Sometime between 8:00 and 9:00 p.m. on October 2, 2003, our family's life was irrevocably changed in the blink of an eye. Mike and I had been moving his father into a new apartment in southern Oregon, and the three of us were headed an hour and a half south to our home in northern California to spend the night. My father-in-law, who'd had aortic-aneurysm surgery a couple of weeks prior, seemed too tired to drive himself, so Dad rode with me while my husband went ahead of us in his father's small pickup truck.
As we pulled in the driveway, there was no white pickup to greet us. My heart began to race as I tried to assure Dad that Mike had most likely stopped at the store and would drive in shortly. Ten minutes later, when I phoned the California Highway Patrol with the license plate number of Dad's truck, my worst fears were confirmed: Mike had been in a serious, single-car accident and was in the hospital with major injuries and massive head trauma.

At 4:00 a.m. on Thursday, October 30, 2003, with family by his side, Michael Charles Yaconelli passed from mortal life into the eternal glory that is beyond time.

"Is death the last step? No, it is the final awakening." -Sir Walter Scott

Mike Yaconelli doggedly chased after Jesus from the time he was ten years old - the real Jesus; not the ethereal, white-robed, sonorous-voiced, halo-headed, float-above-the-ground Jesus, but rather the earthy, untidy, wild, gritty, table-overturning, fully human yet divine, tender, compas-sionate, dangerous, understanding, grace-filled Jesus. That Jesus gradually revealed himself to Mike throughout his life, but never more profoundly than in the ten to twelve years preceding Mike's untimely death.

In the 1980s and '90s, as the editor of a satirical Christian magazine called The Wittenburg Door, Mike became a bit of a table-overturner himself in the face of the excesses of televangelism. (No need to name names from those days - a quick search on Google will tell you who they were back then. There's a fresh and plentiful contingent of them today.) He was appalled at the "false gospel" that was being sold to people through their television screens. For nearly twenty years, Mike used the vehicle of The Door (the name the mag-azine had morphed into) to expose the outrageously fallacious and downright ridiculous things being done in the name of the Jesus he so loved.

Mike began introducing young people to Jesus as a church camp counselor in the early 1960s, when he was just eighteen years old. "Rebel" that he was, Mike was kicked out of two Bible colleges before ultimately graduating from San Diego State University with a degree in communications. He was always fond of telling people that it took him ten years to get his four-year education, and he gleefully told the stories of how he came to be "kicked out" of those two Bible colleges. These stories encompass unbelievably terrible things like violating the "eighteen-inch rule" by sitting too close to a girl at a basketball game; hiding in the dormitory bathroom stalls (by propping his hands and feet against the walls) during the "lights out" room checks; calling the Dean of Men a liar and telling him to go to hell when wrongly accused of planning to meet up with a girl (it was accidental, but he did use the opportunity to chat with her); using real blanks in a shotgun during the performance of a play he was student directing (flames shot ten feet out of the gun); and so much more. I'm pleased to report that Mike's mischief-making continued to be part of his repertoire throughout his life, growing into much more sophisticated pranks that had me, the kids, and most of our friends laughing so hard we were frequently in danger of needing a change of pants.

In the late '60s, Mike realized that he could ultimately reach more young people by providing resources and training to the adult volunteers and (eventually) paid youth ministers who worked with kids in churches all around the country. With the help of a financial backer who appeared out of nowhere (though Mike always knew it was God who orchestrated it), Mike co-founded an organization called Youth Specialties, ultimately legitimizing and establishing youth ministry as a professional calling every bit as noble as that of a paid pastor of a church. Before long, Mike was speaking to churches, youth workers, and young people all over the US, as well as in a few other countries. Nearly forty years later, Youth Specialties is still serving youth workers - now internationally, thereby impacting the lives of adults and young people across the globe.

In the mid-seventies, Mike's unique voice concerning the church in America captured the attention of some in a very small town in rural northern California. After multiple meetings, Mike was asked to come and be the lay pastor of a new church they were starting. He agreed, and though he didn't end up actually moving to Yreka, California, for two more years, this was the beginning of more than twenty years that Mike was a volunteer pastor (you heard that right: an unpaid volunteer) of first one and later a second little church in a tiny town that virtually no one has ever heard of. At the same time, along with his partners, Mike continued to lead the rapidly growing business of Youth Specialties in San Diego. My husband frequently referred to himself as a "K-Mart pastor" because he had never been to seminary and was not an ordained minister. For years, he was haunted by feelings of illegitimacy because he didn't consider himself a real pastor. But as he later came to understand, Grace Community Church itself was his seminary, and the people of the church, with their messy and broken lives, were his professors. You will find many stories of the people of Grace Community within these pages (Messy Spirituality, Zondervan, 2002, 2007), as well as within the book that preceded this one (Dangerous Wonder, NavPress, 1998).

While for much of his life Mike would have been classified as a moderately conservative evangelical, life-altering events began taking place that would eventually cause the "conservative" to drop away, forever changing his understanding of God and launching him straight into the heart of God's amazing, inexplicable, and unfathomable grace. First, Mike's eighteen-month-old daughter was diagnosed with cancer. Though he didn't know it at the time, walking through her treatment and ultimate recovery was the start of a radical spiritual transformation. So was his move from San Diego to Yreka to become a lay pastor. So was his divorce from his children's mother several years after that. So was the fallout of his divorce on his children, his community, his business partners, and his ministry. So was his "scandalous" relationship and subsequent marriage to me, a classical ballet instructor nearly fourteen years his junior. So was the fallout of our marriage on his biological children, his step-child, his community, and his ministry. So were the brutal years and trauma of what it took for us to become a truly "blended" and unified family, one that ultimately included his former wife. So was a week-long retreat in 1991, when Mike was nearing fifty, at a L'Arche community in Toronto, Canada, where Father Henri Nouwen was the priest and spiritual leader. During that time of living, praying, communing, dining, and worshiping with this community of severely mentally, physically, and emotionally "challenged" people, Mike came face-to-face with the fact that his own handicaps were much more acute than the "severely challenged" people of L'Arche. In this setting, Mike began to encounter his utter spiritual impoverishment apart from the mystery and grace of God. Thus began a journey of God's grace manifesting itself to him in all its unfettered simplicity, all its majestic truth, and all its unparalleled glory. Now, we're talking seriously life-altering. In this book (and its precursor), Mike tells you his story from that point forward in his own words. His astonishing journey into the arms of grace continued for the rest of his life, until that same grace escorted him back to his true home.

I had the great fortune and the staggering gift from God to share nearly twenty-five years with this amazing, grace-filled man. Needless to say, he turned my world upside down. In a large sense, we "grew up spiritually" together. Together we learned not only that, despite our warts, flaws, and most egregious mistakes and shortcomings, God's grace is infinitely bigger than we'd ever dreamed, but also that God actually had a special fondness - a downright preference, if you will - for misfits and "screwups" like the two of us. And there came a day when we knew we could trust this as surely as we could trust the air that we breathed and the hearts that beat within us.

I know if my beloved husband could say anything to those of you who are reading these words and who are about to embark on the adventure of reading this book, it would be this:

Take heart, my friends. You are in good company. You, with all of your faults and imperfections; you, with your defects and failures; you, with your hang-ups and emotional scars; you, with your weaknesses and your defeats; you, with all of your blunders, brokenness, and floundering: you are God's beloved, God's favored, the disciple whose name God calls, the one Jesus prefers to hang with, eat with, play with, talk with, cry with, and laugh with. You are the one whom the holy God of heaven and earth longs to spend time with. You are all of this and more. You always have been. And you always will be.

Karla Yaconelli
Taken from the Foreword of Messy Spirituality

Last week, we ran a satirical piece on Frank Pastore's article claiming Al Qaeda supports the Emergent Church. That piece generated a lot of reader feedback, and Burnside was criticized for publishing articles similar in vein to Pastore's, specifically that we sometimes pick others apart without offering solutions.

I don't agree entirely with that criticism, but it did make me think a lot about our goals with this webmagazine. As the folks at the Wittenburg Door can, I'm sure, attest, the world of Christian satire needs to be carefully tread, poking fun while not becoming part of the problem. This issue, we feature an excerpt from Mike Yaconelli's last book, and we know he was a guy who struggled with the same questions.

Not that we're entirely known for Christian satire, but we do appreciate it from time to time.

I feel the need to clarify some of our stances and explain why we run the pieces we do, all the while keeping in mind:

A) None of our writers have the exact same views on every subject.
B) We are still human, many of us are young (read: immature), and many of us have a lot to learn. Therefore, while this may clarify some things, we might end up posting an article that appears completely hypocritical next week because we think it's funny or well-written.

Clarifying point #1: We are not Liberals. We are not Conservatives. We are Christians.

Years ago, I read Brian McLaren's "A New Kind of Christian". That book had an illustration that struck me. The illustration is this: every human debate and argument (political, theological, food-based), lies on a line, with an extreme right and left, and an infinite number of stances in between. Miles above that line is God, and God's view on that debate has little to do with the human line.

Jacques Ellul would characterize our position in those debates this way:

"...the Christian must not act in exactly the same way as everyone else. He has a part to play in this world which no one else can possibly fulfill. He is not asked to look at the various movements which men have started, choose those which seem 'good,' and then support them. He is not asked to give his blessing to any particular human enterprise, nor to support the decisions of man."

