I spend a lot of time reading books to my three little ones. Some days my throat grows hoarse from reading lengthy Beatrix Potter books to them, only to find my children waving yet another hardcover book in front of my face with pleading eyes. Eventually, supper must be cooked, and I gather up the books back onto the shelves for another day. After reading a book like Potter’s, I can’t help but marvel at the wonder and imagination hardwired into her. She must have looked at nature with eyes wide open and a mind twirling with questions and what-ifs. What if a dog and a cat operated a dollhouse store? What if a poor and sickly tailor discovered mice had finished the sewing project he had begun? What if there was a mouse who was tidy and particular about her little burrow? I remember thinking that way as a child. I watched a mallard and his mate swim in the pond and believed they not only mated for life but also worked together each year to plan and raise their young. I imagined my horses forming friendships with one another. I saw birds fight for a spot in the bird feeder and made up conversations for them. As I grew, that kind of wonder and imagination faded from view. Isn’t that the way it’s supposed to be: the turn to adult things? There’s a real world out there, and you can’t be preoccupied looking for love stories between toads. Get good grades in every class and start thinking about what you want to be when you grow up—and it better not be an author with her head in the clouds. As a little girl, I faced my nightmares and trials through imagined stories, but as I grew up, I became weary and cold-hearted as I distanced myself from those stories—both the ones in my head and the ones in books. I traded in my fiction for commentaries, theology textbooks, and Bible studies. And while those are good things, I lost something in that trade-off: wonder and child-likeness. What started to bring me back? Kidlit, like Beatrix Potter’s books. But not just any kidlit—good, true, and beautiful children’s books. How do we know the difference? First, we must understand childlikeness and childishness. Childlikeness Versus Childishness When reading kidlit, we may wonder: Am I moving towards childlikeness or childishness? I learned the difference between these two categories from a pair of homeschoolers. Two years ago, I had a two-year-old son and newborn twin boys, so my in-laws hired two homeschooled sisters to help me throughout the workweek with feeding babies, changing diapers, and staying on top of housework. One was a storyteller like me. She wrote entire novels, short stories, and poetry, and she wanted to try her hand at nonfiction as I had done for the past several years. As I helped her learn to write for Christian nonfiction publications, she reminded me of the beauty of stories again. As I read her stories and listened to her talk about them, I felt the wonder I had pushed aside for so long begin to swell again. She had a dream to write novels, and she hadn’t allowed “reality” to crush it. The younger sister, despite the suffering she had seen as well, still carried an untameable joy. I loved listening to her as she talked about climbing trees and watched her make imaginative games with my toddler. I saw something in them that I didn’t see in other teens their ages; they had remained childlike without being childish. What is childlikeness? The childlike person stands firm in who they are, , not pretending to be someone else to impress others. Those who are childlike play with little kids, even if it means looking silly. They can laugh at themselves when the twins puke down the back of their shirts. They trust in God’s goodness even when everyone else shakes their heads cynically. They find beauty even in the most aesthetically displeasing places. I’m still learning this from them, and I’m also learning it through children’s authors like Potter. I’m trying to look at the world with the eyes of a child to see the stories, the beauty, and the jungle gym before me. Most children have yet to be jaded by this world, and good fiction written for children helps us regain that innocence. Choosing the Right Kind of Kidlit Good fiction truly captures the real child experience. On the Worthy podcast, young adult and middle-grade author K. B. Hoyle laments the state of YA books in recent years, and how many of them have become about adults in teenage bodies. These kinds of books fail to capture the wonder that should be found in those books. Again, they embody that childishness that’s trying to fill out adult clothing too soon rather than a childlike quality that’s working toward maturity. As adults, we need the former because we’ve grown jaded and weary of this world. We need to be reminded again of what it’s like to hope and dream, to look up at the sky with innocence instead of cynicism. When they tried to wave the little children away, Jesus told his disciples to let them come to him because “anyone who will not receive the kingdom of God like a little child will never enter it” (Mark 10:14–15). This is a call to receive Jesus’ gift of salvation with unhindered joy and faith. When suffering makes us bitter and cold-hearted, we must find ways to renew our hearts and minds. When we’re becoming more downtrodden, maybe kidlit can help spark that light for us again. Kidlit also harnesses the power of humor and levity. As cynical, weary adults, we take on a solemnity and seriousness that can make us feel heavy and dead. But children’s authors, especially those writing for children and middle-grade readers, must approach their writing with some levity. Their prose must have a lightness to it, and it thrives even more with witty or even silly humor. Some of our beloved and tattered books are both beautiful and hilarious—like The Gruffalo by Julia Donaldson and The Tale of the Flopsy Bunnies by Beatrix Potter. As we get older and more hardened by life, this part of childlikeness becomes less natural. As G. K. Chesterton wrote in his book Orthodoxy: Pride is the downward drag of all things into an easy solemnity. One “settles down” into a sort of selfish seriousness; but one has to rise to a gay self-forgetfulness. A man “falls” into