OT —
To begin with, a confession: I am among the many thousands across the Western world who at this time of year participate in choral events that inflict Handel’s Hallelujah chorus upon our communities. I apologize, dear readers. In the choir of which I am part, we attempt to atone for this musical transgression by singing […]
So I bought Martina McBride’s and Lucinda Williams’s new cds last night at Target. McBride’s cd comes in your typical plastic hinged jewel case with liner notes stowed inside the front cover and the cd secured in the plastic tray with the little slotted button in the middle. But Williams’s cd … oh boy […]
A hip friend of mine turned Averyfineline HQ onto Pandora, part of the Music Genome Project (the interns are also atwitter over the Roku, but that’s another story). The basic idea is that you plug in some of your favorite kinds of music or artists and Pandora custom builds an aggregating “station” that pulls music […]
Some friends gave me a pair of their season tickets to the symphony the other night, and it was a delightful evening of Strauss, Bernstein, and Brahams (his angsty first piano concerto). This should go without saying at this point in civilization but from I hear (quite literally) it needs to be repeated a little […]
Today’s New York Times kicked off Part I of a three-part series on Pentecostalism in America. As it’s the fastest-growing brand of Christianity today and not a little part of southern gospel, seems worth staying abreast of in all its complexity and increasing diversity. This first installment has a predictably New Yorkcentric approach, but is […]
It doesn’t matter if you like the song he’s writing about - “And I’m Telling you I’m not Going” from Dreamgirls - or not (though I for one do). The writing here is just distractingly wonderful.
Danny Jones wheels out the phony war-on-Christmas trap-set and gives it a few licks. Sigh. Obviously, I’m unmoved by this crusade, not least of all because it’s simply not true that Christmas has been suddenly secularized by newly aggressive anti-Christian forces. On this point, I recommend David Greenberg’s recent article in Slate. Money quote:
The Christmas […]
I’m working with my back to the television and I hear this singer’s voice on the Macy’s Day parade and think “Wow that woman sounds a lot like Sandi Patty … singing a really schlocky song about Oklahoma rising.” I turn around and lo … SANDI PATTY herself … headlining the float from her home […]
This story from the New York Times (free registration required) about evangelicals openly, vocally fearing the loss of youth and what it means for the future of evangecalism might be of some tangential interest to readers of this site.
I honestly don’t know enough about on-the-ground realities of evangelical church life anymore to comment on this […]
Dear reader, I confess. I am addicted to Grey’s Anatomy. The emotional pressure cooker of high-risk (and highly melodramatic) surgery, the vertiginous pitch of the surgical intern’s life, teetering dangerously between medical heroics and mortal cataclysms, the whiplashing between the highs of staunching multiple GSWs or saving abandoned newborns and the ordinary lows of trying […]
From the “hyperbole in Christian marketing” department: Pat Robertson drinks a shake that helps him leg press Benny Hinn’s bus full of healed people. Take that Vitamins 4 […]
That Ernie Fletcher, he’s a sparky little fella. Despite a multi-count indictment against him, the governor of Kentucky (for whom Kenny Bishop works, but in a capacity that hasn’t been implicated […]
Please tell me Jerry Kirksey did not just write a column in which he reduces the integration of Ole Miss to an amusing bon mot (light on the bon) about how hotheaded liberal kids […]
It looks like something’s in the air or the water or the conservative kool-aid was especially strong at the last get-together or something … because John Rulapaugh gives Jerry Kirskey a run for his money in his […]
Ken Kirksey has been doing some fine work recently about anti-intellectualism among contemporary evangelicals. It’s good stuff, for the Christian and non-Christian alike. I said it was “off […]
So back in the day, it used to be my job as the Good Preacher’s Son to change the pithy saying on the plastic-lettered sign out front of the church (”Seven Days Without Prayer Makes One Weak,” […]
It has nothing to do with southern gospel, but Ken Kirksey’s most recent post (sorry, the archives were down when I last checked at SN) is a must-read for any student of culture, politics, and religion. […]
