More Enlightenment
The Vancouver Sun’s spirituality and ethics columnist, Douglas Todd, has shared some of his enlightenment about concerts being like a spiritual experience in his blog yesterday. While he lists artists such as Eminem, Celine Dion, Britney Spears and and Mick Jagger as artists who are “vulgar,” “flakey,” “phoney,” and “hedonist,” he goes on to point out the endearing qualities of Santana and Bono as having substance and inspiration. While it’s not quite like going to church, it comes somewhat close:
I think concerts can definitely be spiritual experiences. But like Santana and Bono and I suspect others of his ilk, I don’t think a wonderful musical experience can fully replace the potential for growth and challenge that can come out of being a member of a healthy spiritual community (of which there are not that many, I know). Concerts can inspire us, make us feel positive about the goodness inherent in the world. But belonging over time to a spiritual community, with all its history, imperfection and complexity, can probably in the long run do more to help us mature.
Of course, if someone’s been following Santana and/or U2 for the length of their careers (30+ years) and attending their concerts, you might find that their fans have gone to their shows more than they might have attended a church. Whatever brings you closer with your walk with your Creator, right?
Last 4 posts by U2isABLE
- Paul McGuinness and U22 Final Tally - January 21st, 2012
- Bono on The Ellen DeGeneres Show - December 1st, 2011
- Autographed Uber Achtung Baby Box Up For Auction - November 8th, 2011
- Unveiling Achtung Baby's Über Deluxe box - October 29th, 2011
Well, to be fair to Todd’s real point, though, someone who had attended a church that irregularly couldn’t have had the “belonging over time, long run, history and complexity” diet of steady training and slow maturing he is saying happen only through regular participation. Showing up at a spiritual community (or committing to whatever spiritual routine, just to be a bit more broadminded: yoga, meditation, Buddhist lovingkindness practice) as infrequently as one attends a U2 show — even for the tiny minority of really hardcore fans who might see 10 shows on one tour — couldn’t possibly have the kind of effect Todd’s talking about of a person committing to a membership role in something week in, week out.
So I don’t think he’s really contending that attending church occasionally is better than attending U2/Santana concerts occasionally — I think he’s contending that regular contextualized practices of openness have more effect than occasional context-less mountaintop experiences.
It’s interesting that his site says he was brought up a “hardcore atheist” (as was I).
i forgot that rock and roll had to be about God and good clean morals.
part of the wonder of music and any art is the sheer number and variety of human experiences that it includes.
I get real scared when U2 gets co-opted as a pure moraled red-state lover’s band. I think back to Achtung Baby and U2 at the End of the World, and Edge enunciating that he had no problem with Christ, it was Christians he had some problems with.
And I would warrant that there are many-a-churchgoer who attends church and does pilates and reads the bible every night, but will have a spiritual experience at a U2 concert that blows off the top of her head and changes her everyday life. And that’s got nothing to do with the fact that its an intense, generalized burst “mountain top” experience. Its because U2 music and art has more resonance with some people than church every day for their life. That’s because moral and ethic columns assume that we’ve all got the same little bit of God or whatever inside of us, and spirituality can be written about as a general condition. A U2 show is not a Christian experience, nor would I say it’s always a religious experience in any way. It’s often humanistic.
I think it’s about U2 started “f&%*ing up” their position in the mainstream again.
I didn’t see the article or either previous post talking about seeing U2 as having anything to do with American red states or morality or “good clean” anything, so I’m a bit confused at where that concern is coming from. But amen to the idea that anybody might get ambushed by a mystical experience that blows their head off at a U2 show — I’ve had that story told to me a lot, and it’s even happened to me once — just as people do from time to time in an art gallery or in an ancient monastery or in a garbage dump where the poor live in Mozambique. And Amen to F’ing up the mainstream, too.
Well said Jon, I agree with every word!