Monthly Archives: December 2011

I’m (not) going paperless

NOTE: I’ve gotten a bit of push back for the use of the word “you” in this post. Some have pointed out the presumptuous nature of the word. I think they are right. While I concede that, I do want to maintain that “going digital” has screwed many of us up. I’ll try to be a little more careful next time.

Second NOTE: Upon further reflection, the presence of the word “you,” the most common objection, was used as a literary device and, I think, fully appropriate. While it is always beneficial to be aware of one’s communication tendencies, I will also choose to assume a high level of self-awareness on the part of readers and will hold them responsible for their own interaction with whatever text they are reading.

I’d like to introduce you to my new Midori Traveler’s Notebook. It’s really a pretty beautiful thingy, this notebook, and it represents my return to organizing my thoughts, tasks, and schedule using pen and paper. I got the “radial datebook” and little modification inspirations from Patrick at Scription.

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I tried for a long time to be a digital boy. I am obviously a fan of technology, but I have found that I do better when I’m writing things down by hand. About two months ago, I tried out another digital system. I bought a tablet that had a stylus you could write with, but… Oh, the balls I dropped. I needed to go back.

Here’s the thing: There is real and there is not real. Pen and paper are real. Digital is not.

Digital is bits and bites. It’s an idea. It’s an abstraction. when something is created digitally, it doesn’t actually exist. I think this was the essence of my problem. When I tried to work solely with a digital workflow, I think my subconscious knew that what I was manipulating wasn’t actually real. And this is saying something, coming from an abstract guy like me.

But the pen and paper… Those are real things. Sure, they may be symbols of other things, but they are real. My to do list can never be deleted. It can only be completed. I can’t erase something, only cross it out.

This is a spiritual thing for me, dealing with the real. My life – your life – is too full already to deal with things that aren’t real. What’s the point?

I know, I know. Some of you will claim that you do “just fine” organizing your life digitally and that I should stop acting like an old fogey and go back to being the “open source guy” who celebrated technological innovation. The thing is, open source is about making sure things work.

Friends, there’s a whole lot of us doing things that aren’t working.

I don’t believe you when you tell me that you can organize your life digitally. I know you, and I read about your stress all the time on Twitter and Facebook. I see how much stuff you try to cram into your day. A lot of you are cranky because of it. I know I am when I try to live by the digital code. It sucks.

So here’s what I want you to do: On Monday, instead of firing up your OmniMuiltiThingFocus program to start the race to see how many boxes you can click, just ask yourself “What are three things I need to do today?” Write them down on a piece of paper or a note card and do them. One at a time.

Cause, really, most of you reading this are pastors, and the people you serve deserve to have a servant who models daily Sabbath and simplicity. We all know you’re good enough and capable enough, but we’re tired of you modeling unhealthy behavior.

Psalm 127:1-2

1 Unless the Lord builds the house,
   those who build it labour in vain.
Unless the Lord guards the city,
   the guard keeps watch in vain.
2 It is in vain that you rise up early
   and go late to rest,
eating the bread of anxious toil;
   for he gives sleep to his beloved.

Music of the Year, Pt. 2: Albums

Yesterday, Rocky and I threw up the first of our end of the year best in music lists when we let you know what the Top 5 Songs of the Year were. Today, it’s on to albums (check out Rocky’s list here – it’s stellar).

I can’t speak for Rocky, but, for me, the album is a different beast entirely than the song. Songs are about mood, moment, and memories. Songs are immediate. Songs conjure emotions. I will never tell you what the “best song” is because, like all other tunes, it is fleeting. But an album…

The collection of tunes we call an album is a serious endeavor. To my mind, an album represents a complete expression of an artist. Any tosser can write a song. But not everyone can write an album. It takes stamina. It takes foresight. It takes something than we mere mortals possess to write not just a bunch of songs, but a craft a vision. It takes something akin to what Nietzsche called “a long obedience in the same direction.”

These five albums I submit to you today are not necessarily my favorite albums. They are not necessarily the albums I spent hours listening to. But they are, in this man’s opinion, the best albums I heard this year. So, in alphabetical order, here are my nominees for Album of the Year:

1) Admiral Fallow’s Boots Met My Face

Featured as well on my Songs of the Year list, Admiral Fallow were a joyous discovery for me. Finding this album was one of those rare moments when I found something before everyone else (the last time that happened was the summer of ’95 when I pimped The Verve Pipe’s “Freshman” ad naseum. No one liked it. Until it went into radio play that fall…). I listened to this on Bandcamp for probably 2 months before deciding to buy it. By the time it hit my mp3 player, it was road tested. The perfect buy.

