Comments on: Monumental: Shouldn’t a movie about history be historically correct?

By: Warren Throckmorton

Warren Throckmorton — Wed, 30 May 2018 20:58:02 +0000

Boo – Unspeakable evil.

By: Boo

Boo — Wed, 30 May 2018 19:13:42 +0000

Part of the problem is that it’s not simply one “the church.” More liberal denominatons like Episcopalians and Lutherans have little to no interaction with fundamentalist churchES. We Episcopalians of course have our well publicized splits of congregations trying to leave and take the dioceses’ property with them, but I still don’t see news organizations inviting the bishops on to talk abot how anti-gay congregations are perverting God’s Word.

By: Richard Willmer

Richard Willmer — Wed, 30 May 2018 19:13:42 +0000

It’s “Why does the Devil have all the good music?”, isn’t it?

(My selection of Weekles’ piece above is not entirely accidental, by the way: polyphonic music was once considered ‘satanic’, I believe. How can anything so sublimely beautiful be thought of in such a way?!)

By: Boo

Boo — Wed, 30 May 2018 19:13:41 +0000

@ Zoe Brain:

Well unfortunately no one invites me on tv.

By: Richard Willmer

Richard Willmer — Wed, 30 May 2018 18:57:22 +0000

Of course: “the Devil has all the good music”! I remember that!

Here’s some good music (no electricals, I’m afraid) to usher in Passion (Palm) Sunday: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=FC2WTqIbp5Y

One more little irony: who’d have thought, thirty years ago, that a full-on ‘bells-and-smell’s’ outfit would be processing in to a spot of Graham Kendrick? But we will be!

By: Warren Throckmorton

Warren Throckmorton — Wed, 30 May 2018 17:59:44 +0000

Boo – You are not thinking multiculturally. I grew up in Southern Ohio. Acoustic guitars and fiddles were tolerated in church. It was the electrification of anything that made it evil.

By: David M.

David M. — Wed, 30 May 2018 17:59:44 +0000

@Richard Willmer: “Polyphonic music was once considered ‘satanic’, I believe. How can anything so sublimely beautiful be thought of in such a way?!”

Unless I miss my guess, it is exactly that it is so sublimely beautiful that made it suspect. There was (and in some quarters still is) the fear that people would be distracted from the truth of the words by the beauty or intricacy of the music. I’m not aware of the view that polyphonic music was satanic, but I am aware of cetain medieval monastic authors who decried the excesses of other monks who sang polyphonically.

By: Patrocles

Patrocles — Wed, 30 May 2018 17:59:42 +0000

“Revision” is in itself neither good nor bad. It’s only the class in power – in fear of losing their authority over people’s mind – who uses “revisionism” as a kind of invective.

By: Richard Willmer

Richard Willmer — Wed, 30 May 2018 17:34:02 +0000

The situation is perhaps better on this side of the Atlantic. Perhaps we Western European Christians simply have less time for religious extremism, and splits in, for example, the Church of England are somehow less acrimonious, with many people on all sides of the various ‘divides’ trying to find ways to keep us all together.

As for ‘the Word of God’: he is Jesus, not the Bible … and getting this wrong is actually the basis of fundamentalist ‘heresy’.

By: Richard Willmer

Richard Willmer — Wed, 30 May 2018 17:34:02 +0000

@ David M.

On yes – I’m sure you’ve hit on a very important point there. (I’m not sure if that piece is strictly polyphonal … but it’s certainly sumptuously exquisite – the way I like my ‘religion’!)