A Word from Jacques Maritain to Michael Jackson

Why is it weird that Michael Jackson has died? Miriam-Webster defines weird as "an unearthly or supernatural strangeness, or it may stress queerness or oddness." Weird things usually land somewhere between the boundary of Normal and Supra-Normal. The "King" of Pop dies in debt. That's weird.

The Most Successful Entertainer of all Time, according to Guiness World Records--13 Grammy Awards, thirteen #1 singles, the sale of 750 million records worldwide--never learns how to be an adult. That's weird.

On November 21, 2008, Michael Jackson, in the presence of Yusuf Islam (formerly known as Cat Stevens), converts to Islam. That's weird, weird because it follows no clearly discernal logic of human behavior. What did all his facial surgeries produce? A sad and unearthly strangeness. Or in street speak: creepiness.

Michael's total lifetime earnings are estimated at $500 million, while his debt approaches $400 million. That's weird.

The parents of one of the most powerful artists of our day question whether their son died with a valid will. The fact that his family is squabbling over what kind of funeral to hold for Michael just makes things weirder, not in a weirder-than-other-normal-family-funeral weirdness, just weird in its own hyper-exposed way.

Farrah Fawcett dies on the same day. News of Michael's death plows like a juggernaut over her news. Farrah, the sex symbol of the '70s, dies of anal cancer. That's weird. The New York Times publishes an article with the title, "Farrah Fawcett, a Sex Symbol Who Aimed Higher." It's a title that strikes me as downright weird. What exactly is a 'sex symbol'? What exactly does it mean for a sex symbol to aim 'higher'? And what is a sex symbol who dies of anal cancer? In a word: weird.

Both Michael and Farrah, both haunted by their alter ego in the pin-up poster world, lived a pathetic life, chock full of pathos. The NYT writer notes this about Farrah:

"A scrim of sadness covers Farrah Fawcett's career. Her stardom traced that cautionary Hollywood arc: meteoric fame followed by years spent trying first to overcome it, then, too late, seeking to recapture it."

I feel sympathy for the way that Farrah might have felt tossed around like a puppet in the Hollywood machine. But I equally feel it's pathetic to see her try to recapture fame. Did it not terrify her the first time around?

After his 2005 child abuse trial, Jackson flees to Bahrain to hide away from the oppressive glare of the public eye. The public eye wanted to behold him, like a god, night and day. They wanted to know what Michael ate (strictly vegetarian), what he wore (rhinestone-studded gloves), how he parented (lovingly, apparently), how he failed (multiply just like Us), the amount of money he spent on vacation ($10,000 for in-flight goods on Swiss Air) and the way he dealt with regret (he built the Neverland Ranch). The man adored by millions hid from them by lodging with sheikhs in the Middle East.

In his music he bridged ages and races. He danced with the energy of James Brown and the grace of Fred Astaire. He redefined the music video. Elizabeth Taylor named him "The King of Pop," while George H. W. Bush proclaimed him "Artist of the Decade" for the 1980s. The American Music Awards honored him as Artist of the Century. The German-based Hubert Berda Media conferred on him the Pop Artist of the Millenium Award.

But how, pray God, do you top that? "Greatest Artist of the Last 10,000 Years? Bezalel at #2"?

Humans cannot bear the weight of this kind of mass adoration. Nor are humans meant to give anyone but God their total devotion. When we place our adoration on another human being, we crush them with our neediness. When a human being seeks this kind of adoration, it disfigures them.

Jesus once said, "What does it profit a man to gain the whole world yet forfeit his soul?" Michael gained the whole "world," yet it came at the cost of his own anxieties and obsessions. And to what extent were we his audience complicit in the forfeiture of his soul? Perhaps more than we're willing to admit.

To my mind, it is a basic question of health. What does it mean to be a whole and hale and even happy, healthy artist?

I believe a healthy artist is one who is integrated and fruitful. That understanding comes out of my reading of Genesis and the Gospels. But I like how the French philosopher Jacques Maritain (1882-1973) puts it. In his essay "On Christian Art," he says to talk of Christian art is as if we were to talk about the art of the bee or the art of man. Christian art is nothing less and certainly nothing more than "the art of humanity redeemed."

"It is implanted in the Christian soul, by the side of the running waters, under the sky of the theological virtues, amid the breaths of the seven gifts of the Spirit. It is natural for it to bear Christian fruit."

By nature we are all of us broken. But grace heals our wounds. And but for the grace of God, any one of us could end up as profoundly disoriented as Michael or Farrah.

