Why One Abandons Christian Radio
June 30, 2008 - 4:33pm by ThomasI gave up on Christian radio a long time ago because it was the sugary and sappy equivalent of Top 40 radio. The same song over and over. The same lazy games and quizzes over and over. Boring!!!
As I began to think that being a Christian means being creational, of doing something new, different, and beautiful, Christian radio seemed like it was Christian in name only. Music is primarily about art, not about a "safe family environment." Good Christian music made by artists, not pop music copy cats, are about as far apart as the Metropolitan Museum of Art is from Disneyland. Disneyland is so contrived and pop induced it is gag worthy.
My father made a similar, equally justifiable comment when we toured the Andy Warhol Museum in Pittsburgh. He posed the question to me of whether Warhol created art at all. I offered that my father's reaction was the whole point of Warhol's work: consumerism had devalued art so much that people were finding artistic value in his paintings of soup cans, but it is hard not to just accept that it wasn't really art at all but cool copy-cat derivatives. People liked his art because he was a celebrity, not because he necessarily made amazing art work. He was contriving the contrivers, and people got a kick out of seeing beautiful consumer goods. Warhol captured the modernist paradox of the lowest common denominator: the devaluation of art into something so bland it can be marketed to every demographic. Lamentably, I think Christian radio has gone the same way.
Not to be alone, Chad Hall wrote a great essay on why he is Tuning Out Christian Radio. A great quote:
"I’ve noticed Christian radio becoming, for me, a sort of faith vending machine. Need some encouragement? Just push a button! I suspect that too frequent exposure to otherwise fine music hackneys that music and causes spiritual satisfaction to become one more commodity in my life. This makes real corporate worship feel like an imitation of the canned radio versions of the songs. Plus, it keeps me from developing truly nourishing habits. After all, who needs real corporate worship and challenging formative disciplines when I can just tune my radio dial and get a quick God fix?"
What is so destructive about Christian radio and TV is the wall built between congregation and individual. The whole media of worship as radio or TV disconnects one from the body. Paul has written that we are tied together as one body in community, and these ties should be made of hand-shakes, holy kisses, hugs, tears, singing, prayer, silence, and communion. None of those things happen over the radio or TV.
Media is a tool that can be used in a corporate setting. But when media forms a barrier between relationships and fellowship, when it becomes a "little bird" in our ear telling us what we want to hear (like in Fahrenheit 451), then media begins to distort reality and encapsulate us in our own contrived, individualistic worlds. We cannot just consume radio jingles, TV shows, and blogs. Everyday, one must be purposeful in building community and relationships in their own communities, and online if need be. This is why I always try to engage people in comments, and make blog posts the start of a conversation and not a pronouncement that, "I am an expert, listen to me and do what I say."
Comments
I guess it depends on what kind of 'Christian radio' you're talking about.
The kind of Christian radio I'm involved in is about reaching the kind of people who would never walk through the door of a church. Around 70% of our audience are not church attenders.
We certainly don't play wall to wall worship music and we're not sugary sweet. We play a mix of music from Christian artists and carefully selected secular artists.
I don't believe that the medium is intrinsically wrong but what those in control choose to do with it.
I would agree. I find your version of Christian radio, one that requires a certain level of thought and "curating" to be far better than the lowest-common-denominator, better-safe-than-sorry ethic of the usual Christian radio that I am discussing.
I do want to reiterate that I think that the majority of Christian radio is not a Christian problem as much as a cultural problem. Top 40 radio suffers from the same mentality. So does most TV. Our culture has lost a definition of art, and once that happens things can become drivvel.
good post. I especially liked your thoughts about Christian radio descending into a quick god fix. I guess pop Christian radio can serve to perpetuate the Christian bubble on the one hand (safe, not secular, familiar, apple pie-ish) but it could also be quite missional. It's a tool, an outlet which can serve either of these purposes. Perhaps if the radio format was truly dj's choice and not a top40 dictated selection set it could be a better experience? Do you have thoughts on how it could be remedied?
I think that in the post-Christian environment of America, where secularism does not reign but some vague notion of Christianized civil religion full of politicized Christian cliches and God's name thrown around for cultural, political, and monetary gain (think of award show acceptance speeches), I think that a missional Christian radio would not be pop, but a counter cultural movement against the diminishing artistic value of pop culture and, therefore, its Christian equivalent.
What I think would remedy the situation is a re-igniting of the Christian's call to high art, to produce less Plus Ones and elevator music praise albums and begin helping bands and artists like Derek Webb, Sufjan Stevens, Danielson, Half-handed Cloud, Ashes Remain, etc. I think a profound difference is found between artists like David Crowder and mass-marketed praise music on Hillsongs #72. Part of this might be my bent toward independent music, but the DIY, independent, working artist ethos has much more in common with the Christian idea of vocation instead of the commercial, mass-produced, materialistic, market-driven music that comes out of Top 40 radio varieties. Music should be about art, not polls and demographics.