, even though it’s sometimes easier to just pray “in between” other activities throughout the day or while walking from one thing to the next. “If you are just twittering to God your prayers throughout the day, then you are not taking the time to think about what you’re praying. God is still hearing those prayers, but you are not really seeking God.” This is one of the biggest problems that must be reckoned with in the Twitter age: our ever-diminishing inclination and/or ability to slow down and think thoroughly, deeply and profoundly about anything. We speed through an article or web page in 60 seconds and pronounce it “read.” We see a blurb about our friend from high school’s weekend at the lake and pronounce the friendship “maintained.” But in this flurry of bite-sized narrative and dollar-menu mediation, are we able to truly be self-aware? Can we consider things and know God and ourselves? At the end of the day, it’s just hard for us to have interior thought-lives anymore. It’s hard to keep anything to ourselves and be reflective just for ourselves. With Twitter, Facebook, blogs and the quick-and-easy communication efficiency of cell phones, we’ve gotten used to

the notion that anything worth saying can and should be shared with the digital community in real time. Any idea or thought worth having should be public. Everything is cooperative, collective and wiki-oriented. When we sit alone and contemplate something that isn’t meant to be shared with the whole wide world, we almost don’t know what to do with ourselves. Especially for younger generations, our identities are increasingly tied to social networking posturing, notes Todd Hall, professor of psychology at Biola and editor of the Journal of Psychology and Theology. “Older generations tend to view social networking technologies as functional tools, not as a way to define their identity,” Hall says. “But for the younger generations, social networking shapes their identity, and I think it makes it harder

If we’re not wired, plugged in and communicating with the world at all times, it seems like such a waste of time. for them to be alone with God when they get used to this sort of constant interaction and ‘community.’” It’s no wonder praying privately, silently and alone is a difficult endeavor for so many of us. Adding to the difficulty—the person we are talking to (God) is not speaking back to us, and it becomes nearly impossible. Instant feedback is such a crucial part of our technological, mediated existence today. If you post something on Facebook, you expect comments almost instantly. If you send a text, you expect a response. If you write a blog post and no one bothers to comment,

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Is there anything in life that is simply un-tweetable? Are some things too big to reduce to 140-character bursts? you deem it a failure. Praying privately to an unresponsive God goes against all of our typical communication preferences. The same logic applies to something like Bible reading. For the same reason reading any book alone for an extended period of time feels increasingly isolating and hard to sit through, having a “just me and my Bible” devotion time has become more and more difficult for those in the “wired” generations. It’s also hard for us to reckon with the intense requirements of context and “big picture” thinking that Bible study requires. In the Internet age, our minds have been trained to be OK with decontextualized, bite-sized flourishes of image, sound and text. But when we open our Bibles and try to make sense of one verse plucked out of context, it doesn’t really make sense. The meaning comes in the larger picture and the over-arching story. But that just takes too much time. Oh, time. It is the thing we most miss and yet the thing we have the least patience for these days. There is an orgy of information and stimuli clamoring for our depleted reserves of attention, and it’s wearing us all so very thin. Think about the computer desktop interface, where most of us spend huge portions of our lives. There is one rectangular space, but within it can be any number of smaller “windows” that contain multiple tasks, programs and applications simultaneously. It’s the consummate picture of multitasking. At any given moment on my own laptop, I have a few Word documents open, at least two (and frequently four or five) Internet windows open, iTunes, my Outlook email system and a few ongoing iChat conversations. Everything is simultaneous and dynamic—with chats going on, emails coming in and going out and various 86 / RELEVANT_SEPT/OCT 09