In some people's view, Burnside leans to the left on many issues. In response, I would say the majority of Christians in America lean heavily to the Right, so more moderate stances seem more liberal than they actually are. 40 years from now, if the Church has swung Left, I hope we'll still be around and even more discerning.

Clarifying Point #2: Learning opposing viewpoints is a lost value, and we hope to change that.

During my first year of college (there were only two), I was on the debate team. My favorite aspect of debate competitions was when we were given a topic and a side. Often, I was forced to argue a point completely contrary to my beliefs. I believe this approach to deciding issues is invaluable.

I take this approach every time I read the Bible and read about theological issues.

This isn't always good, because we don't want to be swayed by each changing wind, but with the understanding that Christ is our savior, I think our foundation is firm. Since Christianity's inception, there have been brilliant, Christ-following theologians and church leaders who've reach a wide variety of theological points.

This does not mean there isn't an Absolute Truth. I believe there is. But I also believe God is the only one who understands fully what that Absolute Truth is, and when a human being believes he or she has reached that Truth, we should be wary.

Clarifying Point #3: If we are following Christ, we are the Church, the bride of Christ.

What I mean by this is: we view the Church as ourselves, and we should then react to the Church as we do ourselves.

Most of us would think of ourselves as kind and good people. We treat others with respect, we help others when we can, we often make the world a more beautiful place.

But we also do much evil. We behave selfishly, we hurt our friends and family with our actions, we are greedy and manipulative.

The important part is understanding our propensity for evil, to address is openly, to lay ourselves bare to the people around us and allow them to speak into our lives, and, over time, we grow stronger and closer to Christ. If we don't accept the conflict and criticism of those around us, we never grow.

And this is how we see the Church. Burnside runs articles about the work missionaries are doing overseas, or how the Church combats the many injustices we live with. But we should have no interest in patting ourselves on the back. If we do good, we should understand this is what is expected of us, we have pleased our Creator and we should keep going. If we are caught lying, we don't justify that lie because we helped an old lady across the street.

That isn't to say we don't take the criticism with a grain of salt considering the source, but it does mean we listen with an open ear and seek to change what needs to be changed in ourselves.

Clarifying Point #4: Our goal, above all, is to be as much like Jesus as we can possibly be.

I'm not talking about Hippie Jesus or Buddy Jesus or Rambo Jesus or American Jesus. I'm talking about the Jesus who is our savior, the one who's words we read in the Gospels, the one who, when the people wanted him to be king and overthrow an oppressive government, instead died on a cross for something infinitely larger.

We all sometimes want Jesus stuffed into a box. Sometimes we want His salvation to extend to our friends who don't believe, but who are good people. Sometimes we want Him to return so we can know we were right. Sometimes we don't want His salvation to extend to people we don't like, even though it very well may.

But we are so, so thankful that Jesus is not who we want Him to be with every passing whim.

***

I hope this clears up some things. I can't tell you how great it was to think these through and articulate what this site means to me, and what I hope it means to my fellow believers.

Thank you, as always, for reading.

Jordan Green
BWC

But that might've been a little generous. While I loved the album, it was rough...a little too DIY in the mixing. The album had great songs, and I did factor in Alex's youth (he was 19 at the time).

So take that album. Then add the fact Alex Dupree spent the last year driving with a friend around the country, soaking it in. Then add studio experience. Life experience. Add depth of sound. And an improved writing sensibility.

You might have something else entirely. You might have what Bob Dylan might've sounded like if he'd started 5 years earlier, and hadn't spent an early career covering folk staples. You might have a masterpiece, book-ended by two rich and thoughtful songs. You might have a thematic feel only the greats can accomplish. You might have the best album of the year.

I only say "might" because I still need more time to process it.

Las Meridanzas, the Trapdoor Band's 2nd effort, seems effortless. Dupree sings with such humble confidence that it seems damning to even doubt him. He sings with something larger behind him, and it's something I have a hard time defining if it is not a pure calling. You know, the kind of calling many of us grew up waiting for.

Take the album's most blistering track, the Tolkien-like-titled "Earth-Mouth".

I remember the Persian Gulf War though Norman Schwartzkopf trading cards and the tension our heroic Patriot missiles shooting down Scuds. Alex is at least 4 years younger than me, but the first segment of of "Earth-Mouth" recalls the war this way:

My feet were made of clay at home my mother stayed up late to watch the news to watch the ever scheming fates: they come in companies of forty faces, eyes encased in oil! Smoke! Deserts full of oil! Veins! Clouds of marching oil! Chains! Too young to see such old things, my eyes are crying out smoke! Smoke! Thick inlaid with oil! Smoke! Black and boiling pillars sacred lead me shaking like a bride is to the V.A. In my dreams all of Kuwait is still on fire.

And these aren't even the best lyrics in "Earth-Mouth". Alex and Seth Woods played this song for us last Summer, and I asked him what it meant, what the depth of the words was saying. I told him it sounded like Isaiah. He told me he didn't know.

Las Meridanzas is not flawless. There are songs I might skip to get to the better ones. I'm not a huge fan of "Summer Song" or "I Was An Only Child Then", but I've long believed any great album needs songs that don't quite hit. Additionally, I wonder if the album opener and closer, "We'll Never Make It" and "Light", could've switched and been equally effective. Structurally, the second to last track, "#182 Runs Late" could've been an excellent closer, as well.

But I'm nitpicking, and it's been a while since I've heard an album where the flaws were so minor.

The high points are frequent. "The Hidden Legacy of Elisabeth Ney" brings raw power and storied tension to the life and death of a girl. "Las Meridanzas" says much in less than two minutes, and the refrain of "We're alright now/We're alright now" seems a hollow respite. Fortunately, the fright of that song is followed by the tempered joy of "Juarez Wedding Song". On "Four Green Mountains", the Trapdoor Band follows a direct country ballad format, reminiscent of Lyle Lovett and Robert Earl Keen. It may be Dupree's most straight-ahead song, but it captures his talent perfectly: this is a guy who knows how to write the basics, which allows him to branch out.

The absolute crime is how little folks outside of Austin know about the Trapdoor Band collective. Their music has been featured on NPR, and I've certainly written about them at length, but Las Meridanzas has them poised to make a leap. Paste and Pitchfork, hop on board. You won't regret it.

You can listen to a rough version of "Earth Mouth" and "The Hidden Legacy of Elizabeth Ney" and purchase this album here. Please, please do.

Some of Suskind's best writing concerns Grenouille's world of smell, for the author delivers vivid descriptions of aromatic objects and places, such as Grenouille's native Paris. In the opening pages he writes, "The streets stank of manure, the courtyards of urine, the stairwells stank of smoldering wood and rat droppings...the bedrooms of greasy sheets, damp featherbeds and the pungently sweet aroma of chamber pots."

But not all details are so unpleasant, for Suskind gives an illustrative account of perfume-making as Grenouille works with rosemary, mint, nutmeg, lime oil, storax balm, bergamot, sage, caraway seeds, orange blossom and countless other ingredients, extracting their scents by way of boiling, distilling, condensing, drying, and cooling, to name a few methods. Grenouille becomes totally immersed, as does the reader, into this world of smell. And he makes perfume using perfectly exact proportions, not by recipe, but by imagination, and not by measuring cup, but by nose.

But our olfactory wunderkind has a secret, whereby the book is given much of its narrative thrust. It is no plot spoiler to announce - given the book's subtitle - that Grenouille is a killer. Grenouille has a specific purpose for his deeds, for he murders certain nubile girls not for kicks, but for their remarkable scents.

But it is Grenouille himself that is the problem with the novel, for he is just plain uninteresting as a character. We are told he has little understanding or interest in theology, philosophy, morality or anything else for that matter. Though some readers will detest Grenouille for his crimes, this is not truly why he lacks the reader's understanding or sympathy. There have been many characters on the page and screen that have committed odious acts and yet the reader or audience still roots for them. Both Tom Ripley and Hannibal Lecter come to mind. Perhaps Michael Corleone could also be added to the list.

But Grenouille cares and only cares for smell, hardly something anybody could identify with. The singular weakness that gives Grenouille the barest whiff of humanity is that he himself has no scent whatsoever, a fact that haunts him throughout the book and that pushes his desire to create the greatest scent and rule the world. But this is just not enough to make him human. Of course this has not kept the novel from being an international bestseller and earning praise from all sorts of critics, however unearned those accolades might be.

Despite this major flaw, the novel does offer insight, almost allegorically, into the life of an artist and what happens when art consumes an individual. Perfume would have made a better short story or perhaps even a novella, but with an insipid protagonist, not even the most florid writing can sustain interest for two hundred and fifty-five pages.

Mark Spence was my best friend, and still is to this day, and he owned the coveted KG away jersey, and when the smoke cleared from our negotiating session, waving goodbye to my AND1 jersey was all I had to do in order to welcome Garnett to the folds of my franchise. In hindsight I'm lucky I didn't have to trade one good jersey, four below average jerseys and two future jerseys to get The Big Ticket (I got you there Danny).

With the return of skilled players to the desolate land we call the Eastern Conference the NBA may actually become entertaining to follow this year. The 2006-07 season was a boring one, and after an underwhelming summer league and a colossal scandal left the NBA with a wake of collateral damage, this trade is a welcome positive news item.