a brown study; he reaches up at a blue sky … It is really a natural trend or lapse into taking one’s self gravely, because it is the easiest thing to do … For solemnity flows out of men naturally; but laughter is a leap. It is easy to be heavy: hard to be light. Satan fell by the force of gravity. With such a natural disposition towards solemnity, we need to make room for books that cultivate this gaiety in us as they draw light into our lives. To move from cynicism and bitterness, we all need not just a bit of wonder and an eye for beauty, but a heart that can laugh. This is the life God created for us: “Light is sown for the righteous, and joy for the upright in heart” (Ps. 97:11). As believers, we have much to be joyful about, and we know laughter is a gift from God. Do we want others to see a dreary or joyful faith? I wonder if kidlit can help lighten our heavy hearts so we can better embody the joy God has given us. Kidlit for All Ages Some of you may not have grown up with a love for reading. Maybe you weren’t exposed to many books—whether good or bad. Perhaps all you remember of reading is being forced to consume dreadful books in school for assignments. You might feel like you’ve missed out. When it comes to choosing literature for children, Leslie Bustard writes in Wild Things and Castles in the Sky, “A steady diet of dumbed-down stories, illustrations, and conversations will not prepare them for all the glorious ways words can be used in times of joy and delight and in times of sorrow and suffering” (p. 9). She goes on, “These young image-bearers of God will be formed by many, many things. Therefore, we must provide the children in our lives with words, conversations, and stories that will plant the seeds of abundance in their hearts and minds … And with these seeds growing in their lives, our children will have deeper roots to draw from in how they love, think and speak” (p. 11). We need to do the same for ourselves; we can change the relationship we had with books and find wonder and formation in the kidlit we missed out on. As you’re rounding out your book list for the new year, don’t feel ashamed for sticking some middle- grade or young-adult books on your list. If you’re a mom or daycare worker reading countless books to little ones, keep your eyes open to the pages. Don’t zone out through the familiar and simple words, but engage your own mind and heart with these pieces of literature. All good kidlit offers something timeless, true, and beautiful to all ages.

I am by nature a thrifty, proceed-with-planning kind of person. So what exactly is it about a garden center in spring that makes me lose all restraint? Something about a hint of warm air, the smell of dirt, and a “We’re Open” sign by the road makes me immediately shift gears. More specifically, downshift! Because I can’t risk missing this abrupt turn! I’ve just got to hightail it in there and peruse all that green glory. What is this thing that commandeers my being, that makes me throw all normal practices right out of that rolled-down car window? I guess I’ll blame it on the spring air blowing up my nose. It seems to flush the stuffiness of the months of closed-window car trips right out my ears and take any good sense with it! Those full-chested, crisp inhalations are intoxicating and make me hallucinate about those green-tipped trees along the roadway. I’m just sure they are those infamous money trees, and they’re going to share their bounty. That makes it completely fine to buy whatever I want. When it’s cold, it seems that somehow I don’t even notice these temporarily shuttered greenhouses. I want to be out and about as little as possible, so there’s no time for pausing in the brisk air to smell the lack of roses. But somewhere along the journey through slush and frigidness, there is always a magic moment of change. The air somehow feels cleaner and the sun feels like it’s smiling. And as if out of nowhere, there it is! This beacon of windows and glass-walled rooms stands waving its “OPEN” banners like a race track flagman! Every gardener knows the emergency detour that is suddenly created in their soul. Spring itself is a waypoint encouraging us onwards. Gina Sutphin Were you headed to important plans? Well, they’ll just need to be rescheduled. Were you supposed to meet a friend for coffee? Nothing says “I’m sorry for my late arrival” like a potted plant. Were you on your way to work? Surely you’re coming down with a case of Spring Fever, and are likely very contagious. The day has now officially taken charge of its own schedule and must be tended to! After all, it is one of the most Hope-Filled days of the year. And isn’t that really what this is all about to us? We who garden, garden because we hope. We hope in the seed and the labor and time invested. When winter is cold, we hold that hope that the truth of spring will still find us no matter how dark it has been. When all around us feels bleak, we hope in this thing that we know cannot be changed or shaken: that spring, glorious spring, will always come and there is nothing we can do to change or stop it. In a world that has felt so very uncertain, spring is certain. It cannot be moved, cannot be injured or stricken with sickness, cannot be tainted, and cannot be bought. Year after year, it has literally and figuratively stood its ground, pressing through unfriendly soil to spread forth tiny tendrils reaching toward the sun. And that enduring hope is what we all carry inside of us. Spring itself is a waypoint encouraging us onwards. So okay, maybe don’t throw all caution, or financial sense, or promised appointments out the window when the opportunity arises. We do all have a certain level of maturity and character that helps us be mostly reasonable about such things. But just know you’re not alone when you consider hitting the brakes to take that squealing, unexpected turn. And if you do have a moment of weakness and shuck responsibility for the day, you can count on one of us other gardeners to help cover your rubber-laid, tire tracks. After all, we know you weren’t being irresponsible. You were just being Hopeful. And that’s exactly what true Living and Breathing feel like.