meandering web browses happening whenever there is a gap in any of my other endeavors. We’ve grown accustomed to an instantgratification culture where we hold the reigns and can switch from one thing to the next, the second something gets too boring or too difficult. This is one of technology’s most troublesome effects, notes 24-year-old filmmaker Curtis Craig. “When something doesn’t immediately strike my fancy or capture my attention, I have to force myself to stick with it,” Craig says. “Our generation has this unique ability to completely ignore something that doesn’t have an immediate gratifying value. As a filmmaker, this scares me because a lot of the best stuff—the films that have shaped me the most—required me to sit with them for a long time to understand. Our threshold for enduring challenges has been disappearing in other aspects of life as well. I’m not as prone to working hard at relationships these days, for example. It’s easier to just get online and melt your mind away a little bit. It’s painless.” The thing the Church must think long and hard about is whether modern communication technology is making things too painless and too easy. Facebook is making it easier to get news out to vast social networks (like church groups). Twitter allows Christians to more readily keep tabs on their congregation’s daily life. Cell phones make it easier to schedule prayer breakfasts and Starbucks devo meetings. But is easier always better? Just because something can be done, should it be? Take Twitter. Does it really have any compelling purpose? Some have suggested the 140-characters-or-less mandate of Twitter might actually improve the quality of our communication. The logic is thus: The bite-

sized requirement forces people to be more concise writers and to learn to use words with a newfound economic precision. When you have so small a space, you can’t rely on throwaway words. It elevates our diction, supposedly. It forces us to be better writers and more to-thepoint communicators. This may be true, but we also have to ask ourselves this: Is there anything in life that is simply un-tweetable? Are some things too big and complicated to reduce to 140-character bursts or installments? Can the Bible and the Gospel be properly communicated in a micro-blogging paradigm? Pastors everywhere are voraciously adopting Twitter and rapidly gaining thousands of “followers,” but these are questions it’s imperative they ask themselves. There’s always a danger that the Church—by embracing such things as Twitter—is simply catering to (and propagating) the lowestcommon denominator, no-attention-span stew of technological trendiness. It’s important to seek out the sacred in the secular, but it’s also equally critical to recognize when the secular is interrupting the sacred in our lives—to dare question the assumption that “new” and “cutting-edge” always means better. The Christian must at least consider that technologies are not benign—that they may be good for some things or bad for others, but they are not neutral. Before we jump rapturously into the arms of yet another hot new technological trend, it’s worth considering the works of those who have wrestled with these questions before us—men like Marshall McLuhan, who said “the medium is the message.” Or Neil Postman, who said: “We need technology to live, as we need food to live. But ... if we eat too much food, or eat food that has no nutritional value, or eat food that is infected with disease, we turn a means of survival into its opposite. The same can be said of our technology.” Or Shane Hipps, who said: “Within the forms of media and technology, regardless of their content, are extremely powerful forces that cause changes in our faith, theology, culture and ultimately the Church.” There is a growing literature and chorus of voices out there, questioning the assumptions of technological progressivism. The questions are vital; the implications profound. If anyone is to listen and think deeply about these things, it should be Christians. We have to be willing to talk, write and discuss the way that technology is impacting our faith. But it will take more than 140 characters. A

RECOMMENDS

MUSIC///

MATISYAHU LIGHT (EPIC)

> No matter what people say, if you act cool then you will be cool–eventually, everyone around you will see the quality emerge. Of course, for Matisyahu, there are a few other factors involved. The Orthodox Jew is blessed with an ability to concoct simple phrases, engaging melodies and a vocal delivery that makes you want to lean back in your chair and just chill. “It’s not about win or lose, we all lose when they beat on our soul/In this maze you will lose your way … but don’t let it phase you,” he sings on “One Day,” a song that sums up the themes and convictions of Light, his third release and best so far. Light is splattered with finely interwoven reggae soul from start to finish. On “We Walk,” there’s a swirling guitar and acoustic-thumping bass, a beehive synth and light drumming that finally gives way to the pounding chorus. On “For You,” the electric guitar—which sounds like Matis employed The Edge for one song and taught him reggae—unfolds in layers and grasps at the Middle Eastern guitars fighting to take over. “Motivate” has a booming drum that sounds like an elephant’s heartbeat, yet the backbeats are a mouse-chant compared to the album’s intense themes. Matis sings about “children taught to blow their brains out in the holy name” (on “Escape”) and struggling to stay positive (on “Struggla”). He takes his work seriously—he studied the Torah for two years as he wrote these spiritual tributes. Overall, Light is slightly less reggae this time, more soulful and wholly funkadelic.