Garnett joins Ray Allen, Jason Richardson, Zach Randolph and Rashard Lewis as marquee names who chose this summer to begin the voyage East. And now the Leastern Conference suddenly becomes interesting (note: I did not say relevant, I said interesting) for the upcoming season. The Celtics and Raptors will be thisclose to being legitimate contenders this year if healthy. The Knicks and Nets will be decent (and for the Knicks that's a miracle in and of itself), the Bulls are poised to do something special and the Cavs have a guy named Lebron which means anything is possible. Add to this that the Pistons won't suck despite being old, the Magic have a dominant power forward and a very rich swingman (who could play some serious ball - if he ever feels like it), Miami has this guy named Wade and the Bucks, well the Bucks might have Yi!?

I'm not contending that any team in the East is of similar calibre as the Spurs, Suns or Mavericks. What I will say is that if any one team now has the tools to come close, it's the Boston Celtics. Think about it, these three guys are the perfect storm of superstars. It's not like when Pierce had Antoine 'refuse-to-bend-over-at-the-waist' Walker, and all they did was compete at chucking off balance threes. It's not even like when Ray-Ray had Sam Cassell and the Big Dog Glenn Robinson, and no one could defend or keep their egos in check. It's not even much like the year KG had Sam Cassell and Latrell Spreewell in Minny, though those were the best two players Garnett had played with to this point in his career. After Cassell and Spree, the talent around Kevin Garnett peaked with Troy Hudson, Ricky Davis and Wally Sczerbiak. (Gulp)

Garnett, Allen and Pierce should be able to complement each others strengths. Imagine an offense where you could kick the ball inside to Garnett on the block, wait for the opposing team to double (because they'd have to double Garnett or he scores) and then let Garnett (a very good decision maker) choose whether he wants to score, kick it out to Ray (the best spot-up shooter in basketball) or Pierce (who can shoot or penetrate and finish in traffic). Those three could play with Bryan Allain and Jordan Green and they'd still make the playoffs and probably win the East.

Like any big move, immediately following the deal is the voice of the skeptics. People who say things like, "Well, they're one ankle sprain away from being back in the lottery." And those people are absolutely correct. But every team in the NBA is in the exact same situation. The Mavericks without Dirk? Still a playoff team, but not a championship contender. Same goes for the Suns with Nash, the Spurs without Timmy D and the Cavs without Lebron. The Raptors would be lost without Bosh, the Nets are hapless without Jason Kidd and I'm pretty sure Utah would be ruined without Rafael Araujo (okay not the last one). But you see my point; no team in the NBA is a championship contender without their best players. You can't let an ankle sprain stand in the way of taking a chance at a championship.

And yes, the Celtics are relevant again. The once proud franchise has endured a lot of, well, crap, which most recently featured the NBA Draft Lottery that saw them get screwed out of Kevin Durant. To me, and to David Stern, Garnett is going to the perfect team for the NBA. Yes, he probably would have had a better chance of winning in Phoenix, and sure his persona is probably even better suited for La-La land, but for the league its best that Garnett helps out an ailing legend (the Knicks could have also sufficed, though I wouldn't wish that situation on anyone).

Garnett (20.5 ppg, 11.4 rpg, 4.5 apg career), Allen (21.5 ppg, 4.6 rpg, 3.9 apg career) and Pierce (23.6 ppg, 6.5 rpg, 3.9 apg career) all bring a different look and they're all starved veterans who should realize that this is likely their only shot at NBA glory. These three together will never come as close to a title again as they could while riding each other's coattails. None have had publicized issues being bad teammates (KG beat the snot out of Sczerbiak a few years ago, but he probably deserved it) or showing selfishness or ego, and all three are lauded as competitors who will do anything to win.

For the Celtics to really make a run for a championship they'll of course need to add some pieces. After all, Bryan Allain and Jordan Green can't do it all themselves. A good, young defender (Tony Allen could be this guy for them) and a big body interior rebounder (like a Danny Fortson) who doesn't mind mucking it up and doing the dirty work would go a long way to giving them the depth they'll need to compete at a championship level. Some veteran help (a Michael Finley type) could also go a long way to put them in the top tier of league talent.

Will Garnett spend more than a season in Celtic green? I think it goes without saying that it depends entirely on the chemistry these three have and the success of this experiment. If they even get a whiff of title contention I think he'd be wise to stay, especially since competitive teams don't have a lot of room under the cap to sign a marquee talent like KG. If he does skip town, Ainge will have egg on his face and a mess on his hands. Then it would be back to the drawing board, all for one flirtatious attempt at something special.

Danny Ainge had nothing to lose. His team floundering, years of his unsuccessful managerial tactics were smeared all over the court in the Fleet Center. Now at least he's taken his chances, pushed all in when his chips were down, and drew trip Kings on the River. Now he's off to the races to see if his Cowboys will hold up.

Despite the steps forward, many wonder if the coming of "peace" through political means actually represents the end of division for the people of Northern Ireland. It's no doubt they feel safer without the threats of bombs and shootings in the city centre. But while peace agreements and political maneuverings have done a sufficient job taming the scarier edges of sectarianism, some argue its people remain as deeply divided as ever. As Belfast Writer John O'Farrel notes in a recent 2005 editorial,

"The apartheid is vivid on the ground, and it is there that its effects are most poisonous and long lasting. Territorial markings such as painted curbstones and graffiti screaming 'Kill All Taigs' (Catholics) or 'Kill All Huns' (Protestants) act as frontiers, intimidating outsiders and keeping insiders in line. In the Ardoyne district of Belfast, four out of every five Protestant residents will not use the nearest shops because they are located in Catholic streets, and the same proportion of Catholics will not swim in their nearest swimming pool because it is in a Protestant street. Most 18-year-olds in Ardoyne, of both religions, have never in their lives had a meaningful conversation (about, say, family or sports) with anybody of their own age from the other side of the "peace line" that runs along Alliance Avenue."

Changing Hearts and Minds

While the sectarian shootouts have slowed, what governments haven't done, nor should we hold them responsible for, is transforming the hearts and minds of actual citizens. Political parties may be able to change laws and implement policies from the top down but they can't alter opinions on the street with shifts in political strategy. Similar to racism in this country, by no means has it been obliterated with the passing of legislation. Therefore, in a place like Northern Ireland, a sustainable peace process, from this point in time, has less to do with bureaucratic power and more to do with grassroots peacekeeping and peacebuilding from local organizations and the citizens themselves. I saw neighborhoods plagued with sectarian tension begin to slowly loosen their grip when individual people took great risks to creatively engage the other and chip away at division.

Last April on the night of Pope John Paul II's death, hateful graffiti emerged in a Catholic area of Belfast that read, "Where the f*** is the Pope now. Ha ha ha." Obviously scrawled by neighboring Protestants, the timing and viciousness of the vandalism was sure to cause an uproar when the community awoke. But before the morning came, a group of mainly protestant peace activists fearfully snuck into the Catholic estate at 4 a.m. to spray paint "sorry, sorry, sorry" in big white letters over the sectarian prose. Their act of courage, while undoubtedly controversial, defused the situation by reminding the Catholic community that not all Protestants were out to get them. Soon enough, "sorry, sorry, sorry" began popping up in both Catholic and Protestant neighborhoods alike. Spray paint, a medium most often used in Belfast for spewing hatred, temporarily redeemed with messages of empathy and reconciliation.

Everyday Peacebuilding

During my time in Belfast, I worked at a community center in a small Catholic enclave located in one of the most contentious and economically deprived areas of Belfast. The Nationalist Catholics in the area are a proud but cautious people, as they have suffered a handful of sectarian attacks on their community by the neighboring Protestant housing estates. The community project employs neighborhood residents in their café, holds trauma support groups, and runs extensive youth programs. In 1995, unemployment in the area for young people ages 18-25 was 65%. Now, because of the community center's dedication to job-training programs, it's at 16%. The center has won awards for its transformative efforts in South Belfast and is seen as an important part of the peace process due to its cross-community efforts in the area. Surprisingly, Ken Humphrey, the man who started the project, is a Protestant who, 16 years ago, chose to move his Protestant family to the Catholic neighborhood to serve its people. As expected, many Catholics have been skeptical of the Protestant involvement in the center. At one point, the high command of the Irish Republican Army considered driving them out but came to a 51% - 49% vote in favor of keeping the project intact because of its effectiveness.

It is examples like these that extend the idea of what "peace work" means. While I think we should continue to lobby, persuade, and motivate our governments to pass just laws and policies, it doesn't end there. From what we've seen in Northern Ireland, as peacemakers, we must make daily and dangerous choices to engage the other and pursue peace both internationally and domestically. We can't be against injustice in Iraq, at Guantanamo Bay, or in Sudan if we are not for justice in our own cities, local neighborhoods, and in our hearts. While Northern Ireland is a place with much work to be done, the success stories of revolutionary peace building rival what any government can achieve.

Elsewhere many Dublin staples have found favor outside of Ireland. O, Damien Rice's behemoth of a debut, stormed the safe rock charts both sides of the Atlantic, while his ex-band mates, Bell X1 stayed home and charmed the local indie lovers. Meanwhile back in the Fair City, Irish darlings Turn, singer songwriters David Kitt and Gemma Hayes, and chop heavy, indie rock new kids Director and The Delerentos have amassed a significant fan base throughout the island and beyond. Dublin folk love their music. Dublin gig goers enjoy nothing better than a beer soaked session of bellowing along with the band and it is this kind of over-exuberant enthusiasm that makes visiting bands return again and again to rock out with the best crowds in Europe. Dublin-based favorites, The Frames have been plugging away in this musical hot house for over a decade. Beloved by the Irish contingent, all over the world, increasingly successful on their native shores and lynch pins of the Dublin music scene it's about time everyone starting paying attention to The Frames.

The Frames' front man Glen Hansard dropped out of school at the age of 13 and spent the next few years busking on the streets of Dublin. In 1990 armed with a short-lived recording contract with Island, Hansard formed a band, (supposedly named the outfit after the broken bicycle frames littering his mother's front yard, though this like many other tall tales tripping from his mouth might simply be another of Hansard's famous and terribly endearing set filling fairytales) and recorded Another Love Song which was reasonably good but not very successful. Shortly after, The Frames were unceremoniously dropped by their record label. Unperturbed Glen Hansard persisted and in 1995 recorded the blindingly brilliant Fitzcarraldo which thumps along with all the fist-shaking holy angst of a before they went ironic U2. Fitzcarraldo, aptly named after the movie about a man dragging a boat over a mountain, remains a firm fan favorite to this day. In my mind, live classic, "Revelate," will always be the song a half cursed, half blessed, Job might have sang at the Almighty had he been offered access to an electric guitar.

Four years later the boys came back with Dance The Devil, an oftentimes angry, rage of a record with the kind of melodies you simply couldn't shake out of your head. However it wasn't until 2001's heartbreakingly beautiful For The Birds that The Frames began to sound fitter, happier and generally more competent than your average local outfit. For The Birds is a hauntingly, delicate, ethereal sort of a record. Legendary producer Steve Albini slid behind the desk to produce several of the songs on FTB. Glen Hansard's songwriting shines on tracks like the monumental "What Happens When The Heart Just Stops," which will to my dying day, undoubtedly remain the best soundtrack to a broken heart I know of. More than anything For The Birds showcases The Frames' signature disregard for any attempts to typecast their sound within a particular genre. The music soars and whispers, rages and sneaks somewhere between dreams and the worst kind of nightmares. Two subsequent live records built on the band's reputation as the best live act in Ireland capturing their big sound, humorous anecdotes, audience participation et al. 2004's Burn The Maps was a tad disappointing, offering up a handful of singles and a good deal of somewhat watery filler. Thankfully The Frames returned to form on last year's The Cost, effectively blending enormous anthemic rock with a gentler melodic and more than competent kind of wonderfulness.

The Frames have been the darlings of the Irish music scene for as long as I can remember. Glen Hansard is well known as one of the nicest men in local rock. Everyone in Ireland, who doesn't have a Bono anecdote, has a story about how nice Glen Hansard is. These stories follow a well-heeled pattern focusing on how Glen is funny and also nice, a multi-tasking combo most rock stars seem sadly incapable of mastering. For example you might recall the time he listened to your awful garage band demo and bothered to email you encouragement or the time he got that fifteen year old kid on stage to sing "Seven Day Mile" in front of 2,000 people or my own personal favorite, the time he touched your elbow accidentally and even though he smelt a bit funny you still thought he was lovely. Glen Hansard has a face like a furry little pixie creature, the kind of effortless Irishness American's find absolutely beguiling and stage presence most front men would kill for. I've seen Hansard solo and collective both sides of the Atlantic at least a dozen times. I've seen him play to 2,000 people. I've seen him play to 200 people and the man has put the same kind of consistent enthusiasm into every single performance. Glen Hansard remains a champion of good musicianship and quality showmanship in an age when crass showiness often passes for entertainment.

Unsurprisingly The Frames have become well-known for their live shows. In a small venue their sound is enormous. A perfect coupling of loud, yearning guitars, frantic fiddling and wild yelping, combining to form something more elementally Irish and ancient than Riverdance and Colin Farrell and, dare I say it, Guinness, combined. The Irish Diaspora worldwide are known for their keen ability to track down The Frames when they tour abroad. They appear stage front in Celtic football shirts clutching pints of the black stuff and bellowing along with all the good bits in the set. One imagines that Hansard might from time to time be frustrated to find his audience chiefly composed of ex-pats but he bears it well, perhaps he knows that much of The Frames popularity abroad is down to the word of mouth fanaticism of the displaced Irish. Crazed Irish fans and charismatic front men aside The Frames are an easy band to love. They write great songs. They sound consistently good live. They tell funny stories between songs and they are famous for their ability to go tripping into someone else's tune mid song. Listening to Glen Hansard live you have to be ready for a few bars of Van Morrison, a chorus of "Redemption Songs," or "Ring of Fire," and of course the obligatory sample from the Charlie and the Chocolate Factory Song.

Now it seems that The Frames are almost famous. Glen Hansard has recently revisited his busking days to play a would be Dublin musician in "Once," an indie flick which did jolly well at Sundance this year and was directed by ex-Frames bassist John Carney. In the last two weeks no less than five American friends have told me about this great new band called The Frames. All five of them had seen "Once," and fallen in love with Hansard as he warbled and charmed his way into a sort of love affair with Czech musician Marketa Irglova. "He's so lovely and Irish," they say, or words to that affect. It makes me think of the leprechaun on the Lucky Charms box every time someone says this. I have learnt to very patiently draw breath and agree that Glen Hansard is both very lovely and also Irish. I have handed out homemade best of The Frames mix cds to all those willing to listen, most of which have been met with general delight and/or mirth. I have found myself wondering why it took a feel good romance movie to make the folks of America finally realize just how good The Frames are. A small part of me is sad that success might mean I never again get to see The Frames crushed into the corner of a tiny venue, close enough to see the fiddle strings fraying at high speed or feel Glen's spit when he goes off on a musical rant. The larger part of me is glad and also proud that people might finally get to hear the songs which have for almost a decade reminded me what it means to belong to a place and a sound and a people. For the curious here are my ten essential downloads of Frames tunes.

1. What Happens When The Heart Just Stops (from For The Birds)
2. Fitzcarraldo (Fitzcarraldo)
3. Revelate (Set List)
4. Finally (Burn the Maps)
5. Pavement Tune (Dance the Devil)
6. Falling Slowly (The Cost)
7. Lay Me Down (For the Birds)
8. Red Chord (Fitzcarraldo)
9. People Get Ready (The Cost)
10. Seven Day Mile (Dance The Devil)

Secret Track: Star Star (Medley) (Set List)

It's not unlike Tooth and Nail to introduce a Christian artist who also appeals to the secular market, and in that sense the label seems to successfully exist in both domains. Still, Neon Horse seems to represent a sort of culmination of a newer trend within Christian music---the understanding that music doesn't have to contain theology and certainly doesn't have to stay in the neat little box of traditional styles. Rather than simply follow the current ideas of popular Christian rock, Neon Horse seems to take this already established trend further in forging a different style. And "different," by the way, is putting it mildly. The exact sound of Neon Horse is fairly difficult to pin down, although '80s style rock is a solid generalization. According to Tooth and Nail's website, the band "has studied, and designed a sound that morphs timeless energy with brilliant modern relevance." Reviews left by iTunes users have compared the sound to AC/DC, The Killers, Modest Mouse, and The Newsboys' album Take Me to Your Leader. (This reviewer immediately thought of Modest Mouse, although it is useful to compare it to Switchfoot's Oh, Gravity! as well.)

The first song is a summer day at the beach, with its exuberant energy complimented by the radiance of the sun. "Cuckoo!" ensures the listener is awake and alert by beginning the album with the essence of everything bright and sunny: energetic guitar-driven rock, enthusiastic vocals, and colorful electronic effects. While the lyrics aren't exactly what one might consider profound, they highlight the track's rush of explosive fun. This leads us into the second track, "Speed Killz," where Neon Horse serves up more of the same.

The album takes a different turn with "I Know---I Just Don't Care." With a decreased tempo and whinier vocals, this track takes listeners on a dark and dreary journey that is, apparently, a story told by a drunk at a bar. (Whoa, Christian music never goes there.) It is here where the summer fun wears off and the band starts to grapple with the struggles of modern life. This track seems to appear prematurely in the album, as it stands in stark contrast with the themes of earlier songs. Perhaps it would be better placed towards the end, where the band's serious (if not depressed) side shows in greater lengths.

The band returns to the cheery style of the first two tracks in "Crazy Daisy," while maintaining some seriousness. This is actually a love song---the only one in the album and perhaps one of the most random ever made. Forging a balance between the crazy and the profound, the track switches from interesting ("I need a crazy daisy/I need a...dogga saga, a Hiroshima!") to reflective ("I knew from the moment that I looked into your eyes/ I was in need of perfection"). There are certainly no bar tales here; just a look at what love is (or should be) on a practical level. Once the hilariousness of the song's bizarre lyrics begins to wear off, "Crazy Daisy" becomes a somewhat touching (and almost sweet) story.

The other eight songs generally follow the previous formulas, providing an interesting lyrical mix and showing the range of the band's style. Overall, the album creates an interesting architecture that oscillates between moods while exploring a variety of topics. The track lengths and intriguing lyrics make this the perfect album for a listener with a short attention span (it's all over in roughly a half-hour) and love of strange, classically-influenced rock. Guaranteed to prevent you from falling asleep, Neon Horse must be a great Red Bull alternative. Best of all, it's calorie-free, carb-free, and sugar-free, all just a click away. Why consume sugary energy drinks or over-priced coffee when music can make your next all-nighter possible?

Transition. This new EP marks somewhat of an "after-thought" to MPPA's recent overhaul of adjustment. With a(nother) recent musician replacement, If You Want Blood serves as the interval between Several Arrows Later and a full length to release in the fall (Last Light). It opens with "Reading," a spirited continuation from the previous full-length: although a bit redundant, the progressive chords and animated melody are a warm introduction. "Magic Boyfriend" increases the album's buoyancy with its stippling banjo and twangy guitar hooks. Matt's vocals shine here, and the overall song (although only under 2.5 minutes, with an abrupt end) shows MPPA expanding their boundaries.

Transition. An abrupt swing from the engagingly poppy "Magic Boyfriend," "Everything Until the East Coast Ends" unfolds to Matt's repetitious lyrics being sustained by meandering feedback and keyboard. Any expectations for further development are dashed by the prolonged end (the song is over 5.5 minutes). Pretty soon into "If You Live," the listener is reminded that the newest cello player hasn't yet gotten the boot. Matt's vocals are certainly weakest in this song, and instrumentation doesn't progress very far. The concluding title track offers a final burst of energy with a bold pulse and soothingly subdued verses; this seems to be how MPPA operates best. Overall the album builds a bit, staggers significantly, and then tries in the end to recover its composure. The clever album cover, with its simple beauty that I just adore, functions as a façade for music that is regrettably unsurprising (see also Efterklang's latest EP).

Transition. The process of continually reorienting our experience to ongoing adaptation can be offsetting (yet necessary for growth). My wife and I are preparing ourselves for a move across these seemingly vast fifty states. We are shredding our identities as Northwesterners and applying the new Northeastern front. I'd like to think that listening to Matt Pond over the past few years has prepared me for the environmental shift to the Right Coast, but that would over-simplify its character. Sadly, Matt Pond's newest EP probably won't find its way into our road-trip music collection (however, Damien Jurado's newest definitely will).

In a blistering but hastily-researched account, Pastore explains how terrorists revel in the downfall of the Conservative Christian empire, and how the Emergent Church, with all its namby-pamby, pansy Christianity, is playing right into Islamist hands. I received a few emails about the piece this week, each sender expecting me to be angry. I've never felt Burnside was a part of the Emergent Church, but I guess some might see us that way.

I am angry, however. I'm angry because I've been following this trail for over a year, and Pastore went and blew everything.

Because of Frank Pastore's half-assed journalism, my sources are exposed, their lives in danger. This is about so much more than the Emergent Church being a chick version of Christianity. Oh, no. Beneath a thin veneer of "love and patience and understanding", the Emergent Church is actually a ruthless bunch of militant Muslims, as quick to slit your throat as they are to hand you a copy of The Message.

If those sources are reading this: It's over. Use the accounts I've set up for you and get out. Now.

Since the safety of almost a dozen men and women has been compromised and years of painstaking research blown, I feel the need to at least correct some of Pastore's assertions.

1. Pastore's title is "Why Al Qaeda Supports the Emergent Church"

Like I said above, the Emergent Church isn't just aiding and abetting the enemies of America. The Emergent Church isn't just leeching power from the Christian Right. The Emergent Church isn't just sipping coffee and pretending coffee is hardcore.

The Emergent Church is the American arm of Al Qaeda.

It's hard to believe, I know, but think about this: if Radical Islam's sole goal in life is to usurp the power of its enemy (in this case, the Far Christian Right), why not pose as that enemy, but a less violent version?

It may seem on the surface Extreme Conservative Christianity and Radical Muslims share the same goals. The both want to run governments. They both want to make laws that make people not gay and keep people from stealing. They're both understand innocent people sometimes have to die to bring about these ends. They both want control of resources like oil. They both understand only men can effectively govern and women should be subservient. They both think Jesus was alright, but he didn't kick enough ass.
But Conservative Christians are predominantly white and Radical Muslims are Middle Eastern. For both sides, that's a big difference.

2. Pastore asserts the United Nations is irrelevant.

He's so dangerously wrong about this I want to punch him in the balls. The United Nations, like the Emergent Church, are Al Qaeda. Current President of the General Assembly, H.E. Sheikha Haya Rashed Al Khalifa, is actually Osama Bin Laden's right hand man. How do I know this? Muslim name. What more do you need? What's that? She's a woman, and Muslims would never allow a woman to rise to such heights of power? Look again.

3. Pastore asserts that "only the conservative, evangelical Christians of American are who stand between radical Islam and their quest for global domination" (sic)

According to his Wikipedia entry, you may think Frank Pastore was just a Major League pitcher who then went to college for a while. You'd be dead wrong. Pastore is actually a trained killer and part of the "Persecution Force" (there were copyright issues with Tribulation Force), a hard-nosed but well-respected First Sergeant who specializes in heavy weaponry. Pat Robertson is the team's pilot, darting through the skies in an F-22 fighter, an ever-present unlit cigar stub in his mouth.

Before President Bush was elected, they worked as soldiers of fortune, all the while on the run from the military for a crime they didn't commit. Post-9/11, President Bush pardoned them. They were unleashed as a secret commando unit to combat the Muslims, capable of infiltrating any organization and killing any foe, all the while ready to die in the name of America. Jerry Falwell's heart attack? It occurred not in his office, but at a safehouse in Islamabad, the result of poisoning from Al Qaeda agents. "Colonel Jerry", as he was called, was an accomplished interrogator, and was fluent in seven languages.

When Pastore says Conservative Christians are our only hope, he knows what the hell he's talking about. The Persecution Force doesn't allow any Liberals. Or gays. And that makes them strong.

4. Pastore asserts "the Emergent Church is an ally in the war against radical Islam - Al Qaeda's ally."

I'm not picking Frank apart on this point, I just wanted to point out how well he worded that sentence. At first, maybe you thought he was saying the Emergent Church was America's ally. "What, Frank? I thought this article was about how the Emergent Church is bad!" But then he twists it around at the end by saying "Al Qaeda's ally" with a dash in front of it, totally throwing you off. That's top-notch writing, my friends. Top notch.

5. Pastore mentions the Emergent Church is "Christianity for Postmoderns who don't like the truth, knowledge, science, authority, doctrines, institutions, or religion".

Pastore got almost everything right here, because I once heard Brian McLaren tell a crowd in Toronto, "You know what I really hate? Truth. And knowledge. I also hate science, authority, religion, doctrines and institutions," he said while ticking off his fingers. Pastore got one thing wrong: the order.

(Note: Brian McLaren may or may not have said this, because I don't have a recording, but I do know I don't trust Brian McLaren because he seems to do good things and be too much of a good guy. Some non-Conservative Christians call this "good fruit", but they're taking that verse out of context, just like they always do.)

6. Pastore gets in to some weird ground when he claims the Bible is no more true than "the funny papers".

I don't know what this had to do with Al Qaeda and the Emergent Church, but it made me mad because I think the Bible is more true than the "funny papers". I like reading the Sermon on the Mount over Luann's travails and triumphs as an adolescent girl any day. But, like "Garfield", I do love lasagna.

Frank, no one calls them the "funny pages" anymore. They're "comics". It's one thing for your careless reporting to result in the ritual executions of three of my key moles. It's another to use words like you're 87 years old.

7. Pastore ends with some strong thoughts and a poignant quote from Yogi Berra, who once said, "Half of this game is 90% mental."

It was never said truer, Frank and Yogi. Never said truer. But I believe NBA veteran Jalen Rose and former Michigan Wolverine said it even truer than that when he told us, "Winning is the cure all. Sometimes when you're losing things aren't as bad as they seem. Sometimes when you're winning things are not as good. It's only one game but hopefully it's something we can build on."

Look, the truth is out. While the Emergent Church is difficult to define, more and more young Christians are bowing to the pressure of moderate thoughts and the wussier aspects of Jesus's words. The "Emergents" like to focus on the Beatitudes, and that whole "turn the other cheek thing", completely ignoring context. They disregard when Jesus coined the phrase "Fight fire with fire" in Luke and when God told every one of us to collect 200 foreskins from our enemies.

These shifts have already cost the Christian Right. For a while, things seemed great. Sure, terrorists blew up the World Trade Center, but America was still on the road to tax breaks for Thomas Kinkade paintings and automatic weapons alike. The Christian Right had control, but then the Emergent Church/Al Qaeda began gaining ground, electing Democrats and moderate Republicans in droves. Now, our soccer moms will be lucky to keep their tax breaks on their Chrysler Aspens.

The war is on, and the Christian Right must strike while Emergents are yet unarmed. The enemy may be difficult to identify. After all, they are in our churches, walking our streets and listening to Christian bands.

Not to worry: here are some quick ways to identify your enemies.

- Pipe smoking
- Spiky hair that may be frosted at the tips
- Frequently uttering words like "Dude" and "Bro"
- Shirts that say, "Jesus Is My Homeboy"
- Carrying copies of the Bible with covers adorned by snowboarders, skateboarders, or other "extreme athletes"
- Any youth at your church who enters a bar
- Facial hair referred to as "goatees" and wire-rimmed glasses. (Note: This is an important distinction. For instance, I have a goatee and glasses, but my glasses are wireless-rimmed. Therefore, I am not Emergent.)
- Familiarity with Nooma videos
- Listening to U2, Coldplay, or other Brit-pop bands on white "MP3 players"

And so the great battle begins.

I like to read funny stories about religion. My life is one big funny story. I live in a country where it is illegal to proselytize and ultimately illegal to be a member of any religion but the one that governs the country. It is a religion that is in the news a lot. It is a religion that many of my compatriots living here describe as dark, oppressive, evil; not really an axis, per se, but rather they see it as a ''machine'' rolling toward a hellish finish line.

I am caught in the middle between some well-meaning but sometimes two-dimensional Christians and millions of nationals for whom changing religion would be like cutting off an arm. The man who chose to do just that while hiking alone in Utah made that horrifying choice after an unmovable bolder had fallen and rested on his arm; not an everyday occurrence and not one most people look for.

The humor arrives almost daily as the eager foreigners sent out with grandiose fanfare from their home churches confidently interpret the behavior and even the words of the national people. When I hear a sentence beginning with:

""The people in this country think..."" or,
""These people always do..."" or,
""People here believe...,""

I know that I''ll have to either zone out mentally or just casually extricate myself from the conversation because it is not really worth my energy to try and present another viewpoint. Usually the people would not have come to this continent if another viewpoint was wanted.

Conversely, when I hear a guest in this country say: ""the longer I live here, the less I know..."" then I know I''m talking with someone who will not only enjoy living here but actually make friends and perhaps be able to clearly explain his location on the spiritual journey we all make on this planet.

When I meet people from ''abroad'' who think that getting on an airplane, watching two in-flight movies, and transferring at a European airport to an airline that will landing on exotic soil, will somehow cause metamorphosis into something other than the person they were in the States, I want to choke on my local tea or perhaps even smoke without inhaling some local plants.

If someone loses his temper in Texas, he''s probably going to lose it in another country; in fact, faster. If someone has a critical attitude in Oklahoma, she''s probably going to have one in her new surroundings, probably worse. If someone struggles with temptations of the flesh in Virginia, those same temptations will travel along with their luggage to their destination. The most powerful and genuine Christians are those who accept the challenge of their humanity while opening up their hearts to people they encounter wherever they find themselves: at home, abroad, or in the air.

The trip over might be that first experience into the unknown world of ''me in a different context.'' When the plane''s lavatory is covered in an inch of water or some clearish liquid, and you''ve walked to the lavatory in your luxurious tube socks that came out of the sealed plastic bag received in economy class, the sacrificial ''all-for-God-to-save-an-entire-country'' seems far removed. Your audible grumblings about ''uncivilized people groups'' is in sharp contrast to the ''mission'' challenge you were delivering last Sunday evening before you boarded the plane.

Well, you think: perhaps, the magical transformation into a never angry, always loving and tolerant giver of life, will be evident once you''ve actually arrived in the country. Perhaps the nationals on the plane returning to their homeland are not a good representation of the people. I''m sure my love for ''the people'' will be more than enough to not only make me forget the things that drive me nuts but also to win them over! Fat chance.

An anecdote: for the past several years, there have been ''teams'' (always be wary of this word involving foreigners) who have come over for a week or two to generously pass out videos and books, including comic books, to the hundreds of thousands of nationals returning from their country of ''work'' to their home country for a month-long vacation. At the end of that month-long vacation, the rested souls are met again by perhaps a different ''team'' to receive yet another parcel of ''free gifts.''

(It goes without saying that the marriage of ''comics'' and religion might trivialize an eternal concept to a certain extent. But to some religions, it does more than that; perhaps you''ve heard about the recent ''misunderstanding'' between a country that published some cartoons that portrayed religious figures and a very BIG religion of the world! Suffice it to say that off the bat, cartoon characters might not be the best way to present OUR religious figures to that part of the world.)

The books and videos ''with a message'' would be difficult to take into the travelers'' home country and impossible to pass out so openly. However, the ''teams'' ostensibly get permission from a neighboring country''s authorities to freely distribute these materials to the weary travelers just as they board the final means of transportation to take them to the home of their birth, culture and of course, religion.

You may ask yourself ''why'' do these teams do this? Well, it is certainly easier than actually sitting down, making a friend, keeping up with a friend, explaining what is in the book and video. But, more than that, they rely on the time tested statistic that salespeople have been using for years, including our unwelcome spammers. ""If I send out 5,000,000 spam message, statistics prove that I will get at least some responses."" So, there you have it: if I pass out millions of videos and books, sales statistics show that I will get some responses. I cannot play omnipotent and tell you that God cannot use this ''formula'' or this ''sales strategy'' and reach through it to touch a life. But I can tell you that it doesn''t represent the powerful miraculous incarnational message that I believe and live each day. We live a message, and I believe that message includes a touch of humanity.

One fated summer, as we were returning to our country of residence on the ill-planned weekend of thousands of other people, we were annoyed to find ourselves in long unorganized lines of cars; annoyed to find no clear schedule for the transportation; and no communication whatsoever about what was going on. Had we metamorphosed after leaving the states and arriving on a new continent we would have faced this frustrating and cross-cultural experience with joy and praise songs. However, we found ourselves still packaged in our same vessel of humanity; still struggling with sin so we grumbled and complained and looked for solutions. We did acknowledge to each other (2 adults and some kids) that it would make a nice story later. But at the time, we were very annoyed.

We parked our car, along with 10000s of other cars in a what we were hoping was a line to the correct ferry, and all piled out of the car. Why we were walking around on a dirty, crowded dockside is not clear to me at this point in time but I''m going to go with: looking for a restroom. (Watch for my upcoming guide on ''tolerable'' restrooms throughout parts of Europe and other continents).

As we walked along the concrete dock area, I suddenly realized that what I was slipping on was discarded and now slippery pages and papers from Christian books and comic books. The sidewalk area alongside the port seemed to be collaged with colorful papers. Litter? Well, yes, I guess so; unwanted ''gifts'': definitely. Rolling our eyes, but not really thinking too hard about it, we dealt with urgent issues: restrooms and somehow moving up in the line to get on the ferry to get home.

Several days later, maybe weeks, when the entire travel experience was but a bad dream and would soon become ''conversation filler'' for dull dinner parties with expats, I was hosting some good friends for coffee. The summer was over; kids back in school, time to catch up. These friends were nationals; not Americans; not other foreigners.

Friend: Oh, Sandra (pretend that is my name), you won''t believe what happened to us when we were returning from ''previously mentioned neighboring country'' after our vacation?!

Me: (hmmm....I''m getting some returning images of wet muddy comic books) what?

Me: ..hmmm...right...of course....people forget that all of the world doesn''t think and act just like they do...oh well...I''m sure if you met them and talked they would be very friendly and interested in you and your country..

Another project; another huge sum of money spent on a ''ministry'', another friendship not made; another team member returning home to show slides and tearfully recount miraculous results.

At the end of the day, I have to ask myself: what kinds of people do I like visiting my country? What kinds of people do I like befriending my children; inviting my children into their homes? What kind of people do I like inviting me over for dinner?

And I have to answer: genuine people; real people. In other words, people for whom I''m not a project or a target; just not a comfortable position: someone''s bull''s-eye or the final step on an action plan. Maybe we have too many action plans, formulas, objectives. Maybe we need to start living.

I snuck out of the office and returned John's call. He was difficult to hear. That was because of the crowd at the Galaxy's home stadium, where he was awaiting David Beckham's first practice in America. English power-house Chelsea was scheduled to practice afterward and John, a Chelsea fan, was elated. I couldn't stay on for long, but I told him to call me back later.

He did, and he told me Beckham didn't do much, just kicking the ball around on the side. He also told me that #23 jerseys were selling fast, and that he missed seeing Chelsea practice because this was an unscheduled stop along the way to meet some friends for dinner.

John's experience encapsulates the game that these practices lead up to: Beckham didn't do much because he's hurt, no one cared and still fawned over him anyway, and the best soccer team present in North America, albeit for a brief visit, was almost completely ignored because people had other things drawing their attention. Along for the ride for Beckham's greatly anticipated debut, ESPN operated with this attitude. I plucked three quotes from their broadcast of the match that boil down what America saw when it finally laid eyes on David Beckham.

"This is Hollywood, my man." -Alexi Lalas

Oh, was it ever. Lalas, who you may remember as that guy with the goatee whose guitar Keith Olberman smashed on an early, "This is SportsCenter," commercial, is now the General Manager of the LA Galaxy, which means he is the point man for all Beckhamania and Beckhamarketing. In his halftime interview with ESPN's studio crew, Rob Stone and Julie Foudy, Lalas couldn't have summed up the game any better.

Throughout the telecast, ESPN did not want us to forget that LA is a town full of stars. During the pre-game, Bonnie Bernstein rattled off a list of celebrities from a red carpet placed outside the stadium entrance: Jennifer Love Hewitt! Drew Carey! Kevin Garnett! Alicia Silverstone! There were no actual stars on that red carpet, but Bonnie told us who had been there, or, at least, who was sitting in the stadium somewhere, being famous and pining for Becks. Rob and Julie were amazed, as we all were, at the names of television stars, people who used to be in movies, and the best basketball player plying his trade in the state of Minnesota.