Waking up to joy can feel like spring. One day, it’s all gray skies and brown sticks. The next, the ground has softened into mud and the trees are covered with flowers you barely noticed were budding. That’s the feeling of Andrew Osenga’s new EP Living Water, five songs that prepare the way for his upcoming album Headwaters like a garden bursting into bloom. Longtime fans know Osenga for thoughtful story songs with a melancholy yet ultimately hopeful and often playful edge. He’s taken us on a journey into deep space with a lonely astronaut, explored his genre versatility through his Heart and Soul, Flesh and Bone EP collection, and explored the depths of pain and hope in 2018’s The Painted Desert. After over two decades of music-making, he’s ready to take a different turn, from the desert to the waters of life. “This is definitely the most gospel-forward project I’ve done personally,” he said in a recent Rabbit Room interview. After years of processing sadness and struggle through music, now he finds himself ready to offer something new to his daughters and the Church—something joy-filled and hopeful, telling stories of resurrection and restoration. A couple of different styles come together on this EP. On the one hand, it shows Osenga’s flair for rock ’n roll, something we haven’t really heard since his (incredibly fun) Flesh EP. “Living Waters” explodes from an electric guitar solo and keeps The Killers-esque driving momentum all the way through. At the EP’s midpoint, “Hold On To Me” rides an easy rock groove for a song about keeping hope alive, even in darkness. The rest of the tracks explore territory we haven’t really heard much on Osenga’s past albums: Church-centered worship songs. On the first listen, “Rejoice Again” may catch longtime listeners off guard. Its straightforward melody and singable lyrics wouldn’t feel out of place at your local church, but it feels intentional in its simplicity. The themes of resurrection continue through “Risen One,” and “Peace of God” rounds out the collection with a gentle acoustic prayer: “Peace of God / Reign in me / Beyond my understanding / Beyond my unbelief.” For fans of worship artists like Mission House, these songs will feel like an easy choice to include in a Sunday morning playlist. Happy songs are everywhere in the world of Christian music, but genuine joy? That’s challenging to capture. But the hope in these songs feel earned, real, and truthful, like a balm for weariness or cynicism. For Osenga, this is only the beginning of a fruitful new era of music — from producing community projects like Anchor Hymns and The Faithful Project, to hymns released under the name The Quiet Hours, to even more solo singles leading the way to Headwaters. Living Water is the sound of new life breaking forth, the year of the locust giving way to a season of spiritual and artistic abundance. Jen Rose Yokel is a poet, freelance writer, and spiritual director. Her words have appeared at She Reads Truth, CCM Magazine, and other publications, and she released her first poetry collection Ruins & Kingdoms in 2015. Originally from Central Florida, she now makes her home in Fall River, Massachusetts with her husband Chris, where you can find her enjoying used bookstores and good coffee.