88 / RELEVANT_SEPT/OCT 09

THE MUSIC, MOVIES AND BOOKS YOU NEED TO CHECK OUT

OWL CITY OCEAN EYES (UNIVERSAL REPUBLIC)

MOS DEF THE ECSTATIC (DOWNTOWN)

> At times reminiscent of early

> As a testament to his eclectic style,

Prince if he used a computer more

Mos Def’s fourth release is a wild

and didn’t sing about sex, Owl City

trip through dangerous times. On

is set to rock the world—or at least

“Twilite Speedball,” a xylophone and

show what an introverted Minnesotan

brass instruments fight to the bitter

can accomplish over the Internet.

end—thanks to fine production by The

Assembled mostly from bits and

Neptunes—as the rapper/actor echoes

bytes, Ocean Eyes is so infectiously

street-worthy sentiments: life is a

joyous it makes you believe in music all

game; you have to play to win. Yet, his

over again. On “Fireflies,” singer and

ruminations on the seedy underbelly of

technomaster Adam Young reminisces

society give way to his characteristic,

about “misty eyes and bizarre dreams”

somewhat sly optimism: “The world

while a Nintendo-happy chorus chimes

is so dangerous, there is no need for

away in the background amid a fat-as-

fighting,” he raps on “Auditorium.”

a-marshmallow bassline. Young, a

The theme: When life throws you

devout Christian, touches on spiritual

lemons, throw those lemons back.

themes but steers clear of preachiness.

IT’S NEVER TOO LATE FOR A FRESH START FRESH START is your guide to moving from stuck to starting over. And it doesn’t take a selfhelp program, positive thinking, or transcendental glowsticks to achieve it! ““Stuckness,”” Doug writes, “was never part of the abundant life that Jesus promised.” Indeed, He came so that we can move forward, “have life... and have it to the full” (John 10:10). So come on! Take the first step. Your fresh start begins today!

PaZm l d^^ibg` rhn _khf [^bg` ma^ i^klhg @h] \k^Zm^] rhn mh [^8 DOUG FIELDS says, ”It’s not about trying harder; it’s about plugging into God’s transforming power.” www.ThomasNelson.com

Available wherever books are sold!

SON VOLT AMERICAN CENTRAL DUST (ROUNDER)

DAVID BAZAN CURSE YOUR BRANCHES (BARSUK)

A FINE FRENZY BOMB IN A BIRDCAGE (VIRGIN)

> Birthed out of the same

> It was hard to know what to expect

> “You should be wilder, you’re no

> Originally intended as a darker, louder

disharmonious band breakup as Wilco,

in the first formal long-player release

fun at all/Yeah thanks for the input,

release, Humbug finds Arctic Monkeys at

Son Volt weaves in more pedal steel

from David Bazan the solo artist.

thanks for the call,” sings Alison Sudol

their most diverse and mood-inducing.

and road-weary disenchantment

Would it be Pedro the Lion redux? Not

on the new A Fine Frenzy release,

Watch for “Potion Approaching,” a crazed

this time out. Jay Farrar should get

really—it’s a straightforward mix of

her voice a performance device of

down-tempo excursion that sounds like a

a medal for his persistence, jumping

infectious melodies and devestatingly

ethereal proportions. On the bridge,

Middle Eastern dance track gone wrong.

labels and replacing band members

personal lyrics about God, family,

she hits upper registry notes reserved

“Secret Door”—ornate and occasionally

when they don’t show up for recording

alcoholism and belief. Bazan has

for angels and English choir boys.

operatic—was apparently recorded inside

sessions. Here, he belts out his

said this is his most personal album,

Musically, A Fine Frenzy keeps driving

a sound chamber built by a ufologist

lonely dirt road melodies to anyone

and lines about his daughter like,

and assailing, pointing and grinning. At

in Joshua Tree, Calif. “Pretty Visitors”

who will listen. Songs about how

“Wondering if she’d soon despise the

times delivering the same whimsical-

thumps along, cobble-footed and random,

“divine hope turns to depredation”

smell/of the booze on my breath like

fairy vibe as Leigh Nash from Sixpence

with lyrics that only make sense if you’re

(on “When the Wheels Don’t Move”)

her mom” (from “Bless This Mess”)

