I sometimes joke around that I have to be careful about leaving places, because bad things (or just things) happen while I'm gone. For example, I leave home for one week in the summer and my parents sell our car. I leave home for 3 months at college (up until fall break) and they change the wallpaper on the first set of stairs. I leave Moscow for the summer and the Bucer's "smoking room" is no longer a smoking room! You get the idea.
Now, I've only been gone two weeks and the First United Methodist Church of Pensacola does something crazy. And apparently they are not the first.
Now, don't get me wrong, I'm a huge U2 fan. It's almost ridiculous how much I like them. But the reason that I like their music is exactly because their music does not sound right as a praise chorus. The music was not designed for any kind of corporate worship - except if you can call a concert that (which you can't by the way, not even at a "Third Day" concert).
It's quite ironic that U2 songs are going to be sung in a church service. U2 is a very individualistic band when it comes to church affiliation. They intentionally separated themselves from the contemporary Christian scene, at a time when they would have gained lots of fans quickly from that medium. That's a very good thing, because that would have killed their music.
The PNJ says that the church will be singing "Beautiful day", "Where the Streets have no Name", "One", "With or Without You", and "Still haven't found what I'm looking for." One? That's a great song, but it's about breaking up (just ask Bono). If you are going to sing U2 songs in church, why not sing "40" or "Yahweh"?
And it's called a U2charist. That's catchy, but I don't approve of turning the Lord's Communion into a pun.
It's an interesting idea, but I get nervous anytime I hear of a novel idea for a worship service. And when I hear the idea I almost always think "what the heck are they thinking?" Here we go again.
Beerbohm
7 years ago
Pardon me as I gnaw a broken bottle.
ReplyDeleteI thought you quit that habit Claire.
ReplyDeleteMPK's dad told me that she said, "You should never to do that to a word as lovely as Eucharist." Very nice, I thought.
ReplyDeleteal sends
Contemporary Christians are notoriously unable to interpret secular music. I do love that Sixpence None The Richer covered "There She Goes" by The La's, a song which even your run-of-the-mill idiot knows is about heroin use.
ReplyDeleteGibbs
I hope we aren't defining intelligence by ability to discern drug references out of songs. I might be a run-of-the-mill idiot in that case. In my defense, I never payed attention to the lyrics to that song or I might have caught it.
ReplyDeleteFear not, Rob. We're not defining intelligence by ability to discern drug references in songs. If the song was only background chatter in the supermarket, I don't know that you're really obligated to carefully listen.
ReplyDeleteOn the other hand, Leigh Nash actually sang the song. That she didn't pay attention to what she was singing does little more than make her like 90% of Church-attending persons on a Sunday morning.
She also sang "Kiss Me." Scandalous.
ReplyDelete