Bazan’s Curse Your Branches, due September 1 on Barsuk, is a visceral accounting of what happened after that. It’s a harrowing breakup record—except he’s dumping God, Jesus, and the evangelical life. It’s his first full-length solo album and also his most autobiographical effort: its drunken narratives, spasms of spiritual dissonance, and family tensions are all scenes from the recent past.

via The Passion of David Bazan – Chicago Reader

I might be one of the only music nerds with a Christian upbringing that jumped on the Pedro/Bazan train after his faith troubles. His struggle appeals to the part of me that constantly deals with doubt and flirts with atheistic/agnostic ways.

And this?

When I talk to some of those kids in the merch tent the day after Bazan’s set, many of them seem to be trying to spin the new songs, straining to categorize them as Christian so they can justify continuing to listen to them. One fan says it’s good that Bazan is singing about the perils of sin, “particularly sexual sin.” Another interprets the songs as a witness of addiction, the testimony of the stumbling man.

Well, that just makes me sad. And pushes me to identify with Bazan all the more. So many in such great denial. Don’t they know that we have warrant to explore the scariest questions of life?

So my iPod was stolen. I’ve only had it for a few months, and I really did like it. But I made the mistake of leaving it sitting in my car when parking it downtown for a few hours. I didn’t figure anyone in this town would go to the energy of getting into a locked car just for an iPod. Consider me proved wrong.

On the positive side, this thief didn’t take anything else or cause any damage to my car. And whoever it is gets a huge collection of really good music! For some reason I imagine a kid that gets into a locked 1998 Honda Civic to steal an iPod (and nothing else) probably listens to crappy music. Like Insane Clown Posse. Or Staind. I listened to Staind in high school when I didn’t know any better, but that’s another story

I haven’t decided this for sure yet — since my discovery of this theft happened less than an hour before writing this — but I might take this as a challenge to live simpler. I don’t really need an iPod. It’s a nice convenience, especially for someone that does music journalism as a hobby. But I don’t really need it. So I might see how long I can go without it. Any bets on how long I last?

Sometimes people need to stop looking at bands loosely connected to shifts in culture and music as evil — using big words like “ephemera” to prove they know more than most of us — and realize that some people legitimately like those bands.

Sure, New York hipsters on their fixies that “like” bands just so they can brag over cans of PBR are annoying, but just like every other annoying trend, they’ll go away. And those of us that kinda like that new Dirty Projectors album will still be around.

So maybe stop calling out musicians that studied music composition at Yale and are well-liked by David Byrne and tell us how hipster culture is actually ruining our generation. It’s just a band, after all. A band with a lot of weird music and one pretty dang good album.

End rant.

I have to be careful how I word this, so here goes.

Maybe men and women can do pretty much everything the opposite sex can but, generally speaking, maybe we aren’t inclined to because at our root nature we really do differ. So maybe, when we see less women DJs and less men tailors, it’s not so much a problem as much as it is the way things are.

I’m not saying any one sex is better or worse than the other, but it’s kind of stupid to ignore the fact that men and women are better or worse at certain things. Is it too late to acknowledge that publicly without coming under fire?

People cannot support torture while claiming to be Christian – they are mutually exclusive. Just like fascism and democracy. Sorry Mom, I love you and your pasta, but you and masses of other right-wingers out there and not the Beatles, homosexuals, Muslims, hippies or rappers, have undermined the footing of American democracy.

You have abandoned your own Christian values of humility, forgiveness and compassion and have empowered craven, greed driven politicians to frighten our nation into submission. It takes far more strength of character to stand for peace, than succumb to war. This is why Jesus was tortured and murdered by people who feared the truth. Fascists all of them!

via The Public Record, via Jason.

Ouch. Those are some strong words from Robert Corsini. While I can’t say it’s only war- and torture-supporting right-wingers that are contributing to our country’s loss of footing, they certainly play a part.

There is absolutely no justifiable reason for a Christian to support the inflicting of pain or death on another human. We have been commanded to love, no exception. On a related note: War is not, and never has been, a means of creating peace. Nobody wants to be in the midst of a war, so maybe we shouldn’t be getting into it (especially on other people’s turf) if peace is the end goal. If we hurt someone, we are protecting no one.

(I have to say, it is quite nice to feel 100% behind an anti-war, anti-torture worldview and be able to defend myself about it. Thank you, Jesus for President.)

Somehow (I wish I could remember where) I came across this interesting slide show that outlines the parallels between histories of the megachurch and the corporate complex.

It’s especially intriguing that they are able to draw these comparisons without any explicit judgment on either the church or the corporate world. I, personally, wouldn’t be able to do that easily. In fact, even without their judgment I began to pass my own.

The main question raised is this: is it healthy to have the Church (big C) looking a lot like a business, especially a business much like that in western consumer-focused culture? I can’t say “no” confidently, but I certainly lean that way.

Side note: I’ve always wondered if, instead of huge megachurches, we aren’t supposed to be growing people up enough in smaller churches in a way that they long to branch out and start their own small churches. Thoughts?

Another coincidental book choice while on my trip to Thailand. Not only was it fitting to be reading a calling for a change in American Christians’ perspectives on politics while dropped in a world of foreign politics, but I happened to be reading it much of the day on the 4th of July while stretched in a hammock on a remote island in the south of the country.