None the Richer, Bomb includes a few

battling some sleep deprivation. “Dance

and assembly line invocations are

certainly support that claim. Add in his

folksy girl-on-a-guitar, singing at a

Little Liar” espouses the immediacy of

the norm. Why does it work? Like

honest reckoning with his loss of faith

bar songs, aiming squarely at those

lying—truth takes more research!—as the

your favorite jeans, these crotchety,

(“In Stitches” and “Harmless Sparks”),

who ﬁnd their music on YouTube.

drums provide cathartic release, a rapid-

countrified rock tunes never get old.

and the result is an album that lets the listener wrestle the pain with Bazan.

ARCTIC MONKEYS HUMBUG (DOMINO)

fire assault amid the outsized sentiments.

AUGUST BURNS RED CONSTELLATIONS (SOLID STATE)

MONSTERS OF FOLK MONSTERS OF FOLK (SHANGRI-LA MUSIC)

DEREK WEBB STOCKHOLM SYNDROME (INO)

> All the usual hard rock analogies

MODEST MOUSE NO ONE’S FIRST, AND YOU’RE NEXT (EPIC)

> If you put Conor Oberst, M. Ward and

> Derek Webb is not known for big

apply when it comes to August Burns

> An outtake from Modest Mouse is

Jim James from My Morning Jacket in

beats—Matisyahu he is not. Strangely,

Red: nail guns into sheet metal, a

akin to the best songs on other indie

a tin cup, placed it in a microwave and

he finds them on Stockholm Syndrome,

chainsaw symphony, screaming like

rock releases. This eight-song master

pressed “popcorn,” the result would

his most unusual and best release

you have acid reflux disease. Yet,

stroke—something to hold us over

sound a bit like Monsters of Folk, named

to date. Curiously non-analog violas

when they use the word “breakdown”

until the next full release—is a diverse

after a tour they did a few years ago.

wrap around a fat bassline progression

to describe their music, they aren’t

collection, culled from the band’s last

(The guys are all friends.) Rambling

on “Cobra Con.” “Freddie, Please”

kidding around. Just check out “The

two releases. “Satellite Skin” begins

guitar solos abound, with sing-a-long

is a smoky-bar rendition of a song

Escape Artist” for its 10-second

with tension—like every other Modest

choruses reminiscent of both Golden

that Frank Sinatra could have done

flailing and wailing sessions mid-song,

Mouse song—thanks to what sounds

Smog and Traveling Wilburys. Each artist

in his prime. And then there’s a

or “Meddler,” which has this crazy

like two strings being pulled taut.

gets a few moments to shine, and the

song called “The Spirit vs. The Kick

guitar/drums grudge match that stops

“Guilty Cocker Spaniels” is equally

harmonies are amazing—especially on

Drum,” during which the former

on a dime and unleashes a fury like

anxious, but “Perpetual Motion

“Say Please” and the brilliantly funky

songwriter for Caedmon’s Call sings

the band has never revealed before.

Machine”—with its trumpet and jazzy

“Dear God,” with its drum machine beats

sarcastically that having sex without

Melodic hardcore? Not really—more

extro—and the acoustified “King Rat”

and what sounds like a harp accenting

being in love (watch for the “grope

like embracing a jet engine.

fit better next to “Missed the Boat”

soft-spoken spiritual questions.

with me, baby” line) is like hell without

from their most recent release.

flames—as in, not gonna work.