What a friend we have in Jesus.” We sing those words, and we take comfort in our personal relationship with the Maker, but just a moment’s pondering reveals our inadequacy. We do not rate such access. We have never before known a friend so giving, so interested, so committed. We can only fail in our half of the relationship, but somehow that’s okay. This grand friendship is the subject of Friend Forever, the fourth release from Mission House. Members of the Rabbit Room community are likely familiar with both Jess Ray and Taylor Leonhardt as beloved singer-songwriters. Jess can be heard on the 2019 Behold the Lamb of God reissue, and Taylor was the featured musical guest at Hutchmoot 2022. It’s possible, though, that many have missed the pair’s convergence as a folk worship duo called Mission House. If that’s the case, Friend Forever serves as a great introduction. The project’s nine songs include fresh versions of band favorites—both solo offerings and revisited Mission House songs—along with hymns, a folk song, and a Delirious? cover that lends the album its title. These are technically studio tracks, though they were recorded live at a friend’s home. They retain the spontaneity and connection of a live performance but are rendered with a warmth and intimacy that’s often difficult to capture with a concert recording. The songs are quiet and peaceful, and it is apparent from the opening track, “Place to Land,” that this is comfort-bringing music. That’s not to say it is lightweight or that it lacks depth. Instead, the lyrics often feel hard-won, like the gentle compression of a pillow under a weary head. “I need a peaceful pasture / I need a steady hand / You are the one I’m after / You are my place to land.” What a friend we have, indeed. Production is delicate and understated, taking a back seat to the meaningful words and expressive vocals. In this setting, the bridge to “Behold” arrives with reassuring confidence: “We’ve been struck down, we’re not destroyed / We’ve sown in tears, we’ll reap in joy.” This proclamation is not in-your-face but matter-of-fact, like a faith that is quiet and wise and not boisterous. Similarly, “Take My Life” is no empty platitude here. It carries the earnestness and desperation necessary to lead one to real surrender, and it demonstrates the kindred nature of brokenness and worship. We are often struck paralyzed by the paradox of our kindred Creator. We contemplate omnipotence and wrath, and we rightly tremble before such might. But the unique mystery of Christ is the coexistence of omnipotent wrath and omnipotent friendship. “Friend Forever” is a soothing balm for those who need a friend, and an opportunity to rest, ponder, and praise him.

A year ago this month, Rabbit Room Theatre launched with my stage adaptation of Corrie Ten Boom’s The Hiding Place. It was a project that stretched me and the whole theatre team in a wealth of ways, and we were overjoyed with the reception. The show ran for 4-weeks to sold out performances at the Soli Deo Center in Nashville, Tennessee, and since then theater-goers and Corrie-lovers all over the world have been asking, “What’s next?” Well, the time has come to tell everyone what we’ve been working on for the past year. What most folks don’t know is that during the run of shows in Nashville, the stage play was filmed for cinema audiences over the course of two marathon-days of shooting. Today, I’m SO excited to announce that, in partnership with Trafalgar Releasing, WTA Media, Matt Logan Productions, and MA2LA, Rabbit Room Theatre’s production of The Hiding Place is coming to a cinema near you. First, on August 3 & 5 for the U.S. and Canada, and then August 16 everywhere else. I am beyond proud of the entire cast and crew and cannot wait for folks to see their work on the big screen. Tony and Laura Matula have worked tirelessly in post production to edit, add foley effects, score, record additional dialogue, color correct, and export terabytes upon terabytes of files for editorial screenings and testing. These two friends are also the creative all-star team behind the design of all the show’s posters and title treatments and photography (in fact they’ve done that work for my other shows as well, The Battle of Franklin, Frankenstein, Sonata at Payne Hollow, and Lindenfair), and none of this would exist without their patience, hard work, and dedication to creating something amazing. Corrie’s story is one that changed me for the better. It’s been changing people for a generation. It’s a tale that deserves to be told over and over again, and I’m humbled to be able to play a part in her legacy. We hope you’ll come see it, and then we hope you’ll spread the gospel that Corrie spent her life declaring: that Christ plays in ten thousand places and there is no pit so deep that he is not deeper still. Christus Victor. Tickets are now on sale at TheHidingPlaceFilm.com. To inquire about groups sales, or to find out how to request a showing in your hometown theater, visit the website link above.

