The Commons

Macy’s, Handel’s Messiah, and a random act of hyperspace


Macy’s, Handel’s Messiah, and a random act of hyperspace

By now, it has been making the email and Facebook rounds many times over: The Opera Company of Philadelphia hides in the Center City Philadephia Macy’s on Saturday, October 30, and during the height of the busy shopping day breaks into an “impromptu” performance of the Hallelujah chorus from Handel’s “Messiah.” It was a “Random Act of Culture,” funded by the Knight Foundation as a campaign to bring “classical artists out of the performance halls, into the streets – and our everyday lives.” The only reason we know about it—and have “seen” it—is because it was posted on YouTube. And in the weeks since it has gone, as they say, viral. Three years ago, I wrote in a more academic venue about the experience of Radio City Music Hall’s Christmas Spectacular as an experience of cultural “transgression.” It seems that a similar…

Why you’re more likely to find the next revolution in a church pew than on Twitter
The Commons

Why you’re more likely to find the next revolution in a church pew than on Twitter


Why you’re more likely to find the next revolution in a church pew than on Twitter

I spent some of my Thanksgiving holiday catching up on the stack of magazines that had piled up, mostly issues of The New Yorker and Entertainment Weekly (got to keep an eye on the high and low brows). Perhaps the most thought-provoking read I have come across lately is by The New Yorker ’s Malcolm Gladwell , of Blink and Outlier fame, in his New Yorker article “Small Change” on why social media like Twitter and Facebook will not (despite popular opinion) lead to great movements for social change. His reasoning is based on a sociological distinction between “weak-tie” and “strong-tie” activism

Reflections on a Soil Motif
The Commons

Reflections on a Soil Motif


Reflections on a Soil Motif

Not too long ago scholars spoke of the story of salvation in the bible as “salvation- history .” In part this phrase meant that God carried out his work of salvation in history through a historical people and through historical events. This distinguished Christianity from so-called nature religions that too closely identified their gods with nature. We called that pantheism

Starbucks Coffee and the meaning of ritual
The Commons

Starbucks Coffee and the meaning of ritual


Starbucks Coffee and the meaning of ritual

I gave up my Starbucks addiction a long time ago. (In a previous life, the Webster/Old Orchard Starbucks was a near-daily stop on my way to work until I realized that it was part of the reason I gained 25 pounds and lost most of the cash in my wallet.) But I couldn’t help seeing Starbucks’ still new ad campaign while I was recently in the airport. “Take Comfort in Rituals.” Does it bring to mind visions of a hot cup of chai?

Galilean Neighbor On My Mind
Blog

Galilean Neighbor On My Mind


Galilean Neighbor On My Mind

Defining missions without some concrete neighbor in mind helps no one. All mission talk should claim some neighbor. The Ablaze!® movement often spoke of the “unreached” and the “uncommitted.” The most common biblical designation, of popular use among preachers and laity, is the “lost.” But who exactly are the “lost”? Christ goes after sinners who ..

The Commons

Strange coincidence? Obama talks about his faith & religious illiteracy in America


Strange coincidence? Obama talks about his faith & religious illiteracy in America

So, on the same day last week, President Obama stood in a backyard in Albuquerque, New Mexico, and gave a lengthy answer to the question “Why are you a Christian?” while the Pew Forum on Religion and Public Life released the findings to its survey on Americans’ basic religious knowledge . The survey has already been discussed here and in many other places, but I’ll only point out that virtually all Americans basically flunked the test