RECOMMENDS

DVDS/// EARTH

(DISNEYNATURE) > Earth, the first feature film to be released by Disneynature, will—

as you might expect—wow you with rare footage and breathtaking scenery. But what you may not have expected is that it will also move you with its subtle spirituality. Earth follows the journey of three animal families through impossible locations across our fragile planet. Along the way, however, the film also reveals the creative character of God, valuable life lessons and environmental challenges. The life lessons are subtle and surprisingly applicable, given that a human never appears on-screen during the film. A polar bear teaches parenting lessons and the utility of tough love, spectacular tropical birds uncover the woes of dating and a pack of elephants highlight the importance of family bonds. But perhaps most profound is the lesson that applies to every viewer regardless of life stage: caring for creation. Actually seeing the effect that climate change is having on the ice caps and the polar bears is exponentially more powerful than reading about them. The “life or death quest for water” by the film’s animals is emblematic of the 3 million humans who will die this year because they do not have access to clean drinking water. The storyline evokes laughter and horror, introspection and genuine joy. But the real selling point is the film’s powerfully redemptive elements.

@karijobe

MONSTERS VS. ALIENS (DREAMWORKS ANIMATION) > It’s a story we know well—good vs.

THE SOLOIST (DREAMWORKS/ PARAMOUNT)

evil. The world is under attack. Oh,

> This “true story” will offer you

no! “Ooze gonna save us?” [Yes, that

more than just pretty music. Director

was the movie’s tagline.] Usually

Joe Wright (Atonement, Pride and

it’s the story of the mortal and the

Prejudice), creates a bond between

monster—but now, it’s the weird

Steve Lopez, an LA Times journalist

and slimy versus the strange and

(Robert Downey Jr.), and Nathaniel

gooey. Monsters vs. Aliens is a witty,

Ayers, a cello prodigy suffering from

action-packed adventure safe for the

schizophrenia (Jamie Foxx). When

whole family. It simultaneously pays

Lopez becomes captivated with

homage to and pokes fun at those

Ayers’ music, his determination to

cheesy 1950s sci-ﬁ ﬂicks. It isn’t

heal Ayers could potentially create a

a classic, but Reese Witherspoon,

predictable “rags to riches” motif—

Hugh Laurie and Seth Rogen are

but the movie will have none of

entertaining. So put on your galactic

that. The ﬁlm shifts into a beautiful

jammies, sprinkle colored salt on your

dichotomy of class, with moments

popcorn and awaken your inner child.

of grace in each erratic scene. It’s sure to strike a chord in your heart.

@lincolnbrewster

HILLSONG: FAITH + HOPE + LOVE LIVE (INTEGRITY)

ADVENTURELAND (MIRAMAX)

ALL TOMORROW’S PARTIES (WARP X FILMS)

AS WE FORGIVE (IMAGE BEARER PICTURES)

> For college grad James Brennan

> More of a documentary on the

> What if you found yourself living

> As the ﬁlmed counterpart of

(Jesse Eisenberg), hopes for summer

history of the All Tomorrow’s

next to the person responsible for your

Hillsong’s latest album, Faith + Hope

travels in Europe become a summer

Parties festival than a concert film,

family’s death? Ten years after the 1994

+ Love blends music with community

of working at Adventureland, a local

All Tomorrow’s Parties combines

Rwandan genocide, 60,000 murderers

outreach to convey how worship

theme park, when his parents suddenly

professionally shot concert footage

were released from prison and returned

should happen both in and outside

can’t fund the trip. But James’ time

with fan video and archival film. The

to the villages where they committed

church walls. The footage was taken

with the eccentric characters at the

documentary is spliced together with

their crimes. Combining interviews with

from three different worship nights

park—including philosopher Joel

reverence for its subject, juxtaposing

live footage, As We Forgive captures the

led by the United crew and others in

(Martin Starr), mysterious Em (Kristen

the often-wild artists (including Iggy

peacemaking process between killers

Sydney. Between songs, images of

Stewart) and handyman/wannabe rock

& the Stooges, Animal Collective, and

and survivors, showing how forgiveness

international city streets and people

star Mike (Ryan Reynolds)—probably

Belle & Sebastian) with the plastic-y

is possible even after unthinkable evil.

