Anyone know who this terrific drummer of a priest (or seminarian) is? (Watch all the way through for the special ending.)

No doubt he’ll be pegged for the youth ministry, but despite myself, I am wondering what it would be like if he teamed up with bass wizard Fr. Stan Fortuna on bass to compose a Mass.

And wait — they could be joined by, perhaps, guitar guru Fr. Stan Fortuna on guitar:

And while Fr. Fortuna can — it is true — also front a rock band, I suggesting sharing the wealth, and nominate Fr. Cesare Bonizzi for lead singer:

I believe this opens up a new topic at R&T: Religious leaders who rock. Do readers have other suggestions?

This topic takes us back to the origins of Rock and Theology and its patron saint, the Abbot Primate of the Benedictines, Notker Wolf.

Tommy Beaudoin, Hastings-on-Hudson, New York

Why is rock music so frequently such a conductor of awareness of — to borrow from Thich Nhat Hanh — “our appointment with life”? I wondered this when reading critic Nate Chinen’s recent review of a Pearl Jam show in New York City. Pearl Jam, edging through two decades of existence, remains fierce as ever.

Chinen writes that lead singer Eddie Vedder “savored the cheers for each song, but he also made sure to provide a rejoinder near the show’s end, with an extravagantly raging version of ‘Alive,’ from [the album] ‘Ten.’ The chorus of that tune, like the title, is a simple but vital declaration — an insistence, really — and the arena roared its fist-pumping assent.”

And then we are back to the extraordinary and simply-stated philosophical theology of Cesare Bonizzi, formerly of the band Fratello Metallo. I cannot get enough of quoting Bonizzi on this blog (most recently here). Once again, his (post?) secular credo:

“I am religious and I am a priest. I believe in it and I put my whole life into it. But I don’t play to draw people closer to Christ, to the church or to religion. I do it to convert people to life, to understand life, to grab hold of life, to savor life, to experience life and enjoy it, full stop.”

Instead of denying or ignoring people’s renewed zeal for the world that rock culture can offer, theology should find ways of operating with this zeal, as if from the inside, if theology is not to neglect its ancient vocation to soul-ish courage-making.

Tom Beaudoin
In flight between New York and Ohio

Apparently, this news is several months old, but Cesare Bonizzi has decided to leave rock. He is the 60-something Catholic friar who made global music news by fronting an Italian rock band, Fratello Metallo. His stated reason? To combat the devil. See his “final interview” here:

Several times, I have featured Bonizzi here at R&T –  for two reasons: [1] His Catholic theology of engagement with secular culture is refreshing, radical, and subtle. As he stated it in an interview: “I am religious and I am a priest. I believe in it and I put my whole life into it. But I don’t play to draw people closer to Christ, to the church or to religion. I do it to convert people to life, to understand life, to grab hold of life, to savor life, to experience life and enjoy it, full stop.” I wager that this is not only a theology occasioned by finding himself playing in a rock band for secular audiences, but the fruit of decades of prayer and service in religious life. [2] He models the experimental attitude that ought to characterize the Catholic engagement with secularity in contemporary Western life.

Now, that “devil” piece is quite interesting, and I would like to hear more about it. In the interview above, he presents a fully-formed nugget about how he thinks the devil was at work in his success, dividing him from his music and his religious companions. He parses “devil” as “divider”, and if that is his way of using traditional language but with a contemporary (“demythologized”) meaning, it’s a further example of his experimenting theologically in a secular age. In other words, theologically speaking, whatever singular force is pulling him apart from his band, his manager, and other monks, is not likely worthy of his own recognition/assent to a divine claim on his life. That’s how I would put what he said.

But even as he goes out swinging, he proclaims with gusto, and again with Catholic provocation: “Metal is the real brother!”

Tom Beaudoin

Hastings-on-Hudson, New York, United States