What gets me about this album is the percussive nature of the tunes and the obvious Scottish brogue of frontman Louis Abbott. But it doesn’t stop there. There’s clarinet, and flute, and pop sensibility. They describe their music as “orchestral folk pop.” Yes. And they do it beautifully.

Sample: “These Barren Years”

2) David Bazan’s Strange Negotiations

Bazan is one of those artists that I have long tried to like. I tried with his legendary band, Pedro the Lion, and I tried when he decided to record under his own name. When he came up in musical conversations I would always say, “I don’t get him. I appreciate him, but I don’t get him.” Strange Negotiations is not necessarily the album of his I’ve been waiting for, but it’s very close. I didn’t turn to this album repeatedly over the year because I just LOVED listening to it. I turned to it because there was something primal and raw in this collection that sought me out and required that I pay attention.

Bazan filled a need for me in giving voice to my distaste with idealism. Be it religious, economic, or patriotic, I have found myself disturbed by the pursuit of the perfect resulting in the shunning of all else. With a clarity and artistic sense rivaled by very few songwriters, Strange Negotiations finds Bazan tearing your understanding of the American Christian Industrial Complex to shreds. And you like it all the while. And you find yourself asking for more.

Sample: “Wolves at the Door”

3) Josh Garrel’s Love & War & The Sea In Between

Let me begin by saying that this album brought me to tears. In fact, I am still coming to terms with the impact this album had on my soul when I found it. The best I can do is say that it was a mystical experience, and I’m not trying to be cheeky.

Here’s what I wrote in Theology is Art, when I used Garrel’s as one of my main examples:

Recently, singer/songwriter Josh Garrels released what I consider to be a magnificent work of art, a collection of songs titled “Love & War & The Sea In Between,” which succeeds masterfully at revealing new facets about God to me. While I find his musical arrangements to be some of the most creative I’ve heard in years, it is his lyrics that leave me dead in my tracks, unable to do anything but ponder their depths… (And this is coming from a decidedly “non-lyric” person. I don’t care what you sing, as long as I tap my foot while you do it.)

Many people deride Contemporary Christian Music, and with good reason. Legend holds that the late Christian musician Rich Mullins commented that most music associated with the church is “fifth rate lyrics set to sixth rate music.” Louisville, KY songstress Heidi Howe has even written a song titled “Why does Jesus Music have to suck?” Saddled by the twin forces of capitalism and a stringent orthodoxy, CCM musicians have consistently produced music that is inoffensive to both ear and soul. Tired musical arrangements provide the foundation for tired “theological” conventions.

Yet Garrels has taken these once tired ideas and given them fresh life.

Garrel’s released Love & War… this year as a free download from his website (you would be foolish to not obtain it), and is, hands down, my pick for Album of the Year.

Sample: “Resistance”

4) The Lower Lights’ Come Let Us Adore Him

Who let a Christmas album in here?! Trust me – I am as surprised as you are.

Here at Casa de Whitsitt we are crazy about Christmas music, and we have a wide variety of it. We have Sting, James Taylor, Bing Crosby, John Denver and the Muppets, New Kids on the Block… (Don’t judge, Judgey McJudgersons). The last thing we needed was more holiday offerings.

But, cruising Bandcamp one night, I stumbled onto The Lower Lights. These magnificently gifted Morman musicians grabbed a hold of us and didn’t let go all season. I’ll be listening to this long after the tinsel is gone.

Sample: “O Come All Ye Faithful”

5) Young the Giant’s Young the Giant

I have nothing witty or snappy to say about YTG’s self-titled offering except that it is a party in my ears every time I turn it on. It’s catchy. It’s jangly in that Athens, GA sort of way. It’s lyrically clever.

It’s just fun, and I could not stop listening to it. I could. Not. Stop.

Yay, hipsters!

Sample: “Apartment”

I am large, I contain multitudes

So, 2011 is about to come to an end. I know many folk for whom this year has been one crapfest after another and are glad to see it go. I’m feeling thankful that my experience has been a bit different. My friend and “what we always hope will be a business” partner Carol Howard Merritt reflected well the other day about feeling a sense of contentment at the loose ends that were not tied up this year, and I feel that the post provided me with some words to express what I am feeling. While I had some pretty big highs this year, I’ve struggled to gain some traction in a few areas of my life.

