Glad to hear someone discussing "Small Gods" from the view of religion. I like to think I am religious, too (I am Catholic) and the story has some spot on points about religion being made of people and their beliefs not the rituals, but the rituals sometimes become the religion itself. Brutha is one of my favorite Discworld characters for his silliness but also how he grows wiser and wiser through the story. I think there was another line in the story that I loved- something like (I don't have the book with me) "No god should be worth dying for. A god should be worth living for."
As for music- actually one of my regrets about the radio show (and the only one since it is just brilliant) is that they don't seem to have very clear renditions of Brutha singing Omnian hymns. I was kind of hoping for that since the names of the songs are so utterly hideously funny and inappropriate as church songs= it would have been a nice way to make a statement against all trite and banal, meaningless church hymns. Another antidote is to listen to the hymns sung in the movie "The Meaning of Life."
Sorry you are having misery with bad choir directors and meaningless music. I have gone through that as well. The best antidote was that I ended up going to campus churches because the student bands were much more interesting with a bizarre combination of instruments and sounds more like jazz and blues- I wound up playing mandolin in a couple of them. I liked those because the songs really seemed to evoke what the service was about, and people sang along which is good.
Nowadays I go to a Byzantine Catholic church where we sing the whole mass in plaint chant in English and Slavonic. It is very beautiful and historical- then again, there is not much room for new creativity. But it does sound pretty.
Thanks for the commentary. It is good to share your views and good for us to think about insights too.
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branchandroot
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Date: 2006-03-13 07:12 pm (UTC)As for music- actually one of my regrets about the radio show (and the only one since it is just brilliant) is that they don't seem to have very clear renditions of Brutha singing Omnian hymns. I was kind of hoping for that since the names of the songs are so utterly hideously funny and inappropriate as church songs= it would have been a nice way to make a statement against all trite and banal, meaningless church hymns. Another antidote is to listen to the hymns sung in the movie "The Meaning of Life."
Sorry you are having misery with bad choir directors and meaningless music. I have gone through that as well. The best antidote was that I ended up going to campus churches because the student bands were much more interesting with a bizarre combination of instruments and sounds more like jazz and blues- I wound up playing mandolin in a couple of them. I liked those because the songs really seemed to evoke what the service was about, and people sang along which is good.
Nowadays I go to a Byzantine Catholic church where we sing the whole mass in plaint chant in English and Slavonic. It is very beautiful and historical- then again, there is not much room for new creativity. But it does sound pretty.
Thanks for the commentary. It is good to share your views and good for us to think about insights too.