So there was this contest in Ottawa to win tickets to the U2 concert, which, despite my many entries, I didn't win. So I'm going to post some of the better ones for ppl to peruse and see if maybe they would've picked mine... basically, you were supposed to write a very short answer to the question (very paraphrased) of how faith mingles with art and politics in U2's music.
Thanks of course to Brian who has helped my lack of arts-brain to think theologically about culture over the years too....
“Grace, she takes the blame, she covers the shame, removes the stain… a thought that changed the world… [and] makes beauty out of ugly things.”. “Touch me, take me to that other place, teach me, I know I’m not a hopeless case.”. A life touched by grace cannot help but offer hope and redemption to a hurting world. This is where Bono’s art and politics reach out to offer beauty and healing. He writes to “open up to the Lamb of God, to the love of He who made the blind to see… He’s coming back, oh believe Him.” (Very incomplete, but that was the word limit)
Hope amidst despair, resurrection amidst death: the dominant themes used in Bono's lyrics for decades now. Whether "claiming the victory Jesus won" on "Sunday Bloody Sunday", to declaring that "You broke the bonds, loosed the chains, carried the cross of my shame", Bono has consistently written about the only One who is able to offer hope. He realizes this when he declares that he "was born, a child of grace... all because of You, 'I AM' [YHWH]". The natural outflow of receiving of grace is helping heal Earth's wounds; for Bono, this is by his arts and his politics.
Anyways, the other ones kind of followed along those lines. Obviously not enough to score tickets though; apparently the winner talked about how Bono and Ali have been married for 25+ years now, though how that answers the original question, I'm not really sure... I'm suspecting a conspiracy about homogenized Christian radio that values 'family values' more than actual Christian thought...
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