Echoing Augustine, Maritain locates the specific identity of Christian art in the interior life of the artist. The art of redeemed humanity, or the Christ-transformed humanity, cannot be limited to any particular kind of object or style. On the contrary, as Maritain insists:

"Everything, sacred and profane, belongs to it. It is at home in the whole range of man's industry and joy. Symphony or ballet, film or novel, landscape or still life, vaudeville or opera, it can be as apparent in them all as in the stained-glass windows and statues of churches."

On this understanding, the movie The Apostle, in which Farrah plays the neglected wife of a Pentecostal preacher, or Jackson's, call me crazy, famous Moonwalk could be regarded as Christian. How so? The movie shows sin as sin and grace as grace and neither are made easy for us. Michael's dance move is fun, athletic, silly, mesmerizing and as unnecessary as grace. The songs could stand on their own. But adding dance introduces an excess of joy; and if grace is anything, it is an excess, among other things, of God's joy.

What is it that secures us as artists? What is it that protects us from turning our gift into an idol? How do we guard against the crushing weight of our own power as artists, our power to create and our power to influence? Again I believe Maritain gets it right. The art of humanity redeemed will be powerful and beautiful, he says:

"only on the condition that it overflows from a heart possessed by grace. . . . And if the beauty of the work is Christian, it is because the appetite of the artist is rectified in regard to such a beauty, and because Christ is present in the soul of the artist by love."

The work will be Christian, he adds, "in proportion as the love is alive." This isn't a feelings-based love. This is the love of Christ, humbled and broken, and thus both beautiful and powerful.

How then do we pursue a healthy and fruitful life as artists? Maritain answers: seek to be a saint. You will be a great artist, regardless of your productivity, if you seek to be possessed by love. That is what it means to be a saint, to live in love, to live with and to be possessed by Christ. Then, Maritain insists, the artist "may go and do as he likes." Make your vaudevilles. Dance your moonwalks. Sink yourself fully into the neglected wife of a Pentecostal preacher and find Christ there.

I'm sad both Michael and Farrah have died. There's nothing I could ever do to prevent their death of course. We all die some day, famous people included. But I'm sad all the same. I was a Jackson fan in the '80s. I've attended a Michael Jackson dance party or two. I'm sad for the loss, the loss of their presence in the art world and the loss of so many things I imagine they wish they could have recovered over the course of their lives. “I never had the chance to do the fun things kids do,” Jackson once explained. “There was no Christmas, no holiday celebrating. So now you try to compensate for some of that loss.” Farrah lost the integrity of her physical body.

All I can do is pray. I can pray for their families. And I can certainly continue to pray for the artists I know, some of whom possess an uncommon giftedness, all of whom face the kinds of temptations, the "carnival of the uneducated passions," as Archbishop Rowan Williams puts it, that Michael and Farrah faced.

But for the grace of God, here we all go.

800 Acres of Texas Living

"Unless you don't give a damn for painting, painting won't give a damn for you." -- the French painter Jacques-Louis David (1748-1825)

Phaedra and I are officially in the transition tunnel. On the other side of this tunnel lies Durham, North Carolina: six weeks away. It's funny how stress multiplies like fruit flies in times like this. We're trying to keep our heads sane. Trips to the swimming pool and to the nacho bar at Chuy's certainly help, but there are moments when you wonder.

Anyhoo, we had a chance to go on a family vacation last week. That'd be my side of the family: mom and dad, Cliff and Christine and the kids, Stephanie and Scranton and the kids. We spent four days in the middle of west Texas, near a small town called Goldthwaite. I love that name. It's a name that belongs in a Cormac McCarthy novel. Our temporary home was a quintessentially Texas ranch: 800 acres, a small pond, a herd of Longhorn cattle, tractors, guns, a go-kart. We ate ribs and brisket. We drank strange brews. We played Farkle.

We jumped on trampolines and fed catfish. Dad taught the grandsons how to shoot a b-b gun. Stephanie almost led us in a Dan In Real Life-esque family kick-boxing workout. (We ran out of time.) Phaedra and I slept with an AC unit, a ceiling fan and two floor fans. We made homemade ice cream (mint and bolders of dark chocolate). And on the last morning before we all took the rode home, we céilidh danced, or danced a céilidh , or jumped a jig, or however you say that. It was very fun.

Here are a few pictures from our west Texas getaway.

(Phaedra tearing it up on the go-kart.)

(The pond with the catfish.)

(Skye Warner looking cute as a button and ready to run through that sprinkler in the background.)

("Papa" teaching Brendan how to shoot right.)

(Phaedra holding some red-headed yumminess: Sohren Twohey.)


(Sohren and Speight: mad max boys.)