This was only a part of the pre-game programming that made it difficult for casual or avid fans to tell an actual soccer match was going to be played. Before and after every commercial break leading up to kick off, Rob told us that they hadn't seen Beckham or they still hadn't seen David Beckham. Rob said once, sounding smitten, that Beckham still hasn't shown "that beautiful face of his." It seemed Rob had a bit of a man-crush, and he got antsy, like a guy waiting alone at a table for two whose date has yet to show. She's not late yet. Really, she's not. They're meeting at eight, and it is fifteen till. She's coming. She is. He sips calmly from his drink and eyes the door. He fiddles with his napkin and explains to the waiter that, 'no, she's not here yet, but yes, he's still waiting.' That calm can only last so long, and Rob nearly crossed that line when he actually raised his voice. As the camera panned over The Home Depot Center before yet another commercial, the television audience could sense Rob's face reddening and his veins bulging as he told us, "He's still not here!"

I've never heard a pre-game show specifically talk about the absence of one player so often without profiling the players who would actually take the field, and I should have known this was an indication of what was to come. The soccer was soccer, with Chelsea pushing hard and LA holding fast despite the weight of the game taking place near their goal, but the broadcast was a eerie display that blended a facsimile of a soccer broadcast, which ESPN has done many times before, with the focus on famous lives of E! News.

"This is what US soccer fans have fantasizing about for years." -Julie Foudy

I'm not so sure about that. The presence of a major international soccer star is certainly something US soccer fans can be proud of. The Madness of David Beckham seems more like the fantasy of agents and marketers, not fans. As the first half finished 0-0, I was in a state of shock, and it wasn't because LA held Chelsea scoreless for 45 minutes. It was the sheer audacity of the attention to the minutiae of Beckham's activity that numbed me as an audience member and embarrassed me as an American soccer fan.

From the moment Beckham came out, ESPN's booth crew, Dave O'Brien, Eric Wynalda, and Tommy Smyth, were relentless with everything but the game. Eric Wynalda gave us a quick analysis of the Galaxy side: "Good lineup." Tommy Smyth-with-a-Y, the token European, countered by judging Chelsea's lineup, a team I would judge as top five or even three in the world right now as, "pretty good." They mentioned Chelsea's recent success in the English Premier League, their superb African players, and the struggles of Ukrainian striker Andriy Shevchenko. But, throughout the evening, they spent more airtime gushing about such sporting subjects as Victoria Beckham's sunglasses and champagne, Shevchenko's wife (a model originally from Los Angeles), and David Beckham's specially-made shoes.

To say the cameras cut away from the game to show us Victoria and her friends, Katie Holmes and Eva Longoria, often would be a gross understatement. We saw Posh six times during the first half. Of a soccer game.

Aside from Posh, cameras often cut away to Bonnie Bernstein, now freed from the lonely red carpet to rove about the stands and find famous people to interview. We found out that Jennifer Love Hewitt is new to all of this, 'that she got into soccer because of a guy,' and she's loving it. Drew Carey, an actual soccer fan, interrupted his answers and looked away more than once to watch Chelsea move in on the LA goal. Arnold Schwarzenegger was there, and Bonnie asked The Governator about playing soccer as a boy in Austria (Eric Wynalda prefaced the interview with the fact that Arnold must like soccer because he's Austrian).

Closer to the field, but still outside the realm of actual game activity, was the Beckham Cam. It was actually labeled that. Randomly, the screen would split and the lower-right would show its subject sitting on the bench. Wynalda, who I expected to be the eye of calm and reason in the hurricane that is Beckham coverage, updated us when Beckham adjusted his shoes. Eric also pointed out that Beckham, "is the only guy leaning forward on the bench... That's got to mean something." It was true. Every time the Beckham Cam popped up in the first half, he was on the bench and he was leaning, enthralling us all.

We watched Beckham sit. We watched him raise his arm in response to fouls or to protest a deft attempt by Chelsea's Ivorian striker Didier Drogba, the runner-up for Player of the Year in the EPL last season, at a slick handball. We watched Beckham sit again, until an update-The Latest From Sideline Reporter Allen Hopkins-told us that Beckham would be getting up and moving soon. After that, we watched Beckham warm up. Beckham jogged, and Beckham did a little hop-back-and-forth move that warming-up soccer players do. The crowd was euphoric. He's magical. He can do it all. Then, Beckham broke off from some stretching to tap a stray ball back onto the field. Dave O'Brien announced, "Beckham's first touch," and Tommy Smyth seemed pleased that, "we documented it." Soon after, the latest from Allen Hopkins tells us that Beckham's ankle tape is too tight, possibly, so we should remain calm while the camera showed Beckham running back into the locker room.

Dave, Eric, and Tommy talked about how promising it is to see Beckham running. He sprained an ankle, but the intensity of their discussion was like a hospital watch for an accident victim in a coma. After Beckham returned to the field, O'Brien compared Beckham's imminent introduction into the game to Willis Reed with the Knicks in 1970. Sure, Dave. David Beckham's sprained ankle in an exhibition MLS match in Carson, California is the much like, if not exactly the same as Willis Reed's torn thigh in Game 7 of the NBA Finals in Madison Square Garden against the Lakers. I can't see it any other way.

"Soccer's time has come!" -Dick's Sporting Goods Commercial

Around the 76th minute, the latest from Allen Hopkins tells us that Beckham will be entering soon. Wynalda excitedly tells Beckham to, "just take it-take that, just take that sweatshirt off!" Alan Gordon had the good fortune of becoming the answer to a trivia question as he came off to be replaced by Beckham. While O'Brien told us that, "the Beckham Era has begun at last," my wife mocked the graphic at the bottom of the screen that graciously informed us that this is David Beckham's first appearance with the LA Galaxy.

He only played about fifteen minutes, but in terms of soccer, Beckham did show US soccer fans something. He made an excellent sixty-yard pass (proof of Wynalda's earlier claim that Beckham can "put it on a striker's eyebrow"). He took a nasty spill at an ankle-busting tackle by Steve Sidwell (a young Chelsea sub who must not have understood manager Jose Mourinho's planned policy of no aggression toward Beckham), rolled over a mild amount for a soccer player, and then hopped back up, grimacing but still playing. He took a corner kick, which the LA crowd had been chanting for, instead of Landon Donovan, who placed the ball and jogged away, smiling and slapping Beckham's hand as they passed. It wasn't enough to even muster a draw, but it appeared that Beckham was there to play soccer, not to be surrounded by media that, from the aerial view inside the stadium, looked like teeming bacteria under a microscope. He was the center of what Rob had called the, "David Beckham love-fest," but he wasn't mugging for cameras, separating himself from his team, or dogging it on the field.

That makes me feel better as a US soccer fan. The maniacal coverage that we saw in Beckham's exhibition debut, a match with absolutely no consequence to either side, will hopefully subside, allowing the sport to be precisely what it is; a sport.

The Dick's Sporting Goods commercial announced over and over that soccer is finally here. Soccer's time will not arrive because of one famous Englishman who will not, as Lalas cautioned, "score five goals a game." Sure, Wayne Gretzky told ESPN's cameras that his kids want to meet Beckham, and Rob Stone's wife called to make sure she gets a Beckham jersey, but Beckham is not soccer and US soccer fans are not salivating over famous haircuts, huge sunglasses, headlines about $22 million houses, and famous Scientologist friends.

Soccer's time will come when people watch soccer for what the game is, as they do for the World Series, the NFL, and March Madness. I don't know how long that will take, but watch for this indicator: when people talk less about Posh sitting with Eva and Katie and more about plays like the lost moment in this match that was most indicative of soccer's creative, free-flowing, spontaneous, team-oriented nature. It happened around the 52nd minute, a brilliant sequence of passing and cutting, a multi-layer give-and-go between Chelsea's world-class attacking players.

They moved seamlessly, first Shevchenko to Salomon Kalou, then a return pass that Shevchenko let through to Drogba in order to slip past the last Galaxy defender and receive the ball back again from Drogba, Shevchenko then drawing the goalkeeper and touching a pass to Drogba in front of an empty net.

Those who watched the game not only for Beckham, but for soccer, will remember this play despite the fact that a) Shevchenko was rightly called offside by mere inches, negating the fantastic goal from counting and subsequently disqualifying it from making number one or two on SportsCenter's Top Ten, and b) Beckham was not involved. Those who didn't watch the game will most likely never see this interchange because of the offside penalty. They will have to wait until soccer's time actually comes, not just when we are told by a poorly conceived and executed commercial that it has arrived.

Multi-instrumentalist and Montreal native Graham Van Pelt has put together a dense, complex, flowery whirlwind adventure of classic beach-rock melodies surrounded by hip psychedelic textures. This album is breath of fresh air in a time where rock feels it needs to be either solemn or depressed. Van Pelt's freshmen effort is appealing on numerous levels. It appeals to one's nostalgia while simultaneously bringing the experimentation that every music fan pines for. Plus, its just damn good music.

Whirrs opens up the album as a swirling concoction of thick bass and thumping organs that soars like The Beatles' "Flying". From the opening track to the closing note the album effortless flows thanks to magnificent organ work and blurry guitar solos that would make a Clapton-era Cream beg for more. "Have You Seen In Your Dreams?" introduces Van Pelt's calm Brian Wilson swooning vocalization, and the theme of the album: life, love and the dream it all appears to be. He sings "In a dream in a day/ And a night and a way/ I feigned of a love/ For the greyness above"

"Fortress" plays like a dream. It plays somewhere in reality, somewhere in fantasy, and made me wish I could stay in dream-world forever.

