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| From the NYC Public Library Digital Collction |
I chose the band Luxury to build my talk around, as they are one of my all time favorites, and have recently been more in the "news" as they released a new album and have a documentary due out this year. This is the video clip that was used to fund their Kickstarter campaign, and I showed an edited version of it today before I spoke:
As can been seen in the video, Luxury is a fairly bizarre band in that 3 of the 5 members are Orthodox Priests. While not Orthodox personally, I am fascinated by the church due to its emphasis on the arts and on mystery. I cut this part out of my talk due to time constraints, but Luxury bass player Chris Foley's essay Man as Priest of Creation has a huge impact on me and greatly influenced my presentation. I highly recommend you read the whole thing, but here is a relevant passage:
"I found that the emphasis on the Incarnation of Christ stressed the goodness of creation and that now matter is united to God. This means that matter matters and beauty is not just something external to God (i.e. – optional) but an energy emanating from from God Himself – an absolute. I discovered that the early Church rejected anything that divided or separated Christ’s humanity from His divinity. As I learned more about the Orthodox faith, I found that the Orthodox teaching that every aspect of life is sacramental underpinned every teaching of Christ and the Church . This idea that matter matters speaks profoundly to faith as it relates to the creative process."
As I wrote in these essays on 1995 music last year, I struggled much in my teenage years about the secular vs. sacred divide. This divide tore at me for a long time, and thankfully, eventually Jesus revealed to me the divide is not truth. My essay on Fleming and John and Hoi Polloi ended this way (feels strange to quote myself):
My faulty, black-and-white world of “Christian music” and “secular music” was greyed so much by these two albums that the line no longer existed — there was just music.
My main point today (when I spoke, and I as I now write) is that music is mysterious. Music requires us to take it seriously, and examine its beauty and depth. And we can apply to this mystery to many aspects of our lives, and open ourselves up to things we don't understand. Music has allowed me to embrace mystery- both in art, in the world, and in the fractured Christian church. And as someone who grew up legalistic and judgmental, embracing mystery has allowed me to follow Jesus better: by loving God and loving others, many of whom are very different than myself.
5/10/16 Update: I uploaded a rough audio recording to YouTube of the 30-minute chapel talk if you are curious to listen (and watch).
I made aYouTube playlist of 8 songs I used in my presentation today, both directly, and by reference:
