By Chris Richards

Mourning David Bowie requires tremendous energy because there are so many David Bowies to mourn. The lost cosmonaut. The alien balladeer. The pansexual glamourpuss. The rake. The maestro. The fashionista. The freak. He was humanity’s ultimate and most giving rock star. A chameleon bearing gifts.

For five decades, Bowie — who died Sunday at age 69 — reimagined himself over and over again, colorfully implying that music should change while quietly insisting that human beings can change. In that sense, Bowie’s mutations were a manifestation of his generosity. Being yourself is fine, but being every iteration of yourself is living. Renewal is possible. Still. Always.

To read the entire Washington Post article, click HERE

By Peter Crutchley, BBC

The date 9 November 1989 is etched in history as the day the Berlin Wall came down. But was it actually a prayer meeting held exactly one month earlier that made the fall of the Wall inevitable? Ignoring death threats and huge banks of armed police, thousands gathered at St Nicholas Church in the East German city of Leipzig on 9 October to pray for peace. The congregation then joined an estimated crowd of 70,000 on a protest march against the country’s communist regime.

It was the largest impromptu demonstration ever witnessed in East Germany, but this was no spontaneous flash mob. It was the culmination of years of weekly prayer meetings organised by Christian Führer, the pastor of St Nicholas.

So how did the church end up playing such a prominent political role under an atheist regime? Disillusioned with the Berlin Wall, the physical fault line of the ongoing Cold Warand the repressive East German regime, Pastor Führer began organising Prayers for Peace every Monday evening, beginning in 1982.

On many occasions fewer than a dozen people attended the prayer meetings. The East German government strongly discouraged its citizens from becoming involved in religious activities, but the meetings continued each Monday without fail.

Continue reading HERE.

By Andy Frye, ESPN

Loren Mutch of Rose City. Photo by Tyler Shaw.

When Shaina Serelson took up roller derby in 2011 in her hometown of Cheyenne, Wyoming, she wasn’t exactly thinking about someday playing in a World Cup. Or battling the best skaters in the world for the prestigious Hydra Trophy. But her newfound passion for the world’s fastest-growing team sport gripped her even back then. And it wasn’t just because roller skating is fun.

“Being an athlete is about working hard, learning and loving every moment of it,” Serelson said. Last year in the 2014 Women’s Flat Track Derby Association Championships, her current team, the Rose City Wheels of Justice, came within three points of knocking off roller derby’s Goliath, Gotham Girls Roller Derby from New York City.

“I think being an athlete also means not getting caught up in the past, or regrets over winning and losing,” Serelson said. “Heartbreak is part of it too, but so is the joy of getting to play the game again and again.”

In the 10 years that the WFTDA has run first a national, and then international, championship, the sport has grown by leaps and bounds, reeling in women from all parts of the world. For the second year in a row, Serelson’s team met Gotham, the five-time international roller derby champions, in the final bout of the WFTDA championships. This time, Serelson, a former hockey player, is now captain of the world champions.

To read rest of story, click HERE.

By Russell Moore

Excerpt: What’s attracted me to country music throughout the years is its rootedness and distinctiveness. There’s a Nashville sound to county and western that has been lost in much of American life. The intimate connections between the music and the places it comes from are part of the DNA of country music.

More than this, though, country music is a narrative music. It tells a story, and in many ways, that story is a gospel story.

Country music recognizes sin and redemption even from people who are lost. Whereas in some other genres of music you can have sin consistently glorified with no consequences, country music rarely does that. Of course, there is much singing about sin–but it is almost always sin that has some hope of redemption or some recognition of judgment, the sowing and reaping and consequences. Country music tends to bypass self-justification by recognizing that something is wrong with the heart.

I remember being asked one day, “How can you listen to people singing who you know use drugs and participate in drunkenness?” And my answer is that real people use drugs and get drunk, and country music, with some exceptions, is recognizing the full reality and complicatedness of sin. Think of Johnny Cash’s song “Ring of Fire,” for instance, a song about adultery that was written on the front end of real life adultery. But “Ring of Fire” isn’t a celebration or a reveling. It’s an honest recognition that adultery feels a certain way – “bound by wild desire, love is a burning thing.” That’s an authentic account.

To read the rest of Russell Moore’s article, click HERE.

Screenshot from MSNBC

For those who are curious about the invitation made to iconic punk poet Patti Smith to sing at a Christmas concert at the Vatican, may find this exchange intriguing. In an October 2015 interview, Smith elaborates about her experience in Rome. You can check out the exchange HERE.

PATTI SMITH: Well, I was studying Francis of Assisi for quite some time, when Benedict was still the pope. And I was studying it for a song that I did for my last album, Banga. And I was so taken with the life of St. Francis, and I thought this was truly the environmentalist saint, because he called upon the people, even in the 12th century, to have appreciation and respect Mother Nature. And I thought it would be so beautiful if there was a pope named Francis, who could embrace the idea of disseminating material things, and – but becoming close to nature and understanding how important it is to respect the Earth. And I met some monks in Assisi, and they said, “This will never happen.” You know, I talked to the monks because I was doing research. “We’ll never have a Pope Francis, because Francis, St. Francis, was too rebellious. We’re never going to have a Jesuit or a Franciscan.” And I said, “Well, you know, let’s hope.”