(The fam.)

(Early morning in the middle of nowhere and all is quiet on the Texas frontier.)

(Cruising with the boys.)

(Dancing with the Stars.)

(Riding down our dinner.)

A Top Ten: Lewis, Siedell, Russian lit, Nietzsche, rockalicious hair et al

(PHOTO: Myself, Malcolm Guite, John Perkins and another dude standing outside the Great Hall at Duke University.)

I'm incapable of writing a coherent blog right now. I'm going to drop a Top Ten instead.

1. CS Lewis' Experiment in Criticism.
I have to say: Lewis is a rockstar. I just finished reading Experiment and find yet again that his writing style is eminently satisfying. I especially appreciate it as I'm about to enter Graduate School Land. It's the land where smart people live. They live and they write books. Thank God for the good people who produce good scholarship. But intelligence, even brilliance, is no guarantee that a man can generate clean, crisp English--or German or any language. We should pass a law that forbids the publication of turgid writing. It's criminal what some scholars get away with. So I thank my lucky stars when I read a sentence like this from Lewis:

"Escape, then, is common to many good and bad kinds of reading. By adding 'ism to it, we suggest, I suppose, a confirmed habit of escaping too often, or for too long, or into the wrong things, or using escape as a substitute for action where action is appropriate, and thus neglecting real opportunities and evading real obligations."

That, my friends, is a dog that will hunt. That is a philosophy of reading that pastors and parents and artists and school principals and anybody who cares about the moral health of the civitas should meditate upon.

Here's another juicy turn of phrase. Speaking of our envy as adults of childhood (the things we should naturally envy, that is), he includes "its well-thatched scalp." A full head of hair performs the job fine. But a well-thatched scalp is vivid and, I'm not sure why, funny.

2. Dan Siedell's God in the Gallery.
I've just finished writing my review of Siedell's book for Books & Culture. I only had 800 words to work with, so now I have reams of pages full of commentary that will go nowhere but around my head and perhaps into this blog. Along the way I wrote down a list of general observations. I noted that Siedell, at bottom, seems to be asking for an overhaul of the way we live and move and have our artistic being as Protestants. Tall task that. The kind of overhaul he has in mind, I believe, would implicate the following general habits:

- our discomfort with unsolved mystery
- our ambivalence about the goodness of the material world
- our aversion to contemplation over against action
- our allergic reaction to the senses vis-a-vis the rational
- our insecurities about the paucity of visual artistry in our history
- our prejudice against the visual, as if it pulled us ineluctably, like a STAR WARS tractor beam, into idolatry
- our assumption that a de-nuded worship space is more holy and therefore pleasing to God than an "ornamented" one. (The fact that God lingers with our primal mother and father in a sensory overloaded garden seems to always be ignored.)

3. "It's not a program, stupid." That's not the politest way to speak but it gets the message across. As I sat in our all-day meeting at Duke Divinity, talking about the future of a theology and arts institute, it struck me that a lot of our comments revolved around programs and activities. There wasn't a stupid person in the room of course. People were offering great suggestion--suggestions I want in on. But a light bulb went off in my head at one point. It's gone off before.

It's a light bulb that made it into the Introduction of my book. If we really want to experience the kind of environmental conditions in which the arts will flourish in a Protestant setting--in the same way that the fruit and flora of God's creation flourish, both in kind and degree--then we don't need programs. The best program money could buy would still not accomplish what we yearn to see. What we need is a different theological and practical ecology. We need a different tradition.

I'm talking about a massive overhaul of a culture. In such a culture every bit of labor, every bit of a program matters. But what a culture has that a program the size of Jupiter doesn't have is positive inertia. That's what we need. We need for the current to be constantly and positively running in the direction of artistic flourishment, not fighting against us half the time.

4. It always makes me happy when I see Phaedra working on her art. She's doing that right now. Poor woman, she's stuck in that miserably hot garage of ours. I'm proud of her, though, the heat and mosquitoes be damned.

5. Our friggin AC is running night and day, world without end. It's hot in Austin, Texas. I'm starting to go batty.

6. Nietzsche: “He who has a why to live can bear almost any how.”

7. And from the mind of Gilbert Keith: “If you’re going through hell, keep going.” Chesterton, that is.

8. I am completely jealous of this man's beard.


9. Russian Literature: Olga Grushin's The Dream Life of Sukhanov. St. John the Forerunner Orthodox Church here in town has invited me to come speak to their community about art. We have some good friends who attend there. I'm excited to be going. It'll be great. Father Aidan told me one of the things that they want to talk about is Grushin's novel. I just picked up a copy at Half Price. The New York Times thinks it's a good book. I've only gotten a few pages into it. I'm not crazy about her handling of adjectives, but no worries, I have another 336 pages of story to discover and it's been a while since I read anything by a Russian.

