The Deadly Silence of Muzak Churches

 I love traveling across our area and seeing the towns and villages where our United Methodist Churches are located. As I stop to pray for the church, its laity, clergy, and ministries, I wonder what that church means to the community it sits in the middle of. Is it seen as a beacon of hope? A refuge from the storm? A place of welcome? A source where basic needs (like water and food) can be met? Does it offer a spiritual path that enriches the lives of those it touches? Does it matter at all to those around it? If it closed its doors the day after tomorrow, what would be different in the town? Would anyone even notice?

When I was growing up, we derided “Elevator Music” which was found in department stores, doctors’ offices, and, well, in elevators. Muzak was invented in 1934 by Major General George O. Squier as a way to send recorded music to businesses without the use of a radio signal. Science entered in when it was found that music could be used to bolster productivity in workers and calm people down. One of the company’s slogans was, “Muzak fills the deadly silences”. At the height of its popularity, Muzak reached tens of millions of people a day, from presidents and astronauts to someone in the produce section of a grocery store.

A professor at Queens College said of Muzak: “[it’s] a kind of amniotic fluid that surrounds us; and it never startles us, it is never too loud, it is never too silent; it’s always there.”

Sometimes, I wonder sadly if the same can be said of our churches.

Have our churches blended into the landscape so completely that people don’t even know we are here anymore? Are we “there” but not “out there” in a world that has so much brokenness and so many needs? Have we watered down Jesus’ message so much that it no longer startles us?

There are “deadly silences” in our churches and communities that the Church must speak into, bringing the light of God’s Love and the healing balm of the Holy Spirit as we minister as disciples of Jesus Christ. This is not the time for us in the church to fade into a comfortable background. Drugs and division, violence and viciousness are causing our communities to crumble.

How can you and your church move out of the background shadows and sing loudly and boldly a new song of hope, healing, and liberation, so that the entire community can dance to Love’s song?

Guilty Pleasure

I confess that one of my guilty pleasures occurs every Sunday morning on the way to Glide: I listen to the Mormon Tabernacle Choir on KOIT. I do feel guilty about listening in to what is being sung in Temple Square, particularly after the Mormon Church's contribution to the passage of Proposition 8 in California. And it feels like a lot of cognitive dissonance, listening to the MTC on the way to listen to the Glide Ensemble, hearing a message from the Church of Latter Day Saints as I am preparing to offer a message at Glide.  Could the two churches be any further apart, theologically and sociologically?

One of the reasons why I enjoy listening to the MTC so much is that I know many of their anthems.  I grew up in the Babylon United Methodist Church (NY) which had an amazing music program. I grew up marking my age with the corresponding choir I was in.  I didn't so much read the bible as a child and teen, I sang it through all the music we covered over the years.

So it makes me wonder: how is it that the same songs that the MTC and the Babylon choirs sang resulted in such different faith expressions? These songs became the bedrock of my faith, which calls me to participate in the liberating work of God's love. The music communicated to me a commitment to be in community with all of God's people, to seek release from all forms of oppression which place God's people in bondage, and to love and protect the earth in all its glory.  How does God speak through music in ways that lead us to such radically different actions in the world?