And then, when Benedict stepped down, I was watching television with my daughter, and the white smoke had come up, and so we were waiting to see who would be pope. And we had to wait a long time, like 45 minutes. And in this 45 minutes, I told Jesse how much I wanted a pope named Francis and why, and I told her the story of St. Francis. And she was saying, “Oh, Mommy, I hope you get a Pope Francis.” I mean, I’m not a Catholic, but I still wanted a Pope Francis. And we’re watching and watching, and then they came out, and, lo and behold, they announce the new pope, and it’s Pope Francis. We were like jumping up and down as if we were at the Kentucky Derby and our horse came in. So, I was quite happy, because I knew anyone who took on this name was taking on a great mantle of responsibility. Continue reading →

By Steve Beard

At the age of 78, the righteous Queen of Rockabilly is still tearing it up with 60 to 80 concerts per year. Considered to be one of the first women to record rock and roll, Jackson is a sassy music legend who toured with Johnny Cash, Jerry Lee Lewis, Buddy Holly, and, most recently, Adele. It was her boyfriend, Elvis Presley, who convinced Jackson to migrate from country music to rockabilly.

In the 1960s and 1970s, Jackson growled out hits such as “My Big Iron Skillet,” “Tears Will Be the Chaser for your Wine,” and “Fujiyama Mama.” Ten years after their marriage, Wanda and her husband Wendall began attending church and dedicated their lives to Christianity in 1971. “We were headed down a pretty rocky road,” she told Smithsonian Magazine. “The main thing that God does for you when you really sell out to him and want to live for him is he sets your priorities up right.” Over the next decade, she recorded half a dozen gospel albums and devoted their talents to churches and revival meetings.

When the rockabilly revival of the 1980s was launched, Jackson was recruited to tour all over Europe. With her legendary status as a rock pioneer, she was periodically invited to play at music festivals and to collaborate with other artists such as Rosie Flores and The Cramps.

“People want to pigeonhole God and say if you’re serving God, you have to do it through the church or gospel music,” she told the Cleveland Plain Dealer. “But it really isn’t that way at all. God uses you and your talents wherever you are.”

Sparked by the lobbying efforts of Elvis Costello, Jackson was inducted into the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame in 2009. “For girls with guitars, myself included, Wanda was the beginning of rock and roll,” Rosanna Cash said during the induction ceremony. “Everyone who cares about roots music and rock ‘n’ roll reveres Wanda. But in particular, every young woman I know, musician or otherwise, worships her as the prototype, the first female rock star, as she so modestly acknowledges herself.”

To this day, Jackson continues to perform live shows and recording albums to highlight her love for Americana, gospel, country, and rockabilly. Her last two albums were produced by critically-acclaimed recording gurus Jack White (“The Party Ain’t Over”) and Justin Townes Earle (“Unfinished Business” – her 31st studio album).

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“Despite all the great things I had happening in my life, for many years I was missing Jesus,” observes Wanda Jackson in the forward to Dan Kimball’s 2012 book Adventures in Churchland: Finding Jesus in the Mess of Organized Religion. Jackson performed on Easter Sunday this year at Kimball’s Vintage Faith Church in Santa Cruz, California.

“I have learned that you can never really have the abundant and happy life you want until you know Jesus personally,” she writes. “But unlike what you might think, you don’t have to give up a thing or change who you are to come to Jesus. You can come to him with all your hang-ups, confusion, and questions. And then, if there are changes that need to be made in your life, he will help you to make them. He will give you the strength you need to make the change. You don’t have to do it before you come to him, and you don’t have to do it alone.

“My life was changed forever when I gave my heart and life to the Lord Jesus Christ,” Jackson concludes. “And that’s what I can promise you: that when you know Jesus personally and decide to follow him, your life will never be the same.”

Steve Beard is the founder and creative director of Thunderstruck.

GQ Magazine recently published a nearly 6,000 word profile by Joel Lovell on Stephen Colbert, formerly of The Colbert Report and soon to be hosting The Late Show. The entire essay is worth reading but special attention should be paid to how he dealt with the death of his father and two brothers when he was 10 years old and how he views his role in the world: “I am here to know God, love God, serve God…” Here are a few highlights.

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[Colbert] used to have a note taped to his computer that read, “Joy is the most infallible sign of the existence of God.”

It’s hard to imagine any comedian meditating every day on so sincere a message. It’s even harder when you know his life story, which bears mentioning here—that he is the youngest of eleven kids and that his father and two of his brothers, Peter and Paul, the two closest to him in age, were killed in a plane crash when he was 10. His elder siblings were all off to school or on with their lives by then, and so it was just him and his mother at home together for years.

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After his sophomore year he transferred to Northwestern’s theater program, where he was purely focused on drama. … And then he met Del Close, the legendary improv teacher and mentor and champion of the idea that improvisational comedy, when performed purely, was in fact high expressive art….He was part of the same Second City class that included Amy Sedaris and Paul Dinello and Chris Farley. “Our first night professionally onstage,” he said, the longtime Second City director Jeff Michalski told them that the most important lesson he could pass on to them was this: “You have to learn to love the bomb.”

“It took me a long time to really understand what that meant,” Colbert said. “It wasn’t ‘Don’t worry, you’ll get it next time.’ It wasn’t ‘Laugh it off.’ No, it means what it says. You gotta learn to love when you’re failing.… The embracing of that, the discomfort of failing in front of an audience, leads you to penetrate through the fear that blinds you. Fear is the mind killer.” (You’re welcome, Dune nerds.)

Continue reading →

The captain of a team in the Gotham Girls league breaks down her hard-core exercise routine on wheels

Eva McCloskey often tells people she has two careers. During the week, the 35-year-old is the director of talent strategy at the New York City consulting firm DDG. On weekends, she trades her high heels for roller skates. She is the captain of the Brooklyn Bombshells. Her team remains undefeated this season in the all-women Gotham Girls Roller Derby league.