2011 saw me reach a significant milestone, meet a life goal, check something of my bucket list: I had a book published. I have dreamed of the moment I held a book of mine in my hands for as long as I can remember and it was exhilarating. Working with the folks at Alban was a treat. Having Carol write the forward was humbling. Hearing that so-and-so was referred to my book by one of you was a grace to me.

2011 also saw a continued opportunity to serve the PC(USA) and the Moderator if the 219th General Assembly as Vice Moderator. I have met some incredible people, been to some amazing places, and seen that God is still working on this thing called the Church. While I admit to being ready for July to arrive and a new moderatorial team to take over, I will be sad to leave this most wonderful of experiences. I tell Presbyterians all the time, “Being VMod is the best job in the church. I make no decisions or assign anyone to anything, but I get to meet incredibly faithful people as see what God is doing in their midst. Everyone should get to do this.” I also started a new job in 2011. After 4.5 years, I left the congregation I had been serving to work for a regional level of our denomination. I’m only 4 months in, but it has been rewarding.

However, there have been a lot of stops and starts this year. Carol and I tried to take God Complex Radio to the “next level” and I found that I just didn’t have the space for that with all the other responsibilities I had. I am glad that Derrick is in the co-host chair now. He’s great and I think he brings a good flavor to the podcast.

I also feel as if I’ve sputtered with what this site, The Metanoia Project, can or should be. That sputtering stems from my confusion over who it is I want to be. Do I want to be a religio-expert of some sort (even though experts are overrated)? Short answer: yes. I have LOVED being able to travel around and speak about my book for the last year. I have so many ideas about different ways to see the Christian life, and I want to share them. I want this work to continue, but I don’t want that to be all that I am.

After writing Theology is Art I have rediscovered a part of me that was buried for a long time. I am, at heart, an artist. I love to create and writing Theology is Art has convinced me that the best theological work done is artistic work. I want to cultivate that again. I want to return to the days when I would write song after song (like the ones I’ve recorded under the name Eighth Day Collective). I want to write a big, epic novel, and I want to be goofy and write mysteries where a pastor is the amateur sleuth.

In short, I’ve got a lot I want to do. As Whitman said,

Do I contradict myself? Very well then I contradict myself, (I am large, I contain multitudes.)

I guess I’m ready to stop painting myself with some veneer and passing myself off as some shiny version of myself. I’m ready to just be me. So expect more things from me and this site than just theologizing. This could get ridiculous.

Music of the Year, Pt. 1: Songs

One of my favorite things to do is to email or text my friend Rocky with a suggestion of some music to listen to. It’s like we’re in Jr. High, trading tapes. Objectively speaking, it’s pretty cute, this thing we do. Check out his “songs” list here.

Here is a list of the “Top 5 Songs” I sent his way or he sent mine over the course of the year. If we still lived in the age of cassettes, I would have worn my tape thin on these tunes.

In alphabetical order, my nominees for Song of the Year are:

1) Adele’s “Rolling In the Deep”

I mean, come on. That voice.

“You had my heart inside of  your hand/and you played it to the beat”

2) Admiral Fallow’s “Squealing Pigs”

Here’s the deal: If you’re from the British Isles, I will probably enjoy your tunes (cf – The Frames, Del Amitri, Mumford, David Gray, Frightened Rabbit, etc.). It’s just that simple.

“Cause sometimes it’s who, not what you do/Just because your father did doesn’t mean that you should too”

3) Fitz and the Tantrum’s “Moneygrabber”

These are the coolest damn cats around.

“Cause I don’t pay twice for a cheap dime whore”

4) James Vincent McMorrow’s “We Don’t Eat”

I stayed with Rocky at his place earlier this year and awoke one morning to this song on repeat. I’ve been a fan ever since. I’m glad to see that we share a Song of the Year favorite.

“I’d rather be working for something than praying for the rain”

5) Josh Garrel’s “Farther Along”

This song has captured my imagination like no other this year. So much so that I wrote about it in my book Theology is Art.

“I wondered why the good man dies, the bad man thrives, and Jesus cries cause he love them both/We’re all just castaways in need of rope”

Honorable Mention: Pentatonix’s “Video Killed the Radio Star”

I know this wasn’t an official release, but this song was sung more times in my house this year than anything else. I can’t wait for their debut album next year.