10. Beautiful art. I've had a stimulating exchange of late with Bobette Rose from Madison, Wisconsin. She's created a series of encaustic paintings that I find very beautiful. Here is one I particular love; and with this I wish you a merry June 12.

21,052 Visitors in One Year + Duke + Theo & Arts

So I know I'm not CNN or The New York Times, or even Tila Tequila. But I've completed one year of keeping track of blog visits. 21,052 ain't too shabby. It doesn't matter of course; it's mostly silly numbers. And you never know, I might have visited myself half that time. But as I look at the list of countries in the MapClusters counter, I can proudly say that I mimic a (very, very unusual) summer Olympics medal count:

USA: 17,266 visits
Canada: 829 visits
United Kingdom in a close second but coming in at an honorable third: 811
Germany at a steep drop: 150 visits
Australia barely missing fourth at: 148 visits
India the next world superpower muscling in at: 119 visits

And on the list goes. I love the bottom of the list.

CUT: Ack! I'm now writing one day later (Monday, June 1) and MapClusters has just recycled my list to zero. I've lost all record of countries visited. Crap. Apparently today is DAY 1: A NEW BEGINNING.

United States (US) 34
Canada (CA) 5
Turkey (TR) 5
Algeria (DZ) 2
Poland (PL) 1
Norway (NO) 1
United Kingdom (GB) 1
Germany (DE) 1
Australia (AU) 1

I'm as popular in Algeria as I am in Norway.

Anyhoo, the point of all this is to say thank you for visiting me here. I've kept this blog chiefly as a writing discipline. Secondarily it's allowed me to work out some of my thinking about art and the church, culture and Christian faith. It's been a pleasure to interact with you in the comments section and I appreciate many of your honest, sometimes challenging thoughts. Keep the challenges coming. I do apologize that I wasn't the most prompt in my replies. But I'm excited about the next year of blogging. I've had this blog since November 2004 and by November 2009 I'll be blogging about life at Duke University.

Phaedra and I have had a great time so far (we arrived this past Friday, we depart this coming Saturday). We enjoyed a lovely Saturday repast with Steve and Sally Breedlove as well as Tim and Skylar. Steve's the rector at All Saints Anglican. Sally's a spiritual director. Tim just graduated from Duke Divinity and Skylar's an artist and quite the baker (bakeress?). Sunday we worshiped at All Saints, then joined their community for a wonderful picnic afterwards. Sunday evening, the Center for Reconciliation's summer institute began in earnest.

Last night and all day today I've had the privilege of participating in an exploratory meeting on behalf of a Duke Divinity School initiative with theology and the arts. The hope is that it will soon become an institute. Some sharp people gathered in the alumni room. We imagined efforts related to teaching, research and art events. We explored possible directions that involved both the official school year as well as summer programs for a general audience. It's an exciting future to be sure. I'm honored and grateful to be able to play a small part in its development.

It's bee-yew-tiful in Durham/Chapel Hill/Carrboro/Hillsborough/Pittsboro. Green, lush, tall trees, pleasant weather. Delish. We both feel a quiet peace in our hearts about moving here. We're meeting many new friends and we're asking God to help us find a good home. One day at a time.

Go Blue.

Pentecostal Protestantism Wins American Idol!

As some know, Kris Allen, winner of season 8 of American Idol last night, is a worship leader at New Life Church in Maumelle, AR. He also attends the campus ministry Chi Alpha at UCA. It's funny because my sister Christine and her husband, Cliff, went to Chi Alpha while they were at the University of Texas in the early '90s. I visited a few times and liked it. But soon after I lost my faith and wandered the far country for a couple of years, though not without the love of many in that group, one of whom I worship with today at my Anglican church in Austin.

What's curious about Kris is not only that he represents a long line of Christians winning American Idol (see here for Huffington Post commentary). It's that he's specifically a Pentecostal Christian. More curious, Danny Gokey, #3 singer to be voted off, is also Pentecostal. And he too leads worship, at a church in Milwaukee, WI, Faith Builders International Ministries to be exact.

I looked up both church's websites and yes, they're essentially, or quintessentially, Pentecostal. As I think about arts in the church (in the Protestant church) and our role in the culture at large, I was reminded last night that, in a sense, tradition is everything. Traditions, like biological ecologies, breed certain kinds of persons and practices. Pentecostalism breeds musicians.