I’m guessing that many of you may feel like I do a lot these days when you look at the news—both angry yet impotent to do much of anything significant about the world’s ills. It’s one of the problems of our age, that our sphere of knowledge dwarfs our sphere of impact. In these moments I often find myself “doomscrolling”, thumbing through one bad thing after another on the Internet until I’m in a bad mood. On one such day recently I just had to ditch my phone and go for a walk in the woods. This poem emerged mostly as a message to myself, but I hope it meets you where you are too. Dear you, yes you, scrolling past this post, on your way, to another dose of despair. Lift up your eyes, look out your window at the real world. Leave your smartphones and smartwatches behind and go. Lift up the limbs that you’ve been given to the sun, breathe in the oxygen, the trees have so lovingly made for you, see and smell the blossoms they have bloomed for you. If you can, hold the life of a small creature in your hands, and feel its tiny life and beating heart, so much like your own, both of you so small in this vast world. You are small, yes but you are not nothing. You can smile at another, you can plant seeds in earth, you can love your friends and your family, you can speak a kind word, you can give a few dollars to a good cause, you can even, write a poem. Shut out the voices of the megalomaniacs making money off your fear, feasting on your paralyzed flesh like a pack of crazed hyenas. Do not despair, do not give up, do not give in, but stand in your small earthen self and be. This poem was originally posted on Chris Yokel’s Substack Beauty Is Truth

“Oh, Mom! JJ Heller!” my two-year-old, Shiloh, exclaimed in the backseat as the song shuffled through the speakers. I didn’t know she was listening, much less processing and correctly identifying the singer-songwriter. I was proud, but it made sense. Heller has filled our house with daily anthems, lullabies, anxiety-soothing balms, and beautiful music these last two years. Shiloh was born in early 2021, while the world was still plagued by uncertainty as COVID fears stretched on. We didn’t know if anyone would be able to greet her, so the privilege of my family being present to welcome my daughter home from the hospital was meaningful enough. My sisters came prepared, keyboard in tow. One sister held my tiny newborn while the other sang Heller’s “Hand to Hold.” This Christmas, we brought our son, Judah, home from the hospital. My sisters repeated the ritual, and it became a beloved tradition. May you never lose the wonder in your soul May you always have a blanket for the cold May the living light inside you be the compass as you go May you always know you have my hand to hold. Experiencing the newborn phase the second time makes me want to go back and offer grace to myself as I struggled through several first-time mom moments of crippling anxiety. Even now, I feel the thirst for grace as the floods of worries and inadequacies creep up. I type these thoughts out while sitting on the floor, caked in layers of spit-up, cooing nonsense babble, in the twenty-minute window where Shiloh naps and Judah is semi-content. Heller’s songs offer me the grace I struggle to give myself: “It feels like forever / But it’s gonna get better / Hold on.” When I look back on certain seasons of my life, hindsight highlights ebenezers of artwork. Art marks time; it helps me characterize and see beyond immediate vantage points. In this physically demanding season, I don’t have time to linger slowly through my favorite museums. My emotional tolerance for great plot has tragically diminished. Reading and writing used to fuel my faith, but I’m so tired even when I’m gifted time to engage in these acts. Instead of feeling shame, I feel hope because the cornerstone in this season’s ebenezer is music, and Heller’s songs are a foundation in that pile of rocks. Her songs are gentle reminders to pay attention. I sit on the porch with my babies and play “I spy.” I notice the sparkling beads of water that pool up on top of the grass blades. Shiloh’s learning colors, so I wonder what color to name that bit of shine. A pinecone falls from the tree across the street and rolls down the hill. I don’t have time to capture it in a poem, but I appreciate Shiloh’s laughter. And later, when I listen to Heller sing, “Every park bench is a pew / There’s a sanctuary everywhere that I go / When my eyes are open / I see you,” I remember the pinecone rolling down the street. I’m glad JJ Heller’s music, like all good art, helps me in the sacred work of understanding, of believing, of glimpsing, of loving. Sarah Bramblett I had never pondered the poetic truth that “All who live in love are Thine / Teach us how to love each other/ Lift us to the joy divine” until Shiloh requested Heller’s version of “Joyful, Joyful, We Adore Thee” be played on repeat as we play with a bucket of water. Shiloh stomps on a sponge so she can see her footprints. Judah coos. I’ve heard it said before that children are sponges, but I didn’t fully appreciate it until I saw how my mood can impact my four-month-old, until I heard Shiloh lift up a teacup and say, “Ah, delicious!” just like I often do. All who live in Love are Thine—stomping on the sponge, soaking up the water. Teach me how to love my children—a footprint. Let them soak in their belovedness. I might not utter long, thoughtful prayers these days. But as “Joyful, Joyful” plays, Shiloh is absorbing truth and I’m letting the Spirit intercede, through Heller’s voice. Because we’re listening on repeat, these songs are becoming my voice, too. Before I had kids, I never sang. I loved music, but I doubted my voice. Shiloh strips me of my self-consciousness, and I sing for her, “You are poetry in motion and you want to dance with me.” I also catch myself singing when I’m alone, fighting ants for the crumbs scattered under the kitchen table, no music playing, “Big magic in the mundane / The big picture in a small frame / Everything is sacred when you take time to notice / Big love happens in the small moments.” These songs root in the heart; they speak to moments and lifetimes. Shiloh asks to read “the light book,” Heller’s picture book Hand to Hold (she calls it the light book because of the little lamp with stars in the corner). We turn to the page with the photo album, the picture with the words, “Every day, you’re changing, sometimes I wish it wasn’t true. Hearts are made for giving, I’ve given mine to you.” I struggle to maintain an even, happy tone since Shiloh can’t yet understand why the beauty of growing up makes me want to cry. And if she asks her favorite question, “OOT (what) that, Mama?” I’m not sure I’d be able to explain the profound mystery. I’m glad JJ Heller’s music, like all good art, helps me in the sacred work of understanding, of believing, of glimpsing, of loving. You can find more about JJ Heller here.

