bruce

Hard to believe but Bruce Springsteen is now eligible for Medicare. The seemingly timeless rocker turned 65 years old on September 23.
 
Just as his music, which straddles the line between rock, folk and country, defies easy labels, Springsteen the man is giving new meaning to the term “senior citizen.” 
 
So says Chicago author June Sawyers, who’s written four books on Springsteen, including a new e-book called “Workingman.” I interviewed Sawyers on WGLT Radio, the National Public Radio affiliate in central Illinois. 
 
Sawyers says “the language of Catholicism” seeps into many of Springsteen’s lyrics. She also talks about how both New Deal populism and Catholic social justice teaching have influenced his work.
 
Sawyers chronicles Springsteen’s early Catholic education, and why he now describes himself as a “runaway Catholic.” And yet, Sawyers says, a careful reading of his lyrics shows “once a Catholic, always a Catholic.”
 
I hope you enjoy the interview with Sawyers about the man called “the poet of the Jersey shore,” “the rock and roll laureate” and simply, “The Boss.”  My conversation with June Sawyers is followed by an interview my colleague Willis Kern did for WGLT on a former Illinois State University student who just may be Springsteen’s biggest fan.
 
You can listen here.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Judith Valente, a regular contributor to NPR and "Religion and Ethics Newsweekly," is a journalist, poet and essayist. She is the author of Atchison Blue: A Search for Silence, a Spiritual Home and a Living Faith, named best spirituality book in paperback for 2014 by the Catholic Press Association and one of the three best spirituality books by Religion Newswriters Association. Her book, The Art of Pausing, was runner up for the Catholic Press Association book award in 2014.

Ms. Valente began her work as a staff reporter for The Washington Post. She later joined the staff of The Wall Street Journal, reporting from that paper's Chicago and London bureaus. She was twice a finalist for the Pulitzer Prize, first in the public service category as part of a team of reporters at The Dallas Times Herald in the 1980s. In 1993, she was a finalist for the Pulitzer in the feature writing category for her front page article in The Wall Street Journal chronicling the story of a religiously conservative father caring for his son dying of AIDS.