Whether it's John Wimber, the godfather of the Vineyard Church and a keyboardist for the Righteous Brothers, or Hillsong Church in Australia with Darlene Zschech bequeathing to the world--yes, world--the song "Shout to the Lord," the Pentecostal tradition creates an ideal environment for musicians to grow and excel at their craft. That craft may be limited to certain types of music. Sure. But it's a music that they're quite good at.

I was surprised Kris won last night. Phaedra and I don't have a television so we had to go to the gym and climb the treadmills so we could watch the marathon of music showbiz. We watched and ran. And ran and ran and ran. Eventually we slowed the treadmills down to a very mosey pace. Our muscles were this close from a massive cramp. Two hours of KISS, QUEEN, ROD STEWART, QUEEN LATIFAH, KEITH URBAN, CINDY LAUPER, LIONEL RICHIE, BLACK EYED PEAS and the gang of variety-style pop musicians was enough to wear us down. The never-ending commercials didn't help either.

We thought Adam Lambert was a shoe-in. The boy's got the chops.

But he didn't. Kris won. Kris the mousy, deferent, aw-shucks, Chi Alpha, worship-leading, tenor-singing, short-term missions trip-going, hot-as-a-sex-idol Kris. Humble Kris. Child of a pentecostal musical ecology Kris.

Well done, Kris. With nearly 100 million Americans voting, Phaedra and I were surprised you took the prize. But we're happy for you. And I said a prayer of thanks for the good that the church has done to foster a love for music.

Now all we need is for the church to develop an equally vibrant tradition for visual art-making, filmmaking, poetry-making, theater-making, dance-making, architecture-making. Then we'll be rocking.

Published Article: On the Art of Encouragement

I'll write soon about our fantastic time in Endicott, New York, leading a retreat for artists at Union Center Christian Church. What a great bunch of people. Brian and Tamara Murphy, for the record, are officially our favorite people in all of upstate NY, possibly the entire state.

For now I'm posting a link to an article I wrote for Q WORDS: A Digital Magazine About Faith and Culture. The magazine is a production of the Fermi Project and the fearless leadership of Gabe Lyons, Norton Herbst, Rob McCloskey and other sharp-as-a-tack folk.

With each "issue," they include an essay and two video talks given at previous Q conferences. In my issue they adjoin Makoto Fujimura, "Beauty in Culture," and Jamie Tworkowski, founder of "To Write Love on Her Arms."

I was very pleased when they chose to use Phaedra's artwork as the masthead image for the issue. I've included the whole painting here.

I geared my essay principally to those in leadership. My aim was to inspire and inform leaders of the crucial importance of encouragement in the life of an artist. But really, all of us are in the business of needing encouragement as well as of needing to offer encouragement to fellow artists. So I hope you find this a helpful essay to share with those around you, over you, and under your care.

The magazine is by subscription only. Thankfully, it's only $40. Once you pay that you get access to all the other issues. That includes thoughts by Alister McGrath, Andy Crouch, Bethany Hoang, Shane Hipps, Josh Jackson, Ruth Padilla Deborst, Eric Metaxas, Catherine Rohr, Francis Collins, Os Guiness, Susan Grant, Charles Colson, Cathleen Falsani, Donald Miller et al.

Here is an excerpt from my essay:

...I believe Shackleton’s note should be posted on the front cover of every art book, every art school brochure, every announcement of every art summer camp, every art magazine, every artist residency, and every website of every organization dedicated to the preparation of artists. I would amend it this way:

Warning: Hazardous material inside. Might cost you your sanity. All children aspiring to be artists, like children born of a communist state, must memorize the following memorandum. Herein lies your future life: small wages, bitter rejections, long months of enduring drafts of work that are complete drivel. Constant danger from people around you, especially the church-going and blood-related, who will tell you (or forcefully hint) that you are crazy and weird and wasting your time. Safe return to the end of your life doubtful. Honor and recognition in case of success, but likely not financial. So hold on to the honor part because that is probably all you will get.

It is difficult to be an artist. Over the last thirteen years working as a pastor in Austin, Texas, I have seen hundreds of professional and amateur artists—filmmakers and modern dancers, poets and actors, singer-songwriters, designers, painters, architects, even a clown artist—come and go through the doors of Hope Chapel.

I have seen many artists succeed and plenty fail. Most fight for every inch of progress. All artists I’ve known have had to look the Minotaur in the face: “Do I quit or do I keep going?”

The CDC and 2 Dancing Dudes

CDC Warning: "Do not do this."

This swine, er, fine, pic is courtesy of Phaedra's dad.

