From: owner-believers-digest@smoe.org (believers-digest) To: believers-digest@smoe.org Subject: believers-digest V11 #53 Reply-To: believers@smoe.org Sender: owner-believers-digest@smoe.org Errors-To: owner-believers-digest@smoe.org Precedence: bulk believers-digest Monday, May 7 2007 Volume 11 : Number 053 In Today's believer's digest: ----------------- Re: I'm somewhat confused [meredith ] Pittsburgh May 12th [simona loberant ] Re: I'm somewhat confused ["Tracy J. Wells" ] RE: Pittsburgh May 12th ["Amy Whipple" ] Re: I'm somewhat confused ["PhotoTwang" ] ---------------------------------------------------------------------- Date: Sun, 06 May 2007 13:35:20 -0400 From: meredith Subject: Re: I'm somewhat confused Hi, Tracy J. Wells wrote: > This seems a lot more accurate description of the album to me than > all these news articles I keep seeing where they're all like, "OOOH > CONTROVERSIAL NEW ALBUM SEEKS TO DESTROY THE CHURCH FROM WITHIN" or > something like that. Which news articles? Where? Can you please post links ... I really want to read those!! - -- =============================================== Meredith Tarr New Haven, CT USA mailto:meth@smoe.org http://www.smoe.org/meth =============================================== hear at the HOMe House Concert Series http://hom.smoe.org =============================================== HELP! owner-believers@smoe.org Send mail to believers@smoe.org Susan's CD's are available on your desktop at World Cafe CDs http://worldcafecds.com ------------------------------ Date: Sun, 6 May 2007 11:39:30 -0700 (PDT) From: simona loberant Subject: Pittsburgh May 12th Any believers out there going to the May 12th concert at Club Cafe in Pittsburgh? ~Simona Tired of spam? Yahoo! Mail has the best spam protection around http://mail.yahoo.com HELP! owner-believers@smoe.org Send mail to believers@smoe.org Susan's CD's are available on your desktop at World Cafe CDs http://worldcafecds.com ------------------------------ Date: Sun, 6 May 2007 16:31:14 -0500 From: "Tracy J. Wells" Subject: Re: I'm somewhat confused Oh, they're not all that extreme... that was me exaggerating/ caricaturing. It wasn't like the entire articles were saying that; just lines here or there in various articles that always seem to play on how "controversial" this album is, when I guess I just don't see it as that controversial. Not sure I could dig them all up again; I didn't keep them or bookmark them or whatnot... but I'm thinking mainly of this article from the Philadelphia Daily News back from March (someone posted this to the list back then): http://www.philly.com/dailynews/features/ 20070323_The_word__according_to_Susan_Werner.html "The word, according to Susan Werner The controversial singer offers her 'agnostic gospel' Is the world ready for a gospel album that delivers the jubilee without the Jesus? That uses hearty spiritual styles and hymnal language to burrow from within? We're talking about songs that challenge the eternal truths of the church, that wryly underscore its hypocrisies. And that even suggest a new spiritual secularism, salvaging the moral code and social activism of religion while tossing out the rest." I mean, come on. "to burrow from within"?? Songs that "challenge the eternal truths of the church"? "tossing out the rest"? That's a bit of an exaggeration, isn't it? Many parts of this article seem a bit on the sensationalist side to me. I mean, maybe this guy is writing that because of songs like "probably not" or something, but that just seems preposterous to me to say that songs like that are "challenging the eternal truths of the church" mainly because so many church folks I know really resonate with that song and love it. I mean, people in the church have a lot of the same questions and thoughts and feelings as those outside of it -- at least in my experience. So it just annoys me, I suppose, when people don't recognize that fact. There just seems to be this underlying assumption in this article and others like it that I've read that assume that the church is a bunch of straight-laced, close-minded folks who can't ever ask any questions. I suppose that may be true in some cases but certainly not in all and I suppose I just get frustrated with getting stereotyped into that category... I don't know. Maybe I'm just over-sensitive. It's also frustrating, though, when journalists attempt to write about things about which they clearly don't have a solid