Jesus for President is written by Chris Haw and Shane Claiborne (who I already respect much for his book The Irresistible Revolution. They both have learned, from personal experience, the value in living a communal life with other Christians that is radically different than the culture that surrounds them. They make their own clothes, grow their own food and ask that those they commune with use their God-given skills and finances to help each other in every way possible.

The book itself is not a calling-out of a particular Christian-political demographic, as many might expect. It doesn’t say, “Here are the issues you should vote for and against.” Instead, it is a strong reminder that Jesus, our King, is not a king of the earth, like many hoped for in His time. He is here to raise a kingdom not of this world: the Church. So why should we even be buying into the politics of man?

Certainly some particular issues are raised, especially a concern about Christian support of war. But they spend a good portion of the book encouraging a shift from over-consumption to simplicity, questioning our need for “stuff” and asking if we’re really following Christ’s example in helping those in need around us when we set aside a big enough portion of our own money to afford flat-screen TVs and high-speed Internet.

I wish I could find nice, little quotes to pull out to convince you to change your life, but this is a book that needs to be read from cover to cover. I am not good at defending my points just yet (I want to read this again), but I want to say that this book has done more to break me down and rebuild my lifestyle more than pretty much anything else I’ve read. I can no longer support being a soldier as a profession, I’m starting to buy local more and I intend to buy a bike in the near future. Small steps, but they lead to bigger things.

Jesus for President is not easy to read, but necessary for any American Christian in my opinion.

It’s absolutely no secret that I’m a Donald Miller fan. Maybe slightly less known is the fact that I love road trips, traveling and leaving places in general, especially stories about such things. They are always ripe with epiphany and growth in their characters.

Through Painted Deserts is a true story about Miller himself, who, in his younger years, jumped in a van with a friend in his hometown of Houston and meandered his way to Portland, Oregon, where he still lives today (I hear).

It’s noticeably less spiritually-conceived than Blue Like Jazz and Searching for God Knows What, with much more emphasis on storytelling, character development and descriptive writing. No complaints from me. Miller’s a wonderful writer, no matter the subject.

Still, though, those road trip epiphanies and growth are there. And it was clearly no mistake that I was reading this book while on my first international adventure in Thailand, for in his introduction, he offers a simple command to the reader: Leave. As in, get out of where you’re comfortable, even if for a little while. Go out and see the world, learn how you differ from others and what they do better that you could stand to improve upon. This was, coincidentally, a common subject of discussion between my travel partner, Buddy, and I.

Now, enjoy some random Don Miller quotes:

I had only recently begun questioning my faith in God, a kind of commercial, American version of spirituality. I had questions because of the silliness of its presuppositions. The rising question of why had been manifesting for some time, and had previously only been answered by Western Christianity’s propositions of behavior modification. What is beauty? I would ask. Here are the five keys to a successful marriage, I would be given as an answer. It was as if nobody was listening to the question being groaned by all of creation, groaned through the pinings of our sexual tensions, our broken biochemistry, the blending of light and smog to make our glorious sunsets.

I was raised to believe that the quality of a man’s life would greatly increase, not with the gain of status or success, not by his heart’s knowing romance or by prosperity in industry or academia, but by his nearness to God. It confuses me that Christian living is not simpler.

I love that second one especially. And it ties in with my next book review heavily, which you’ll see tomorrow, as well as my recent post about buying phones.

One more book down on my reading list, fourteen more to go!

Don’t get me wrong, technology is cool. I get caught up in gadget glory as much as the next geek. But lately, I’m starting to wonder if I’ve got my priorities straight.

While I was in Thailand, I saw the business class of Bangkok and the barefoot-and-dirty Muslim families in tiny villages. It was immediately noticeable that the happiest people seemed to be the ones furthest from the rat race and competitive edge of owning the coolest new junk.

I read a couple books while I was there — which I’ll be reviewing as soon as I get my rear in gear — that couldn’t have been timed better: they directly and indirectly pointed out the danger of giving in to consumer culture.

And then I read this article in Relevant Magazine that closes with this quote:

Do I want the “Internet in my pocket”? Am I troubled by my lack of immediate knowledge of world affairs? Am I troubled by my distance from email, and should this distance be closed? Will I be closer to my “friends” if Facebook is in my pocket? What kind of person do I want to become? And, finally, is an iPhone the shape of the distance between the current me and that better me?

Replace “iPhone” with any piece of technology we hold high and you get what I mean.

Two of the best things about being in Thailand were the fact that I had no cell phone or texting and that my Internet consumption was forced down to 15 or 20 minutes a day. The only downside was that I was in limited contact with people I love, of course, but that’s the nature of international travel no matter what. So why, then, do I come back home and immediately start checking out what phones are coming up in Verizon’s lineup?

Maybe, as much as I was glad to be home, landing in LAX and wading through the culture resulting from consumerism wasn’t the best method of re-entry. As if I could avoid it.

It upsets me a bit to see that the question “can ‘real’ Christians be depressed?” is even something we need to address. Do we need a full 10-paragraph article? I was almost expecting Onion-esque satire with a one-word article: “Yes.”

Why would anyone, in this day and age, expect that faith protects us from the same sicknesses the rest of humanity is plagued with? Or do people just not know that depression is just as much a physical/chemical issue as it is a spiritual one (if not more so)? I guess I thought better of people. That’ll teach me.