I've got plenty to report from my visit to the Q conference last week, and a blessing ceremony for a newly minted arts pastor down in San Antonio, and our forthcoming trip to upstate New York to lead a retreat for artists and creatives. But my cabeza is tired at the moment, so I'm depositing lighter fare for now. To use Terri Fisher's phrase, Phaedra and I are learning to "abandon ourselves to hope" in a season when things don't always go according to plan, and sometimes you just need a little bit of silly laughter to keep going.

The two dancing dudes below don't have much in common, at least not in what we witness in these videos. But they do share one characteristic: courage. You may or may not like what they do artistically. Both, however, exhibit a great deal of courage in their respective performances. Without courage you can't make your best art; indeed you won't make your best art. But as sure as the sun rises, your best art lives on the other side of many, many acts of courage.

So go for it, my artist friends.

(That sounds, I know, like something Stephen Covey would say. Still, it's true. And I bet David Bayles and Ted Ortland would agree.)

1. Dancing Dude #1



2. Dancing Dude #2
[YouTube has disabled the embedding function. You'll have to go here to see it. Oh me. It's so bizarrely funny. If you're in a bummer mood, do yourself a favor and click on the link. It's never to late, my friends, never too late.]

And one bonus video with Dom Deluise.



Ok, I can't help myself, this one is hilarious.

Michael Jordan Prayed for Me

We had a fan-ta-stic time out at the Laity Lodge retreat. For three full days we shared space--a beautiful, quiet, restorative space--with men and women from around the country: 6 New Yorkers, 6 Georgians, 6 Coloradians (Colorados?), 5 Washingtonians, two Canadians, plus folks from North and South Carolina, California, Virginia, Pennsylvania, Tennessee, Florida, Indiana, Iowa and a scad from around Texas, all of whom feel called in one form or another to shepherd artists.

Phaedra and I drove home on Thursday with great joy. We were ready to open a commune so we could hang with these dear people forever.

It was great to hang out with Mako, sweet, gentle-souled Mako. Mako and Matson Duncan went fishing. Kenyon Adams, who heads up music and theater activities (under Luann Jennings' fearless leadership) at Redeemer Presbyterian in NYC, went swimming. Shannon Newby, an Atlantian with a mean handling of encaustic painting and a heart for missions (along with her husband Erik) in Germany, made art down in the studios. Lance Mancefield, a producer along with Michael Card with the By/For project, strategized with impunity. I went for a walk with young monsignor of emergent village, Troy Bronsink. Others napped, rested, slept, hung in hammocks, chatted, and napped again, climbed bluffs, fed raccoons, read, or did nothing.

We worshiped, being lovingly led by Brian Moss. We heard me speak. And Mako too. And Steven Purcell three. We put on a 5 Minutes Max. We prayed together. We watched Stephanie Moss dance. She rocked. We laughed. And some wept from being overly exhausted and crushed under the weight of the unreasonable expectations placed on those in full-time ministry.

But mostly, I think, we had a blast. And we ate like olympian gods.

I feel very, very encouraged about the church's work with artists; and by church I don't mean simply a local church, I mean the church universal, the church in the thick of things. God is faithfully raising up a generation of pastors and ministers to artists. As our children and our children's children continue to pour into art programs in greater numbers, God is preparing a tribe of men and women who will care for their spiritual, relational and artistic well-being. It is a good thing. It is beautiful in my eyes.

Here are a few pictures from the retreat. (I wish I had more but I didn't have a chance to take as many as I usually am able.) I'm now praying that God will allow us to do it again next year. I'll take every excuse to retreat with these dear people, and to invite all those who couldn't make it this time around. Next year, my friends.

(Troy Bronsink, Jeffrey Guy [amazing painter guy], and Todd Damotte.)

(A panel of six practitioners: Geinene Carson with Operation Mobilisation's Arts Link, Roz Dimon, the most spunky, funny person on site, who serves as Director of Communications at St. Bartholomew's Episcopal Church in NYC, Luann Jennings of Redeemer Pres in NYC (with whom I had the most lovely connection), Dal Schindell, director of Publications at Regent College and dry, dry humorous guy, and Lance Mansfield.)

(Steven and Amy Purcell, Mako, Phaedra and myself.)

(Mako and Brian Moss thinking deep thoughts.)

(Matt and Geinene Carson and us.)


(And last but not least in the photo reel: Michael Jordan himself. Michael serves as Pastor of Music and Creative Arts at Greenwood Community Church in Castle Rock, CO. I asked if he would be willing to pray for folks on our last morning. He kindly said yes. Then over lunch, along with a few of our new BFF's, he prayed a sweet prayer over me and Phaedra and the work God has for us. I can always tell my children: "Kids, Michael Jordan prayed for me and it was a good prayer.")