Back in April, I saw two movies in theaters: CREED III and the theatrical re-release of the Indian blockbuster RRR at the magnificent Belcourt Theatre in Nashville. If you’ve never heard of RRR, it’s an overwhelming and rollicking piece of epic historical fiction that quickly became the highest-grossing movie of all time in India last year–and you can watch it on Netflix. The story follows two real-life Indian revolutionaries who fought against colonialism, imagining the two of them as near-mythic heroes who go from the worst of enemies to the best of friends. More to the point, seeing RRR and CREED III back to back got me thinking about an emerging pattern within many of the blockbusters we’ve received since the pandemic. Let me explain. The plot of CREED III hinges on a long-lost friend (he’s described as being ‘like a brother’) who resurfaces in Adonis Creed’s life after a betrayal years earlier tore them apart. The enigmatic Damien, played by Jonathan Majors, feels let down by Adonis’s lack of loyalty to their friendship and wants to offer payback in a myriad of ways. The ultimate fight in the third act is a near-Shakespearean confrontation between Adonis and Damian, not just feuding as wrestling opponents, but doing battle as former brothers torn apart by the wounds they’ve inflicted on each other. Watching that brutally engaging, anime-inspired final fight, I was hit by something: we’ve been seeing this a lot recently. My favorite movie of last year, The Banshees of Inisherin, might best be summarized as a movie about broken brotherhood as well. Pádraic Súilleabháin and ColmSonnyLarry have been “the best of friends” for years, going to the pub at 2 pm every day to idly chat about Pádraic’s donkey, until one day Colm decides that he’s done denying the obvious: Pádraic is not an interesting friend, and Colm has better things to do with his time than listen to his nonsense. Pádraic is, of course, deeply wounded by this betrayal—and the movie’s central conflict spins out from there. Top Gun: Maverick might have more of a father/son-type relationship than a friendly one, but Maverick and Rooster certainly have brotherly conflicts. Rooster resents Maverick for his involvement in his father’s death, and for holding him back from flight academy at his mother’s request. Maverick doesn’t know how to make things right. Then there’s Avatar: The Way of Water, where the tension between Lo’ak and his older brother Neteyam—and their tension with the other boys in the reef tribe—drives much of the drama in the second act. Not to mention Jake Sully and Colonel Quaritch, who were in some sense military “brothers in arms” in the first film and have since taken completely opposing sides in a war. Even AmbuLAnce, the first great movie Michael Bay has made in 20 years (!), has a fascinating adopted-brother relationship (and conflict) between Jake Gyllenhaal and Yahya Abdul-Mateen II. And then there are the movies that have come out this year, like Disney’s Peter Pan & Wendy, which imagines Peter Pan and Captain Hook as former best friends who betrayed each other and eventually find a way to reconcile. Or John Wick: Chapter 4, where the sinister High Table forces one of John Wick’s former allies (Cain, played by Donnie Yen) to attempt to track him down and kill him. I won’t spoil John Wick: Chapter 4, but that friendship plays an interesting role in the finale. When I think about a movie that best exemplifies the ideal concept of brotherhood, though, it’s definitely RRR. Indian revolutionaries Ram and Bheem are mortal enemies who don’t know it, and through a seemingly coincidental twist of fate, accidentally become the best of friends. There’s a montage set to a song called “Dosti,” which literally means “Friendship,” including lines like “an unpredictable gust of wind has erased the distance between the two of them,” and “won’t this friendship break one day in the form of betrayal?” As their bond grows, the lingering threat of their eventual conflict does, too—and it all culminates in the second half. I think it’s pretty clear: there’s a pattern of brotherly conflict and betrayal in all of these movies. In most of them, both ‘brothers’ are somewhat sympathetic to the viewer; sometimes the conflict comes from misunderstanding, or difference of priorities, or unresolved pain of the past, or a sense of masculine duty. But in all of them, things eventually come to a head. The brotherhood breaks. And then something new rises from the ashes. Maybe, in some sense, these movies resonate deeply with audiences because they acknowledge that male friendships can be just as difficult and complex, and just as integral to human flourishing, as romantic relationships. Houston Coley The masculinity in these movies is interesting to dissect. It’s been a season of bromances—even in movies like The Batman, which doesn’t quite have the ‘broken brotherhood’ element. I think what’s so refreshing about bromances is that they go hand in hand with sincerity; male friendships in the real world are typically defined so heavily by their irony and sarcasm and macho-posturing, and to see two guys onscreen earnestly expressing non-romantic affection for each other requires a total lack of that sardonic self-mockery, both