Listening to Bruce Springsteen has always been some kind of prayer for me.
I remember when I first discovered “Jungleland.” I was 14 and listening on my headphones as I floated on a raft in a pool in the Hamptons. With the volume turned up, I left that high-class world behind and entered a rock and roll meditation on the devastation and redemption that happens on the streets of a New York City summer. I did not personally know anything about that reality but the images, piano and saxophone captivated my heart and were an invitation to step out of my sheltered life into something more real.
I was thinking about that moment when I took my son Roddy to see Bruce Springsteen recently. Every time The Boss comes through town, we find a way to go. We make it work because there are some things in life that are too good to miss and Bruce Springsteen, for us, is one of them.
I first took Roddy to Bruce when I was pregnant with him. That was the only one of dozens of Springsteen shows I have been to where I was privileged to sit close to the stage. It was a sacred moment in my Springsteen journey, a fitting setting for my son’s prenatal initiation.
Since then, Roddy and I have seen Bruce together on several occasions. Each time, I feel a strange sense of parental satisfaction when I look over and see my son belting out each word. In those moments, I think, “If Roddy receives no other wisdom from me, he’s got Bruce and that is enough.”
It’s a crazy thought.
I am supposed to feel that way about Jesus. Or morality. And I do. When I see Roddy singing “Amazing Grace” or the “Regina Caeli,” I feel the same sense of satisfaction. But Roddy is 13 and right now Bruce is initiating him into the transforming power of ritual, the importance of social justice, and the mystery of resurrection in a way that Roddy gets and inspires him to be a better person.
Right about now I need to issue a few disclaimers. Yes, I have grown out of my teenage obsession with The Boss. I no longer want to be his girlfriend or anything like that (though I salute my teenage self for making such a fine choice in groupie obsession). I no longer need to trick or treat at his house on Halloween (but I am proud of my friend Katie’s and my dedication in driving to Rumson NJ to do so when we were 18). I no longer need to see him from the floor seats. Any time Bruce plays in town I am happy just to be there. It’s like going to see an old friend.
In recent years, I have been loving the fact that Bruce is claiming his sacred role as a minister of rock and roll. He started the last show I saw asking, “Are you ready to be transformed?” He has a Gospel choir singing with him now. And he has a whole collection of songs about the sacred rising that is at the heart of my faith.
Back in high school, I did not intellectually understand these connections Bruce was making to the religious imagination. But I could listen to his ballads over and over and they were forming me in ways I did not yet understand. “Drive All Night,” “Backstreets,” and “Racing in the Street” fascinated me, which was strange, because I was not a teenage male who lived for my car, or a man who had been broken by economic injustice. The chords of night and the hope Bruce could find there were what drew me. They pointed to some deeper mystery that I hoped was real.
In my senior year, I discovered the acoustic album, “Nebraska.” Listening to those plaintive tunes, I wondered what led “Johnny 99” to pick up a gun. The “State Trooper’s” struggle to figure out whether to arrest his brother or let him go troubled me. I was learning about the nuances of personal morality in religion class at my private Catholic school then. When I put on my headphones, I entered into the complexity of human choices that happen inside of profoundly unjust situations. I did not know about social ethics yet, but I was getting a primer thanks to Bruce.
Years later, “Across the Border” became a maternal hymn for me. Bruce was talking about immigrants dreaming of a better life. I was pregnant then and sang the song as an invitation to my child to cross from the world of Spirit into my life. Two years later that child and I were dancing in my living room to “Land of Hope and Dreams.” As Bruce described the train that was open to saints and sinners, I knew he was issuing the same invitation that Jesus did when he ate with lepers, tax collectors and Pharisees alike. Dancing with my son, I prayed that I too could find the courage to get on that train and trust the one who would take care of me if I followed my heart out of my wealthy world into a life sourced in God. It was not Bruce I heard inviting me to rest my head on his chest, but Bruce’s music brought that image from John’s Gospel to life.
Shortly after that, “The Rising” had a similar magnetic pull on my life. Bruce was singing about New York’s struggle to recover from 9-11 while I was walking through divorce. Writing right into the pain, Bruce somehow came out singing, “dream of life” as a kind of mantra. It was his honesty about grief and despair while keeping his soul oriented toward life that showed me how it was done.
When our country chose war in response to 9-11, Bruce wrote “Devils and Dust” about a soldier looking himself in the eye. When our government passed laws taking away our civil liberties, Bruce sang “The Devil’s Arcade” about politicians’ lies. These days he is clearly and powerfully telling stories that describe the impact on working class people of the choices people on Wall Street have made. His social analysis is compelling. But he does not let us get away with just taking it. Over and over he asks, “Is anyone alive out there?” and leads his audience in a celebration of life. Though we sit inside of an economic recession, no one is depressed after an evening with Bruce.
A year ago, I saw Bruce in Philly as our country was grappling with Trayvon Martin’s killing. It was powerful to see a white man sing “American Skin” to a mostly white audience about the reality of racism as he stood alongside a profoundly diverse band and then move into a musical celebration of Soul music. Every step of the way he tells the truth about what is wrong and then embodies hope.
That is why I feel like going to a concert is a celebration of The Paschal Mystery, the belief at the heart of Christian faith that right in the middle of the mess is where resurrection happens. That is the faith I want my son to have. I want him to know how to dance when life is falling apart. I want him to know how to see and name the truth when the powers and principalities are trampling on those who are vulnerable. I want him to know how hope is present even then so he can find a way to embody something else. I want him to know how to grieve as an honoring of life. And as a white man, I want him to know how to be in partnership with people who are different from him, all while having the time of his life.
For me that is what the Gospel is all about, which is why I am so glad that my son has the words of Bruce Springsteen written on his heart and firmly implanted on the soles of his dancing shoes. Yes I have done what I promised to do at the moment of his baptism. I have passed on the heart of my faith to my beloved son, thanks to The Boss.