It would be useless for me to break down the best and worst tracks. Because this album flows so well, it plays as a single work, as most albums should. There are few gaps and even fewer flaws. I was in love by the end of the first listen. And, I have found new aspects to appreciate each time through.

Perhaps the only negative is the lack of diversity between the songs. A barrage of instruments, like you hear in Modest Mouse or Arcade Fire, would not have serve the album much, but I would have liked to see Van Pelt play around with a few more instruments than just a guitar, bass, drums and organ. This does not mean, though, that the sound is not full, just not varied.

My local record store is raving over this album, and for good reason. Besides the display for the album they wrote, "Album of the month. Yes. Album of the Year???" It could be, I don't know. All that I know is that listening to Miracle Fortress has been one of the most enjoyable music experiences I have had since Neon Bible, and that Canada is doing something right.

A few years back I worked as a college intern at a church. Sitting directly behind me in our office was the junior high intern named Eddie. Often I would sit in the office, working on flyers and slide shows, my back to Eddie, when I would hear an excitement behind me. Eddie thoroughly enjoyed calling our local Christian bookstore. His conversations typically went as follows.

"Fighting Lamb bookstore, this is Bartholomew, how can I help you?
"Hi, yes, I'm looking for a new book that just came out last week."
"Ok, can you give me the name of the book and author please?
"Sure. It's called The Only Gift Of Tongues I Ever Got Was From My Ex-Girlfriend by John MacArthur."
"I'm sorry?"
"The Only Gift Of Tongues I Ever Got Was From My Ex-Girlfriend. It's by John MacArthur. It just came out a few days ago."
The sound of typing on a keyboard.
"Umm...I'm not seeing it here."
"Really? Are you sure?
"Yes. There is nothing here on my screen that shows up by that name."
"Nothing that shows up for The Only Gift Of Tongues I Ever Got Was From My Ex-Girl-friend?"
"Correct."
"Maybe your shipment is late."
"Possibly."

This happened quite frequently in the office. Eddie would call asking for anything from Midnight Massacre by Max Lucado, Bible Battle Buddies and a Christian massage oil called "Revo-lotion". Eddie remains convinced to this day, that if it weren't for a certain Christian rap trio, he might have become a Christian a few years earlier than he did. His neighbors were trying to witness to him so they invited him to a Christian concert. After Eddie heard a cassette tape of the group he promptly decided that it was the worst thing that he ever heard in his entire life. "So if anyone tells you," he says, "that that band brought them to Christ, then I can say that Satan used that band to keep me from Him."

The more that I speak with other twenty-something's, the more that I am seeing that this untrustworthy view of American Christianity is becoming prominent, sometimes occurring more within those who attend church than those who don't. At first, it was a breath of relief. This was something we could rally around. This was something that we could poke fun at. I laughed just as hard as the next person when I read Robert Stratham's hilarious book, The Sinners Guide to the Religious Right. There is something profoundly disturbing at times with what we see produced in our subculture and churches. And as a result, it has given birth to a generation of cynics.

And yet, as I have seen this trend grow more and more with each person I talk to, I am now becoming more uncomfortable. I'm staring to see the negative effects. As we seek to deconstruct everything, as I have seen and have been a part of for so long, I have sensed a steady decline in reverence. Where has the sacred gone? Where is the holy? If everything is questioned and torn apart, then we aren't allowed to appreciate God's beauty in a myriad of different ways that He chooses to reveal Himself. We are in danger of missing Him, blinded by our own accusations.

A perfect example of this came a few weeks ago when I left my church service completely fed up with the songs that we were singing. I sat with a friend outside and vented about how much I hated the songs, that they were mindless and cheesy. A few days later I was talking with a few friends and I found out that the service that I walked out on had had a significant positive impact on several individuals. Life changes occurred and someone decided to follow Jesus that night.

My resolution for all of this madness is not to stop complaining This is because I feel, for the most part, that my complaints have been directed towards achieving a positive outcome. Where would the church be today if people did not question systems and structures, seeking to provide a more holistic approach to God? So my resolution is not to stop questioning. My resolution is to become more sensitive to those around while I seek change, to tear down but constantly seek to build up, that I would be aware that what I am tearing down is a beautiful thing for some people, so I need to be careful. I also propose this: that we find a place where we can be refreshed.

A few weeks back I had the opportunity to attend a Taize service. For those of you not familiar with Taize (as I wasn't) it is an Christian monastic community centered out of France. It was founded by Brother Roger in 1940, who spent much of his life attempting to reconcile Christian churches. It is primarily Protestant but people from all denominations and even other religions come and worship at these services which focus primarily on meditation, worship and prayer. They have Taize services all over the world.

There was no preacher, no message, no announcements, no hierarchy of leaders, no "modern-sounding" music. The chapel was very dark save but a few candles. The room was lined with iconic pictures of Jesus and various saints. Pews faced what appeared to be the front of the chapel and along the walls on both sides were more seats facing inward. In the front (or what appeared to be the front) was nothing but a few carpeted steps leading nowhere and pillows scattered about for people to lie on. Nearby there was a cross where you could come throughout the service and rest your forehead upon in an act of humility.

As soon as the music began I realized that this would be one of the best experiences, in regards to church services that I would ever have. A wave of peace swept over me as the music filled the room and drenched me in beauty. Piano, violins, horns, guitar and a few other instruments led the most beautiful chanting music I've ever sung in a church. Throughout the next hour or so, we would sing a few chants, say a few prayers aloud and then sing more chants, some in Greek, some in English.

Kathleen Norris, in her book The Cloister Walk says this,

"Recent neurological study has shown that in religious rituals around the world, poetry is generally chanted with a pulse between two and four seconds, a pulse that researchers now believe to correspond to an internal system in the human brain. This system, epitomized by the traditions of Gregorian chant and plainsong in the Christian West, seems to help integrate the workings of the right and left hemispheres of the brain in processing information. As a contemporary monk has written, this may explain why 'the ritual chanting of sacred texts contributes in a unique way to a profound, largely subliminal, absorption and engagement having many more dimensions than mere rational understanding.'"

I can see the effect that chanting has on people. It soon takes up its residence within you until you are no longer repeating the words; you are now breathing them in and out. They become a part of you. The evening ended with everyone standing up and holding hands around the room as we sang a beautiful praise chant. I stared at the elderly women in front of me as they wiped their eyes continuously throughout the night, wishing that I could experience it that deeply as well.

As I sat and listened and soaked in as much of what was going on around as I possibly could, everything felt holy. Everything felt sacred. God's Spirit was thick in the room. I could feel it in the separate voices joined together as one singing praises but then pleading for God's mercy upon their children, suffering alcoholics, the war to end and so much more. I realized that it is possible for the church to come alongside someone.

They left no room for criticism because how can you criticize a group of people who lead services like this, where they encourage people to stay in their local churches, have refused to become a movement and have always been centered out of a love for your neighbor and God?

My suggestion is that we all find our Taize, that we all find a place, be it our church, a monastery, a Bible study or music that we can go to, to help us breathe, to center our vision. The last thing that we need is this generation to produce more cynics. We have enough as it is. So let's continue to question, let's continue to re-think our methods. But let us not become hard-hearted to what God is already doing amongst us. The sooner that we can recognize what God is doing in our midst and beyond, the sooner we can join Him to make His dream for this world become a reality.

And if anyone finds a copy of that MacArthur book, my friend Eddie wants to use it in his youth group for a study on dating.

This is not a perfect work of apologetics. There are, in fact, gaping holes in his arguments. There are non-sequiters in his logic and mere opinion stated as fact. But there is far less of that nonsense than there is in most books defending materialism (exhibit A - Christopher Hitchens' recent half-baked assault on world religions). Chesterton himself would probably agree, for while his sarcasm can be biting and his strength of opinion titanic, he retains the Catholic guilt and humility to realize that he is only a gatekeeper, a signpost directing the seeker to the Scriptures.

He is in his best form when he abandons dogmatic influence and merely tells the incredible story of the Gospel in all its glorious mystery, and in expounding, or revealing rather, the fulfillment of natural paganism in the Incarnation. Some highlights:

On the nature of humanity, countering the pseudo-Darwinist intellectuals of his age: "Art is the signature of man."

On the meaning of myth: "It is not the voice of a priest or a prophet saying 'these things are.' It is the voice of a dreamer and an idealist crying, 'Why cannot these things be?'"

"Therefore we all feel what is meant by Prometheus stealing fire from heaven, until some prig of a Pessimist or progressive person explains what it means. Therefore we all know the meaning of Jack and the Beanstalk, until we are told."

"It is easy enough to say that the philosopher is generally the more rational; it is easier still to forget that the priest is always the more popular. For the priest told the people stories, and the philosopher did not understand the philosophy of stories. It came into the world with the story of Christ."

"Someone once asked me whether I thought mankind grew better or worse or remained the same. It had never occurred to him that it might depend on how mankind chose to go on; and that its course was not a straight line or an upward or downward curve, but a track like that of a man going across a valley, going where he liked and stopping where he chose, going into a church or falling drunk in a ditch. The life of man is a story; an adventure story; and in our vision the same is true even of the story of God."

And you thought Donald Miller was the first one to come up with that idea.

* * *

I invite any and all feedback on this humble review. Tell me if you think my opinions are amateur misguides (which they most likely are), or if they make a sort of sense. A dialogue as to the merits of Chesterton's masterpiece from an array of viewpoints would be most welcome.