Category: Arts and Music

Larry Norman

Joel Miller blogged that this is the 5th anniversary of the death of Larry Norman, a giant in Christian Rock — who I not only met, but transported, all by my little ole’ self in my Volkswagen, from the Peoria Airport to the Bradley Campus for a concert.

I don’t try to keep up with today’s commercial Contemporary Christian Music racket (“if you like Guns’N’Roses, you might like This Pathetic Krustian Knock-Off”), nor, for that matter, did I try to keep up with Norman after a few years post-college. It appears that he had a head injury and maybe a bipolar disorder. He bought the whole Rapture/Great Tribulation heresy hook, line and sinker. He probably had other feet of clay, too.

Today, if someone tried to do his music in my Church, I’d be on them just a few milliseconds slower than I’d be on Pussy Riot if they decided to target my Church. “Christian music” it may be, but it’s not suitable for corporate worship.

But I tolerate music outside Church that I’d never allow in. And Larry Norman, as I’m reminded by a collection of YouTubes, was a true original, nobody’s knock-off.

May he rest in peace.

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“The remarks made in this essay do not represent scholarly research. They are intended as topical stimulations for conversation among intelligent and informed people.” (Gerhart Niemeyer)

Some succinct standing advice on recurring themes.

Fear of Flying

“Do you know what that means?” he asks. “That feeling at takeoff?”

“Transformation,” I say. “It’s a leap of faith, perhaps a leap into faith. It’s your mind telling your body to relax. the physics and the math work pretty well.”

“Some people never get over that fear, though,” he says. “Some people can never make that leap. Just like some people sometimes in the religious life never get over certain fears, they build up regulations and walls and rules. They do things that keep them from flying.. And it seems to me that the spiritual life is about letting go, is about being free and trusting. There is a sense of mystery about it. There is always a sense of mystery ….”

Thin Places & Thick Time, Saint Katherine Review, Volume 2, Number 3.

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Some succinct standing advice on recurring themes.