Against the Machine

Posted on February 11, 2008

Ellen Ullman (Washington Post) reviews Siegel’s new book, Against the Machine: Being Human in the Age of the Electronic Mob:

The author paints everyone he sees as a huckster, poseur, opportunist, hypocrite, liar or pornographer. He cannot admit it’s not all evil out there. Despite the junk shown on YouTube, the lies told on Facebook, the anonymous trash talk that passes for reader comments — despite all that, there is a generation that has been born to the Web and is finding its way through it. It does no good to brand them all as lazy makers of mash-ups and vapid self-displays. Siegel quotes Spinoza: “All things excellent are both difficult and rare.”

Read the whole article.

A Couple Big Books I am Enjoying

Posted on February 11, 2008

A Secular Age (Charles Taylor) : Taylor is a well-known philosopher with a penchant for secularism and religion. Instead of writing religion off, Taylor points out that secularism allows religion to flourish. This magisterial volume (896 pp) offers a range of interdisciplinary and historical insights on the nexus of religion and secularism. Though written by an academic, this volume is eminently readable.
The Message of the Old Testament (Mark Dever) : Dever (Ph.D) is the pastor of Capitol Hill Baptist and founder of Nine Marks Ministries. He has recently come alongside Acts 29 in support of church planting, one evidence of his commitment to combining academic skill with pastoral wisdom and ministry. Though this work is a collection of sermons on Old Testament passages and books, it summarizes major themes well. In the preface Goldsworthy cautions, most preachers are not gifted to preach these kind of sermons. This book is reacquainting me with the message of the OT while also offering an example of good writing that is engaging and biblically faithful.

Newsweek on Keller; Keller on Newsweek

Posted on February 10, 2008

 Newsweek profiles Tim Keller.

The reporter writes about visiting Redeemer: “There’s nothing sexy here. There’s no rock band, no drop-down theater-size video screen, no 100-member gospel choir—just a few chamber musicians and a couple of prayer leaders to help the congregation along in its hymns. The crowd at Redeemer Presbyterian is overwhelmingly young, single, professional and—for lack of a better word—sober.”

Here’s the conclusion:

Like so many New Yorkers, Keller is a misfit. He’s a megachurch pastor who doesn’t like megachurches. He’s an orthodox Christian who believes in evolution. He emulates the Puritan preacher Jonathan Edwards and loves a good restaurant. He’s an evangelist who relishes the power of doubt. New York is the perfect home for such an idiosyncratic Christian: “I’m probably an overeducated guy who makes things too complicated for a lot of people,” he says. As it is for all New Yorkers, the question for Keller is whether he—or his vision—will ever be at home anywhere else.

(HT: Z)

Update: Tim Keller writes in with regard to the comments to this post:

We should be charitable to the writer on the issues mentioned. They are pretty minor. Yes, it isn’t my first book, but the last one was over 20 years ago. I don’t preach at all 5 services–I preach 4 and every week someone from the preaching team preaches the fifth one. I wouldn’t in the least style myself a new C.S. Lewis (who would want a new one when the old one is still so great) but she got that from publicity copy written by well-meaning people at Penguin. I wouldn’t want to characterize myself as another Rick Warren but she likes Rick and wouldn’t see that as a negative statement. I believe in the historicity of Gen 1-11 and Adam and Eve and I don’t believe in young earth-creation or six 24-hour day creation, but, as far as she’s concerned, that means I believe somewhat in evolution. She’s not used to the fine distinctions on these things we make inside the church. Also, I’ve never lived anywhere near Georgia (but maybe I’ve spent so much time in the airport it’s affected my accent!) And even the statement that my book disappointed her in comparison to my preaching is actually true—I’m a better speaker than writer, and always will me. That was more a compliment to the preaching than a criticism of the book.

Despite this list of nits to pick, it was an overall positive, even warm article, especially considering it comes from someone whose beliefs are so different. The writer clearly likes the church and appreciates the ministry in many ways. So I’m glad for her efforts.

HT:JT

New U2 Album in October

Posted on February 7, 2008

*Update on album title, tracks, audio, and release here.

No name, no firm info, but a partial track list….

  • No Line On The Horizon” – Bono and Edge played this song for a USA Today writer during an in-the-car interview at the Sundance Film Festival. On hearing it, writer Anthony Breznican says “heavy distortion fills the car,” and later adds: “The song is rough, weaving between brutal guitar blasts underscoring the mellow title refrain.” Edge explains that the song “It came out of a new distortion box that my guitar tech got.”
  • Unknown Title – in the same interview with Anthony Breznican, Bono and Edge played a second song whose opening lyric is, “It’s six o’clock…”. Bono tells Breznican that numbers are significant in each of the new songs.
  • “If I Could Live My Life Again” – Bono says this song is “inspired by the great Argentinian poet Jorge Luis Borges.” Bono said he had just begun the song while speaking with author Michka Assayas in December, 2005. Their interview appears as the extra material in the paperback version of Bono in Conversation with Michka Assayas.
  • “Love Is All We Have Left” – a song Bono named during his May, 2006, trip to Africa as one that he had recently written. “It’s like an old Broadway tune. I thought it was a Frank Sinatra song,” Bono said.
  • “North Star,” a song from the How To Dismantle an Atomic Bomb sessions which included a guest organ appearance from Michael W. Smith. In this CCM article, Smith describes the song as a tribute to Johnny Cash.
  • “Mercy“, one of the last songs to get cut from How to Dismantle an Atomic Bomb, described in Blender magazine as “a six-and-a-half-minute outpouring of U2 at its most uninhibitedly U2-ish”
  • “Lead Me In The Way I Should Go” — a contender for Atomic Bomb first mentioned in this February, 2003, interview with Bono in Grammy Magazine
  • “You Can’t Give Away Your Heart” – a contender for Atomic Bomb first mentioned in SPIN magazine

HT: @U2 : CM