ﬂash by, evoking the need to do more

teaches him more than staying in

serenity of the festival surroundings—a

Filmmaker Laura Waters Hinson makes a

than just sing. The ﬁlm also features

hostels across the pond. One thing he

rundown summer resort rented out

national struggle personal by depicting

a behind-the-scenes look at song

learns is how much he can tolerate

of season. The festival hosts some

two heated stories of reconciliation. The

preparation, prayer and a discussion

hearing “Rock Me Amadeus” 50 times

of the biggest names in indie music,

ﬁlm, which won the Student Academy

of worship’s meaning. It is both an

a day. (Not much.) This coming-of-

and the documentary captures the

Award for Best Documentary, offers hope

encouragement and a challenge to

age film will inspire nostalgia—or at

feeling of community that can only

for all nations, cultures and relationships

move toward more outward living.

least some ‘80s music downloads.

come from such music festivals.

divided by past crimes and deep hatred.

@israelnewbreed

@vickybeeching

@integritymusic

RECOMMENDS

BOOKS///

DONALD MILLER (THOMAS NELSON)

> As Peter Rollins, a barroom

SHOP CLASS AS SOULCRAFT MATTHEW B. CRAWFORD (PENGUIN PRESS HC)

philosopher from Northern Ireland

> A philosopher/mechanic, Matthew

with a Ph.D. in postmodern theory,

Crawford explores the benefits of

> Donald Miller wants to tell you a story: of the time he hiked

reimagines the feeding of the 5,000,

the manual trades in Shop Class as

Machu Picchu to woo a girl; of the time he rode his bike across the country to help build wells in Africa; of how he went looking for his father; of how two filmmakers showed up at his door with the idea of turning his life into a movie. Donald Miller wants to tell you a story of what it means to organize your life into an epic of risk and reward and meaning. The elements that made Blue Like Jazz a national bestseller are here—Million Miles is funny, charming and disarmingly honest. Miller has come into his own as a prose craftsman, as in this passage reflecting on a beloved uncle felled by a heart attack: “[His] life was like the roots of a tree that went miles into the soil and miles around its trunk and came up in my cousins, in their faces and their voices and their character. I didn’t think you could kill a tree that big. Not even God could kill a tree that big.” Miller’s latest book is his best so far—his guts are in this one.

Jesus and His disciples collect food

Soulcraft. Drawing on his experience

from the crowd, bless it and eat

as an electrician and a motorcycle

like kings in front of the starving

mechanic, as well as the experiences of

multitudes. In another “impossible

other craftsmen, Crawford challenges

tale,” a man dragged before a court

the assumption that college is for

on charges of being a Christian is

everyone and articulates the difference

enraged when there is not enough

between the “knowing how” of the

evidence to convict him. Difficult,

trades and the “knowing what” of the

challenging and transformative, these

American education system. Shop

33 subversive parables get under

Class as Soulcraft is especially salient

your skin and become impossible

in today’s economic environment and

to ignore, until they start to change

calls us to reconsider how good work

not just the mind but the heart.

is defined in 21st-century America.

A MILLION MILES IN A THOUSAND YEARS

THE ORTHODOX HERETIC PETER ROLLINS (PARACLETE PRESS)

Shape Your Culture

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AS THEY SEE â&#x20AC;&#x2DC;EM BRUCE WEBER (SCRIBNER)

WOODSBURNER JOHN PIPKIN (NAN A. TALESE)

THE ANGELâ&#x20AC;&#x2122;S GAME CARLOS RUIZ ZAFĂ&#x201C;N (DOUBLEDAY)

FORGOTTEN GOD FRANCIS CHAN (DAVID C. COOK)

> Often unnoticed (at least until

> In April 1844, during an exceptionally

> Following his internationally

> After challenging us to pursue a

they screw up), the major league

dry Massachusetts spring, 26-year-

bestselling debut novel, Shadow

radical love of Christ in his debut book,

baseball umpire occupies a vital but

old Henry David Thoreau and a

of the Wind, Spanish author Carlos

Crazy Love, Francis Chan now turns his

little understood place in Americaâ&#x20AC;&#x2122;s

friend with whom he had been fishing

Ruiz ZafĂłn spins another tale of

attention to the Holy Spirit. He asserts

pastime. To research his book, As

accidentally sparked a fire that

literary-geek suspense (in the

that the Holy Spirit has long been

They See â&#x20AC;&#x2DC;Em, Bruce Weber spent

charred 300 acres of forest before

non-pejorative sense, of course)

neglected in American churches and

three years in â&#x20AC;&#x153;the land of umpires,â&#x20AC;?