from the characters and from the artist portraying them. One of the reasons RRR felt so fresh to American viewers was that the friendship between Ram and Bheem was pure and wholesome and affectionate in a way that we’re rarely bold enough to depict in our own blockbusters. Speaking as a guy myself, it’s the kind of ultimate-bro-friendship I’d dream about having, but have never fully managed to attain. Even with my closest friends, there’s still a level of self-deprecation and posturing that has to be breached to have a truly sincere conversation. It’s taken 14 years for me and my best friend to be able to say “I love you, man” every now and then. Maybe, in some sense, these movies resonate deeply with audiences because they acknowledge that male friendships can be just as difficult and complex, and just as integral to human flourishing, as romantic relationships. The role of the female characters in some of these films is an equally interesting component. Kerry Condon’s Siobhan in The Banshees of Inisherin is probably the most reasonable and even-tempered character in the film, intuitively reading between the lines of the juvenile and stubbornly masculine conflict around her. Eiza González’s character in AmbuLAnce has a similarly clearheaded disposition toward the macho insanity of Danny and Will. When the boys fight for her sake in Avatar: The Way of Water, Sigourney Weaver’s Kiri just rolls her eyes and laughs at the absurdity of it all. In Top Gun: Maverick, Penny provides Maverick with the parenting knowledge he needs to realize that he can let Rooster make his own mistakes. And even in RRR, Ram’s fiancee Seetha is the one who selflessly saves Bheem’s family and provides him with the revelation that Ram is not a traitor, catalyzing their reunion and teaming up in the third act. The women in these movies, then, are often able to see the ways that the men are seeing past each other—and kindle something that looks like a true relationship. It’s always important to me to ask why a certain theme might be resonating through such a huge set of movies in a given period. When I ponder this “brotherly conflict” playing out in the real world, I can only think about the countless friendships and family relationships that have been impacted by the contentious events of the last few years. The pandemic felt like a time when everyone was pushed to the brink and showed their true colors; I don’t have the stats to back it up, but it feels like we could all probably think of at least one person in our lives who has, intentionally or not, become more distant from us post-2020. I guess some people came out of the pandemic feeling like we “beat it together,” but I think for the majority of people in the US especially, the world feels more divided than ever before. The tension had been bubbling beneath the surface for years, but COVID brought it writhing and wriggling into the light, and nobody has been exactly the same. The good news about these movies, though, is that they all seem to suggest one thing: conflict built on honesty is better than peace built on denial. Colm and Padraic’s conflict reveals the way that Padraic’s ‘niceness’ has been intertwined with the repression of negative emotions, and brings Colm’s true struggle with depression into the light, forcing him to decide that he has something to live for. When Ram and Bheem finally learn the truth about each other after multiple butt-kicking misunderstandings, it allows them to team up and wreak havoc on the imperial forces like neither of them could’ve done alone. Rooster and Maverick being forced to sit in the same cockpit together and fight for their lives—and accept that they have been saved by each other—ultimately brings closure for both of them around Goose’s death. I don’t know exactly what all of this says about our current world, but maybe it’s an encouragement that actually facing our division and conflict with honesty and clearheadedness (like Siobhan in Banshees) could lead to something more livable, even if it’s not exactly friendly. “Can’t we all just get along?” isn’t working. I’m not exactly advocating for a simplistic “both sides” narrative where we’re all just completely reasonable people seeing past each other for exclusively innocent reasons, but I do think that our division often comes from willful misunderstanding or mischaracterization of what the other person is trying to say or communicate. I’m particularly drawn to 14-year-old Kiri’s summation of the brotherly brawling in Avatar: The Way of Water: “This is so stupid!” Maybe we need some kind of divine mediator who can see through the stupidity. Fascinatingly, I think the real revelation of these movies is that seeing two brothers fight is just as integral to the experience as watching them join forces. Watching Damien and Adonis punch each other in the face at the same time, anime-style, in CREED III was awesome. The “fire and water” standoff between Ram and Bheem in RRR is profoundly cool, but seeing them both riding a motorcycle and a horse to fight an army together is even more gratifying when it comes an hour later. Maybe, even in our personal relationships, we need to embrace conflict to truly earn those epic team-ups. Maybe the two go hand-in-hand.