Here is an excerpt from my first talk at the retreat, "The Preparation of the Pastor to Artists":

As you and I learn to become at home with our brokenness and to see it as the arena for God’s work in and through us, as St. Paul believed, we will be able to help artists face their own brokenness and to invite God into it and to see God saving them in and through and out of their brokenness so that they too can give hope to a world that is afraid.

We can remind artists that some of the greatest work produced in history has come out of a context of woundedness: Beethoven deaf when he wrote the 9th symphony, John Milton blind when he wrote Paradise Lost, Van Gogh mentally broken down at the end of his life, dying at only 37 years of age, Byron with a clubfoot, Demosthenes a terrible stutterer. As Madeleine L’Engle reminds us: “The great artists have gained their wholeness through their wounds, their epilepsies, tuberculoses, periods of madness.”

(PHOTO AT TOP: this is a picture I took while driving 89 mph in the hill country of Texas of a truck carrying three intimately related instruments: a four-wheeler, a helicopter, and, in the back of the pickup truck, shotguns. These guys are what you might call serious hunters.)

A Birthday Year in Pictures

"The steps of a good man are ordered by the Lord, and he delighteth in his way. Though he fall, he shall not be utterly cast down. For the Lord upholdeth him with his hand."
Psalm 37:23-24

Today I am 37. Last birthday, April 17, I wrote a mildly doleful note about turning 36. I needed it at the time. But in all humility I can say that I'm a better golfer today than on that windy day at the Hancock course, and hopefully a better man too. Today there will be no dole, in the Latin sense of dolus, or grief. Today there will be joy with Phaedra and going on a camping trip with the men of Christ Church. Huzzah!

I read my birthday psalm (Psalm 37, that is) this morning over a tasty cup of PG Tips tea and it's such a wonderful psalm.

Here then is a photographic description of my life since my last birthday.

Oh, one more thing. Like I mentioned on Facebook wall, since I am lord of this day I have ordered rain for all of Austin, not just for my own backyard. And I have to say it was the loveliest feeling to wake up to a dark brooding sky, dousing our house with sheets of rain. God bless us, we've needed it.

April 25, 2008 -- The Imago Dei Church Artists Retreat, Portland, OR

(Our friends Dave and Anneli Anderson.)

(A very red door.)

June 1, 2008 -- I resign as arts pastor at Hope Chapel

(My friend Michele Trepagnier gives me a "Last mile care package," and it's got chocolate!)

(The window pane on my office door at Hope Chapel: art, art jokes, and a prayer of St. Francis in Italian.)

(Bookshelves in my office.)

July 16, 2008 -- Laity Lodge retreat with Dr. Packer
(The J.I. himself.)

August 14, 2008 -- Nashvegas!
(Pic with some very musicale people--Stephen Mason on my left, Sarah Masen two doors down, and Scott Hawley, physics-professor-qua-singer-songwriter on the end.)

(Standing under the Man in Black.)

(Enjoying the coolness of the Smoky Mountains.)

September 23, 2008 -- Visit to John Michael Talbot's place in northwest Arkansas
(Phaedra walking with the monk. A dog named Benedict strolls ahead.)

(The monk performing a dog trick. Or is that dog levitation?)

October 2, 2008 -- Laity artists retreat
(Nathan Marion, he of the Freemont Abbey arts center.)

October 17, 2008 -- Union Center Christian Church, Endicott, New York
(Red tree.)

(Very cool bridge with dreamy barn in the background.)

October 22, 2008 -- Auspicious visit to Duke Divinity School

(A door that will become very familiar to me in a few months' time.)

(It's beautiful in Durham, North Carolina. Ahh.)

October 28, 2008 -- Leave for Thailand

(Our preferred mode of transportation.)

(And the arts pastor shall lie down with the tiger.)

(Rajendran and Pramila. He's the director of the Indian Mission Association. And she is a completely lovely woman.)

December 25, 2008 -- Christmas Day

(Hanging out in my parent's backyard.)

December 31, 2008 -- "First Night" in downtown Austin (under the lights of Zilker Park)

January 20, 2009 -- Our 1 year wedding anniversary, Five 'n Dime Shop, Fredericksburg, TX

(We're wearing everything we need to conquer the world.)

January 28, 2009 -- AMIA conference in Greensboro, NC
(My bishop, Philip Jones.)

(The Christ Church staff: me, Bryan Brown, Jodi Wicker (nee Heatly), Cliff Warner, Christine Warner (my sis), and Rusty St. Cyr. Isn't that an awesome last name?)

