Theological Journal - May 16: Three Songs with the Worst Lyrics *Theologicall Considered)

Theological Journal – May 16

It’s 4:15 a.m. and I can’t sleep. I heard a song on my phone that made me think I ought to draw up a list of the most theologically rancid and vacuous lyrics with popular tunes and well-sung by noted artists. Everyone will have their own list. I have not included rap music because I don’t listen to it though I understand there are plenty of objectionable lyrics in the, Nor have I included country music because I don’t listen to it and have my doubts if it is really music. Nor have I included Christian music for similar reasons (not to be confused with music by Christians). My list comes from the pop rock music of the 1980’s. That’s the last time I listened to music seriously. So here we go!

1.       “The Greatest Love of All” by Whitney Houston.

 

Featuring Whitney’s characteristic and classic intensity and range that few other singers can even imagine matching, the insipid lyrics are as bad as Whitney’s voice is good. Self-love is the greatest love of all, it’s easy to achieve, and of we can just teach our children this and turn them loose to lead the world, everything will be perfect, bigly perfect! Poppycock! as my friend Walk Jones might say. That’s about as far from the real greatest love as the east is from the west (to use the psalmist’s phrase. This sentimental claptrap should be avoided at all costs.

 

2.       “From a Distance” by Bette Midler.

Here was have a classic American theological instinct – keep God “at a distance” where everything seems peaceful and in order. But at all costs, keep God from coming near into the muck and mire and stench of real life. He can’t take it (we think) nor do we want him to. Safely tucked away in heaven, we insulate ourselves from his real love and holiness which means we have to change. The Divine Miss M sings this well, but there is little truly divine here!

3.       “All You Need is Love” by the Beatles

Much as I like the Fab Four the lyrics of this one is sentimentalism run amuck. We tried this gambit in 1960’s and 1970’s with Situational Ethics (Joseph Fletcher). Love would direct us to the right course of action in any particular situation. Of course, love as a free-standing, abstract quality quickly proved itself not up to the task. Questions immediately arise: what kind of love are you promoting, what vision of the good funds that view of love, who are its exemplars who mentor us and what community nurtures this kind of love in us? A vision of the good, a community of mentors and support are necessary to fill out the sense of love we want to promote. “Love” not nested in such a matrix is useless and probably meaningless. We need a but more than love, friends.

Two songs just missed making the cut. “We are the World” is the first. While emotionally compelling and creatively arranged and produced, its lyrics belie the truth that the problem is precisely that “we are the world.” The Babelian proposal that the world come together and solve its problems and especially save the children is Babel-speak writ large and forgets the unanimous testimony of history that it is a pipe-dream those in power use to keep the poor and powerless down.

The other song is John Lennon’s “Imagine.” It didn’t make the list because sometimes I can bring myself to take Lennon’s “imagine” in an eschatological sense as the world we hope for but will realize only kn the next world but nevertheless spurs such to action in this world to make a little more like the one we hope for. I doubt that’s how Lennon meant it and as a proposal for living in this world it is merely wishful thinking.     

Well, no doubt I’ve offended most readers by now. That’s ok. Give me your lists as an alternative. Let the fun begin!