understanding... I mean, take this quote, for instance: "Raised a Catholic in rural Iowa, Werner says she's "both inspired by the church and also distrustful about it, of what's done in the name of the church." Closer to her spiritual base today are notions like "the purpose-driven life," as set out in the book of the same name by the "green evangelist" Rick Warren." Um... has this guy READ Rick Warren?? He's the pastor of a huge evangelical megachurch in California... somehow I really doubt that Susan's spiritual ideas are anywhere near to Rick Warren's. I mean, I could be wrong, but... Anyway... in contrast, I thought this article in the Daily Iowan did a great job of capturing the complexities and nuances of the album and did a really great job of characterizing Susan in her descriptions... (I posted this to the list a while back as well.) http://media.www.dailyiowan.com/media/storage/paper599/news/ 2007/04/05/80Hours/Approaching.God.From.The.Left-2824323.shtml And this recent article from the Worcester Telegram was a good one as well... not sure if someone posted this to the list or if I just saw it on my Google news alerts... http://www.telegram.com/apps/pbcs.dll/article?AID=/20070426/NEWS/ 704260362/1111 On May 6, 2007, at 12:35 PM, meredith wrote: > Hi, > > Tracy J. Wells wrote: >> This seems a lot more accurate description of the album to me >> than all these news articles I keep seeing where they're all >> like, "OOOH CONTROVERSIAL NEW ALBUM SEEKS TO DESTROY THE CHURCH >> FROM WITHIN" or something like that. > > Which news articles? Where? Can you please post links ... I > really want to read those!! > > -- > =============================================== > Meredith Tarr > New Haven, CT USA > mailto:meth@smoe.org > http://www.smoe.org/meth > =============================================== > hear at the HOMe House Concert Series > http://hom.smoe.org > =============================================== > > HELP! owner-believers@smoe.org Send mail to believers@smoe.org > Susan's CD's are available on your desktop at World Cafe CDs > http://worldcafecds.com HELP! owner-believers@smoe.org Send mail to believers@smoe.org Susan's CD's are available on your desktop at World Cafe CDs http://worldcafecds.com ------------------------------ Date: Sun, 6 May 2007 16:51:58 -0400 From: "Amy Whipple" Subject: RE: Pittsburgh May 12th Oh, I wish. I'm going to be in Pittsburgh the day before for a job interview. However, graduation is the day of the show, and I tried to imagine that conversation with my mother. Even in fantasy conversation, I still lost that fight. Have fun to those who are going. (= Amy - -----Original Message----- From: owner-believers@smoe.org [mailto:owner-believers@smoe.org] On Behalf Of simona loberant Sent: Sunday, May 06, 2007 2:40 PM To: believers@smoe.org Subject: Pittsburgh May 12th Any believers out there going to the May 12th concert at Club Cafe in Pittsburgh? ~Simona Tired of spam? Yahoo! Mail has the best spam protection around http://mail.yahoo.com HELP! owner-believers@smoe.org Send mail to believers@smoe.org Susan's CD's are available on your desktop at World Cafe CDs http://worldcafecds.com HELP! owner-believers@smoe.org Send mail to believers@smoe.org Susan's CD's are available on your desktop at World Cafe CDs http://worldcafecds.com ------------------------------ Date: Sun, 6 May 2007 19:33:25 -0500 From: "PhotoTwang" Subject: Re: I'm somewhat confused >>Which news articles? Where? Can you please post links ... I really want to read those!! << The saddest bunch of "reactions" that I've seen were at this link posted by Tracy on the 15th. I put "reactions" in quotes cuz I doubt that many of these people "reacting" have even heard the disc. If NPR and that heathen Susan Stamberg are giving it airtime, it must be bad and godless, seems to be a common reaction here. http://www.getreligion.org:80/?p=2347 They make me tired. ~Richard HELP! owner-believers@smoe.org Send mail to believers@smoe.org Susan's CD's are available on your desktop at World Cafe CDs http://worldcafecds.com ------------------------------ End of believers-digest V11 #53 ******************************* ------------------------------------------------------------------------- ------------------------- -------------------------- This has been a posting from the Susan Werner believers-digest To unsubscribe send mail to Majordomo@smoe.org with "unsubscribe believers-digest" in the body of the message