March 10, 2009 -- Consulting trip to Trinity School for Ministry, Ambridge PA

(Here taking a break for lunch, shoving a massive pizza "wedge" into my mouth, Travis Hines behind camera.)

March 15, 2009 -- Fantabulous times with the nephews and nieces


(Aunt Phaedra showing Brendan and Cormac how to wield a propane torch to take beeswax off of an old art piece. They badly want to hold that torch.)

March 22, 2009 -- Our nephew Sohren's B-day -- the fam (Four generations of men: my granddad, my nephew Speight, Scranton his father, my padre holding Sohren.)

March 28, 2009 -- Golf with the boys

April 1, 2009 -- I say yes to Duke's invitation to join the basketball team, er, doctoral program.

(I'm angry, man.)

April 12, 2009 -- Easter dinner at the Younger Taylor household

(Phaedra puts the Martha Stewart touch on our dining room.)

(And here we are feasting it up and glad to be drinking our coffee, tea, and wine and eating our cheese cakes and chocolate tortes and pastel-colored malt balls.)

The Art of Lament

There is no true love save in suffering,
and in this world we have to choose either love,
which is suffering, or happiness....
Man is the more man—
that is, the more divine—
the greater his capacity for suffering, or rather, for anguish.
--Miguel de Unamuno (1864–1936), Spanish philosophical writer

The Lutheran theologian Dorothee Sölle once said in a public lecture, "We must view with suspicion all theology that is pre-pain." By this I presume she means that a theology, or any speech or writing about God, that ignores the practical and omnipresent reality of pain in people's lives is not a theology worth having. This makes me think, tangentially, of Barth's comment about Paul Tillich's theology. Barth said it was bad theology because you couldn't pray it.

The danger of getting lost in the world-within-world of ideas is an occupational hazzard for theologians, or again, for any Christian. You can get lost in the world of activities. You can get lost in the world of feelings. The point is, every one of us faces the constant temptation to escape--to escape life, to escape suffering, to escape it all. Sölle urges us not to escape.

The playwright Samuel Beckett says we have only two options in this world: suffering or boredom. We get to choose which. As he puts it:

"The pendulum oscillates between these two terms:
Suffering—that opens a window on the real
and is the main condition of the artistic experience—
and Boredom."

But it's amazing how attractive boredom looks on the days when our suffering feels unbearable. Give me boredom. Give me distractions, wasteful hours, duties, people, noise, internet, or never-ending things to do and accomplish, but please don't make me suffer any more.

I'm thinking about these things not only because it's Lent, and thank God near the end of a difficult Lent in the younger Taylor household, but also because I'm beginning to do research for a seminar I'm teaching at Duke Divinity's summer institute this coming June. My aim is to help participants understand how art teaches us not only about lament but how to lament.

So my question to you, dear reader, is: what art has been helpful to you in a time of sadness? What art has helped you process grief? A song? A painting? Is there a movie that has deepened your lament? Is there a novel that has made it more bearable?

Alternatively, what artworks in popular or high art do you think have helped the masses grieve well? Again, I'm looking for examples all across the arts.

One famous example of a painting that aided an entire community to process suffering is Matthias Grünewald's Isenheim's Altarpiece. Grünewald painted it for the Monastery of St. Anthony in Isenheim. The monks took care of people who suffered from skin diseases, and it is believed that Grünewald depicted common physical symptoms of the diseases on Jesus' body.


I think also of Johnny Cash's cover of Nine Inch Nails' "Hurt," Verdi's Requiem, Tony Kushner's play "Angels in America," Maya Lin's Vietnam Veteran Memorial sculpture, Percey Shelley's "Adonaïs," the electrifying lament of I believe Juliet's mother in Prokofiev's ballet "Romeo and Juliet." And then of course there's the entire elegy of Job.

I want to hear what art has been meaningful to you in times of grief. And I'd love to hear your opinion on what art, from TV to the Tate Modern, has helped people process loss and death.

I end with a statement I wrote for the Stations of the Cross exhibit we hosted at Hope Chapel in 2003.

Suffering is a privilege, a sign of grace, a reminder of God.
Suffering is a fierce, purifying thing, commonplace,
welcomed with holy terror . . .
If it comes in fits and starts,
that is only so as to leave the sufferer more
receptive to the love of God,
to the awful mystery of severe purgation
when one relives the last dose of grace and waits for the next.

(ARTWORK: Phaedra's submission to Hope Chapel's 2005 Lent exhibit, "Loneliness, Departing, Frailty.")