Children

The More Cowbell Award II

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More Cowbell AwardYes, it’s another installment of Cerulean Sanctum’s “award that no one wants to win”—the More Cowbell Award!

This one deals with contemporary Christian music, so you know it’s going to be a doozy. I’m sure just about everyone reading this blog will agree that most modern Christian radio stations are deep wells filled with the music of mediocrity, but it was hard for me to believe what I was hearing on two of the stations in my local area (I listen for the one or two decent preachers they have on from time to time. None of the Christian music I like is ever played.) In the span of no more than fifteen minutes, I heard three instances of what wins my second award. Even I was caught off guard by this new CCM trend because I didn’t think it was possible to surpass a nadir.

And I still can’t scrub it out of my ears, so—

Our second More Cowbell Award goes to

Children’s Choirs in Adult Contemporary Christian Music

I don’t get it. What is the lure for adults singers to have children’s choirs backing them on what are essentially pop and rock tunes? One of the songs that sent me screaming into the night had the most inane backing, with little kids repeating ad nauseum, “I fall down and get back up.” If I were a kid singing that three hundred times over through the course of the song, I’d think I’d take a swing at the producer, or at least bite his ankle. Guessing the ages of the singers, it sounded to me that on that song not a single kid was past the concrete reasoning stage, leading me to believe that all of them were thinking, Grownups must be really clumsy.

Back in the Eighties and Nineties we had what I called “Sandi Patty (or is that “Sandi Patti” or “Sandy Patti” or…oh, never mind) Syndrome” where producers, especially on her albums, had to have four thousand cymbal crashes, a white pop choir, a black gospel choir, and a London Symphony Orchestra swell at song’s end, culminating in a sonic denouement I can best describe as “cataclysmic.” I developed a permanent tic after the Christian bookstore I worked for several years ago insisted on playing a loop of Patty/Patti’s album Morning Like This all day, every day for weeks. Now, some musical genius from the realms of 2005’s CCM is forcing real live human beings to endure the voices of cherubic children mouthing the words some Nashville-crossover songwriter thought would sound cute and/or serious coming out of the mouths of babes.

Give me a man or woman with a decent singing voice and a mastery of a guitar or piano, and just let them sing, fer cryin’ out loud! After all, it’s Christ-ianity, not Kitsch-ianity.

*For an in-depth explanation of the More Cowbell Award, please click here.

Honoring Our Parents As They Move Toward Death

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Today would have been my mother’s 71st birthday, but she only made it to 67 before brain cancer shortened her life. We never know how fast or how slow our parents will die. When my mom was diagnosed, we knew her condition would deteriorate just long enough to give us time, but slow enough to cause great grief as a vital woman was reduced to a shell of herself. Nor did we predict that my father would drop dead unexpectedly, less than four months before my mom did.

I say this to ask all you who have both their parents alive now to make a decision today to never put your parents into a home.

It may mean that you have to accommodate them as they die. You may have to move one parent in with you if the other is unable to care for them for whatever reason. It may mean you have to go part-time at work to take care of them, or even quit your job altogether in order to take care of them in the last stages of their lives, but do it. Don’t even question how it will work out. It will be messy and will undoubtedly hurt to be that close in such a precious time, but God will honor you for that decision to give your parents that last bit of your love and care.

Also, it is never too early to discuss estate details with them. Make certain they have all their funeral and estate plans in order, a lawyer (and a backup lawyer) selected, and make sure an executor is appointed ahead of time. If they appoint you, you will have a lot of work to do. A trust can make this easier and your folks should consider putting their estate in a trust, rather then letting it go through messy probate issues. And absolutely get a statement of the value of their assets before they die. It can always be revised later, but trying to organize it all under the emotional pressure of their passing is avoidable if done in advance.

All the legal stuff aside, the last gift you can give a dying parent is to be there for them in their hour of death. Don’t let anything take that away. Again, God will honor you for loving your parents that way. You only get two chances; let them both be blessed.