The Dancing Monk and the Rhythm of Divine Life
Thelonious Monk’s jazz aesthetic can help us reframe theological thinking, generate new categories, and envision radically inclusive modes of being in the world. By Raymond Carr
Category: Music
Poets on Hymns: “Silent Night”
Seven poets discuss their favorite hymns: “Silent Night” by Jason Gray.
Poets on Hymns: “Great Is Thy Faithfulness”
Seven poets discuss their favorite hymns: “Great Is Thy Faithfulness” by Kwame Dawes
Poets on Hymns: “Jesus Is All the World to Me”
Seven poets discuss their favorite hymns: “Jesus Is All the World to Me” by Patricia Jabbeh Wesley.
Poets on Hymns: “I Love to Tell the Story”
Seven poets discuss their favorite hymns: “I Love to Tell the Story” by Kathleen Norris.
Poets on Hymns: “Come, My Beloved, to Greet the Bride”
Seven poets discuss their favorite hymns: “Come, My Beloved, to Greet the Bride” by Yehoshua November.
Poets on Hymns: “The Green Hill Far Away”
Seven poets discuss their favorite hymns: “The Green Hill Far Away” by Mark Jarman
Poets on Hymns: “One Bread, One Body”
Seven poets discuss their favorite hymns: “One Bread, One Body” by Kate Daniels.
The Work of Art and the Art of Life
Art, religion, ritual, dance, and song are not different phenomena, but moments in an existential struggle to act vicariously upon the world—bringing it into being. By Michael Jackson
Two-Part Invention
Our vocational lives tend to be complex, unpredictable searches for meaning on many levels, from the quotidian to the transcendent. By Nancy J. Nordenson
Ethiopian Lives and Liturgies
Ethiopian lives and liturgies at home in North America. By Kay Kaufman Shelemay
A Cringe-worthy Depiction of Africa
The Book of Mormon fosters stereotypes of Ugandans. By Max Perry Mueller
Into the Infinite Together
Patti Smith’s Just Kids. By Stephanie Paulsell
The Healing Ministry of Rock and Roll
Bruce Springsteen’s ministry. By Jeffrey Symynkywicz
Music on Your Mind
Oliver Sacks’s Musicophilia. By James Clyde Sellman
God: Chart Topper
If you want to hear folk singing praises to God these days, no need to go to church. Just turn on a local top-40 radio station. Or the Grammys. By Ben Westhoff
Gospel According To . . .
While Kanye West’s hip-hop “Jesus Walks” can be considered a turning point in the history of black sacred music, the fears that it represents the wresting of the
“sacred” from the faithful are ahistorical. By Wallace Best
Toward a Theology of Sound
In Santería possession performance, “divinely targeted sound,” through drums, rattles, and maracas, as well as discourse about that sound, map the experience of divine transcendence onto a human grid. By Katherine J. Hagedorn