the citizens of Concord, Thoreauâ&#x20AC;&#x2122;s

in The Angelâ&#x20AC;&#x2122;s Game. The story

American Christianity. Chan points to

which he compares to an isolated

hometown, were able to extinguish it.

takes place in Barcelona during the

the Holy Spirit as the ultimate source

island group rarely infiltrated by

John Pipkin reimagines the blaze and

1920s and 1930s and follows David

of powerâ&#x20AC;&#x201D;reminding the reader that

outsiders. Weber, a staff writer

its aftermath in Woodsburner, one of

Martin, an aspiring young writer of

Jesus promised to send the Holy

for The New York Times, does this

the most compelling debut novels of

serialized pulp fiction who is hired by

Spiritâ&#x20AC;&#x201D;the Helperâ&#x20AC;&#x201D;so we could be true

with some success, interviewing

the year. Pipkin weaves fiction and

a mysterious patron to write a book

and living witnesses for Christ ... and

current and former umpires,

history, exploring the relationship

that could change the world but may

that we would do â&#x20AC;&#x153;greater thingsâ&#x20AC;? as

players and coaches to tell the

between humans and their natural

end up destroying him in the process.

the result of the Spiritâ&#x20AC;&#x2122;s presence in

story of what itâ&#x20AC;&#x2122;s like and what it

surroundings, and speculating on

Written in the tradition of Umberto

our lives. Chan compellingly combines

takes to be one of these elite yet

how Thoreauâ&#x20AC;&#x2122;s guilt over the fire may

Eco and Dan Brown, this page-turner

Scripture with narrative as he invites us

faceless arbiters of the game.

have led him toward Walden Pond.

only slows when ZafĂłn indulges in

to stop and remember the One weâ&#x20AC;&#x2122;ve

facile religious philosophizing.

forgottenâ&#x20AC;&#x201D;the Spirit of the living God.

Live The Language

www.semesterinspain.org/rm spain@trnty.edu or call us 800.748.0087

CONTENTS

Any chance the government might expand the “Cash for Clunkers” program? We have a few articles we could unload.

MISC.

06 FIRST WORD

Cameron Strang

08 LETTERS 12 SLICES 22 WORLDVIEW Spotlight

24 DEEPER WALK Frontliner

26 REJECT/ APATHY Spotlight

28 REJECT/ APATHY

60 / RELEVANT_/MONTHMONT 09

FOR THE LOVE One very secular student dares to go undercover at one of America’s most conservative colleges.

Frontliner

30 THE DROP

Cover story

Zee Avi, Niamaj, The Low Anthem, Brooke Waggoner

WILCO

38 WINE TO WATER

Frontman Jeff Tweedy doesn’t leave anything off the table.

Doc Hendley is putting a twist on Jesus’ ﬁrst miracle

52 THE TIDE IS TURNING

Evidence our ﬁght against disease is actually working

TECHNOLOGY & YOUR SOUL Your laptop, your iPod, your cell phone ... all within arm’s reach. But what’s all that convenience really doing to you and to your faith?

58 REGINA

SPEKTOR

THE NOT GOING BACK TO SCHOOL GUIDE What to do when fall is no longer the start of the school year.

The Russian songstress is rediscovering myth

66 ANTHONY

HAMILTON

This soul singer is about more than just heartbreak

78 RELEVANT

RECOMMENDS

Our favorite music, DVDs and books

GLUTTONY One of the seven deadly sins is not simply about eating too much.

PAPER ROUTE

THIS GENERATION CAN END EXTREME POVERTY.

ARE YOU IN?

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