If it’s not too early for Pope Francis to start listening to Christmas music, it’s not too early for us!
Music
Posted inArts & Culture, Music
Olivia Rodrigo’s Gen-Z Gospel
Olivia Rodrigo’s lyrics cover many of the same topics I discuss with my Catholic high school students. As a church that infamously struggles to reach and retain young people, we have something to learn from her.
Posted inArts & Culture, Music
Get ready to hear Ed Sheeran’s new music at every wedding from now until his next album
No matter how far he has risen in fame, Ed Sheeran has stayed true to himself.
Posted inArts & Culture, Music
Adele was the soundtrack to my coming of age. But she lost me in her glitzy ‘One Night Only’ special.
Whereas once Adele’s music exuded humility, “One Night Only” showed me someone who has become so embedded in the cultural exclusivity of Hollywood that she is no longer relatable.
Posted inArts & Culture, Music
Brandi Carlile is Pope Francis’ kind of songwriter: Tender
Brandi Carlile’s latest album shows the singer’s keen awareness of the radical nature of tenderness.
Posted inArts & Culture, Music
Don’t dismiss Lil Nas X because of his controversial video. He has something to teach the church.
“Montero” can offer new perspectives into the realities of Black queerness; for some, including some Catholics, it might even give a voice to their own experiences.
Posted inArts & Culture, Music
From ‘Mr. Brightside’ to ‘Pressure Machine,’ The Killers are still singing about God.
On their last two albums, the Killers continue to circle around faith and eventually grasp it—if not in completely solid form.
Posted inArts & Culture, Books
Review: Fame, fortune and falls from grace in the 1960s music scene
In his new book, British novelist David Mitchell affirms the irreducible and vivifying goods of the human soul.
Posted inArts & Culture, Ideas
The K-pop band BTS spoke at the United Nations—and sounded a lot like Pope Francis
Maybe in this time of uncertainty, fear and doubt, it would be worth recruiting some young people like BTS, Greta Thunberg or Malala Yousafzai to officially join the pope in his fight for the future of our planet.
Posted inArts & Culture, Books
Sinéad O’Connor longs for transcendence in ‘Rememberings’
At the heart of Sinéad O’Connor’s new memoir is her sense of transcendence and her longing for it, as well as the depth of her religious imagination since childhood.