Bass Playing and Teaching

11 Monday Jul 2011

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bass playing, bassist, homiletics, John S. McClure, preaching, sermon, teaching preaching

Here’s something I read this morning about research correlating bass guitar players and golfers. Theologian Tom Beaudoin, another bass guitarist, posted it on one of my favorite blogs, Rock and Theology.

It turns out that bassists are among the “dullest” musicians, personality-wise – at least from the outside. I’m a bassist from way back, and I’m thankful that I also play electric guitar, and keyboard – instruments that, by analogy, must pull other personality characteristics out of me on a regular basis. But the bassist in me is, to be honest, kind of foundational, (pun intended), and explains a lot.

I’m not a golfer, but the article infers that bass playing and golfing are roughly parallel, in terms of crowd-pleasing behavior. Here’s the most telling quote: ‘The golfers just did a few practice swings and lots of pretend looking into the distance after their imaginary ball and the bass players just swayed ever so slightly, did a lot of out-of-tune humming, and asked for a pie. God it was dull.’

This explains much of what I see when I review video tapes of my teaching. (I think the preaching tapes are more influenced by my rock guitarist alter ego) With this in mind, I appeal to my students, past and present, to be forgiving, and to recognize that, when teaching, I may appear a slight bit dull, but I’m really living the rock and roll dream. Just re-imagine me with my (heavy) bass guitar slung over my shoulder, on stage at the Royal Albert Hall, and this should energize the entire experience.

Homiletical Self-congratulationism

11 Monday Jul 2011

Posted by John McClure in Musings

≈ 1 Comment

Tags

country music, homiletics, John S. McClure, preaching, sentimental, sermon

I read this great newspaper article in the Nashville Tennessean this morning by Peter Cooper. Peter is miffed at country music song-writers for what might be called self-congratulationism. Now, that’s a mouthful, but translated it means that their songs create a perjorative, stereotypical, and often sentimental self-image for “country folk.” Instead of writing genuine country songs that wrestle with the tough road to redemption among those who struggle from paycheck to paycheck, and from harvest to harvest, they write songs that are patently self-congratulatory about “being country.”

I couldn’t help but think about all of the self-congratulatory sermons I’ve heard over the years, sermons celebrating “our church” or “our story,” the “let’s give our selves a big bear hug” sermons that paint an overly idealized picture of “us” – our inclusivity, our love for one another or the world, our choir, our children’s program, our fellowship, and on and on. Not that positive thinking about our church is necessarily a bad thing. I’m speaking about sermons that have no particular story line apart from the good old “back pat,” and provide no real feel for the tough road to redemption for many in and beyond the congregation.

To tell the truth, what often goes missing is honest particularity, which will include some picture of sin or the human condition in our midst. Just take a listen to Hank, “rapping” about country life in A Picture from Life’s Other Side. I know this song is a bit over the top. But where has the real country in much of our country music today gone? And where are the pictures from life’s other side, right there in our churches, that might find their way into our sermons?

Jumping right in

11 Monday Jul 2011

Posted by John McClure in Musings

≈ 3 Comments

My daughter, Leslie Rodriguez, is a Ph.D. student in sociology. We were taking a walk the other day, and she was going on and on about how much she appreciates the blogs that many of the academics in her field create. She is a review editor for a journal in sociology and reads through these blogs regularly as she looks for faculty to review articles. Several things stood out about her comments that made me think that blogging might be a worthwhile and genuinely helpful practice.

First, blogging can help to humanize and contextualize scholars. By seeing bits and pieces of the scholar’s life, pictures, videos, and so on, they become regular folk who are not wholly defined by their work. I will post this kind of blog entry in the category entitled “Who is this?”

Second, blogging can help others understand the relationship between a scholar and their work. When reading scholars’ blogs, my daughter seemed to learn a lot by connecting the life-passions and interests of scholars to their work. It connected the dots between the scholar as a person and the scholar’s work. These sorts of posts can be found in the category called “Connecting the Dots.”

Third, reading blogs can help to bring the scholar’s work “down to street level.” Whereas published essays and books are important for developing careful arguments based on careful research, a blog can be a place to see how these ideas work themselves out as part of a “mind set” or habitus. Whereas publications require absolute consistency, blogging opens the door for real-time inconsistency, pragmatic conversation with other perspectives, and making a host of connections that were not made in the published material. I am putting these posts in the category called “Views From the Street.”

Finally, a blog allows a scholar to push beyond their published work and to think out loud in real time about other ideas and issues in and beyond their field that may have little or nothing to do with their research and writing.These sorts of posts appear in the category called “Musings.”

With these things in mind, I’m “jumping in” for better or worse. I hope this practice is helpful or of some interest to my current students, ex-students, and other new friends in the great new social network of provided by the Internet.”