Sniffing Glue--A childhood in Christian pop by Meghan O’Gieblyn

Here's an interesting article about Contemporary Christian Music (CCM).  Honestly, I only have a nodding acquaintance with much about which she speaks.  Her background seems quite foreign to the Lutheran experience when she describes church. Clearly she was deeply into CCM and now no longer calls herself a Christian.  Even if you can't relate to her experience, I think that you will find her story compelling.

Sniffing Glue--A childhood in Christian pop by Meghan O’Gieblyn

Warning:  You'll get the most benefit from reading O'Gieblyn's musings but if you insist on cutting to the chase, here is her message as hard as it might be to hear:

"In trying to compete in this market, the church has forfeited the one advantage it had in the game to attract disillusioned youth: authenticity. When it comes to intransigent values, the profit-driven world has zilch to offer. If Christian leaders weren’t so ashamed of those unvarnished values, they might have something more attractive than anything on today’s bleak moral market. In the meantime, they’ve lost one more kid to the competition."


If that's not quite enough for you, here is her entire final paragraph with my highlighting:

"Despite all the affected teenage rebellion, I continued to call myself a Christian into my early twenties. When I finally stopped, it wasn’t because being a believer made me uncool or outdated or freakish. It was because being a Christian no longer meant anything. It was a label to slap on my Facebook page, next to my music preferences. The gospel became just another product someone was trying to sell me, and a paltry one at that because the church isn’t Viacom: it doesn’t have a Department of Brand Strategy and Planning. Staying relevant in late consumer capitalism requires highly sophisticated resources and the willingness to tailor your values to whatever your audience wants. In trying to compete in this market, the church has forfeited the one advantage it had in the game to attract disillusioned youth: authenticity. When it comes to intransigent values, the profit-driven world has zilch to offer. If Christian leaders weren’t so ashamed of those unvarnished values, they might have something more attractive than anything on today’s bleak moral market. In the meantime, they’ve lost one more kid to the competition."

I don't know what you may think of her ideas but they do deserve some serious contemplation particularly in light of the cover story of this month's Michigan In Touch!