In many ways, we’re in the Golden Age of worship music. Great congregational music is released every week, it seems. But it’s a rare project that engages the listener with spiritual depth, passion, and musical excellence. Anchor Hymns’ new project Sing, Sing, Sing pulls it off, all while covering difficult subjects like doubt, lament, and suffering. Sing, Sing, Sing also accomplishes what few worship albums manage to do. These songs are completely appropriate for a congregational setting as well as being intimate and personal. The album allows the guest vocalists to shine and show their personality while never sacrificing the communal “singability” of the songs. Thematically, this entire EP centers around the idea that the good and right response to trials and difficulty is not to suffer in silence, but to sing. These songs bestow on the listener permission to bring their pain and lament to the feet of the Lord. This idea is summed up in the title track, “Sing, Sing, Sing.” The opening organ and vocal run immediately take you to church, and then the first verse hits hard, “Grandma taught me life gets hard / but one little melody has brought me this far / when you feel lost babe, just look up to God / and let this be your song/ sing, sing, sing / something happens when we sing.” The rest of the song, powered by the vocals of Sarah Kroger and Jasmine Mullen, along with lines from “Blessed Assurance,” reminds us that this phenomenon isn’t new. This idea that singing to God about our troubles is as old as stories themselves, but it can be our story now. “By the Savior’s Power” opens the album with a potent reflection on the idea that, while our sin drags us beneath crashing waves, Jesus’ power and grace are able to lift us out and drag us to shore. The theme of the song is the power of Jesus to overcome the darkness, and Dee Wilson and Ricky Vazquez’s vocals are the perfect way to illustrate that. The lead vocals here are stunning, and just when you think you’ve heard the best part, the final verse hits you like a freight train. ‘Oh, the mighty Great I Am, rules with victory in his hands/ he will crush the gates of Hell and bring us with him to dwell.” “Those Who Have Not Seen” is led by the trio of Matt Maher, Taylor Leonhardt, and Paul Baloche, and this meditation is like a soothing balm to those of us who struggle with seasons of doubt. Punctuated with sections of “When I Survey The Wondrous Cross,” this slow-driving hymn reminds us of Jesus’ words of comfort at the end of the book of John, “Blessed are those who have not seen and yet have believed.” It’s an incredible moment of comfort when the trio sings, “I have my doubts but you have my heart.” On “It’s Alright,” Dee Wilson and Jasmine Mullen reinforce the overall theme of the record with lyrics like “If I’m buried in suffering, don’t worry about me, it’s alright/ cause the tomb of my Savior stands empty.” And if you didn’t believe that it was going to be alright before, you absolutely will after you listen to this, because this is not a song about platitudes, it’s about the holiness of Jesus and that he is the source of our assurance. Maybe the best moment of the entire album comes on the bridge of this song, a rising affirmation of the foundation of our life and strength. “When We Walk Together,” sung by Travis Ryan and Andrew Osenga, is a simple yet anthemic pronouncement of the fact that, whatever we do, we are better when we do it together. Be it walking, mourning, or dealing with times of weariness, the family of God feels those things alongside you, and you aren’t alone. “When we walk together, no one walks alone / and we bear each other’s burdens so the road doesn’t feel so long.” This is a song to come back to when you’re at your lowest. It’s tough to call Anchor Hymns a “bright spot” in the worship music landscape, simply because these songs are so full of struggle and doubt. But Sing, Sing, Sing exhorts the listener to take these difficult subjects and do just what the title says—to sing. Powered by passionate guest vocalists and masterful instrumentalists, Sing, Sing, Sing is a challenging and hopeful record that encourages the listener toward Christ as the source of our strength. This collection of songs has personality, and it’s filled with artists at the tops of their game—nothing here feels empty or vacuous. Anchor Hymns is creating worship anthems that are worthy of your time and attention.

Join our book club to read Corrie Ten Boom’s beloved memoir The Hiding Place ahead of the global cinematic release of A. S. “Pete” Peterson’s new filmed stage adaptation. Starting July 6th through August 10th we will meet weekly at 6pm CST over Zoom to discuss the book and the upcoming theatrical film adaptation. A. S. “Pete” Peterson will lead the group and welcome a few cast members into the discussion along the way. Join the book club by signing up for our Rabbit Room Theatre email list here. The Zoom links will be available to access in an email every Thursday. View the reading guide below and download a copy here: Week One: Chapters 1-4 July 6 @ 6pm CST: Zoom w/A. S. “Pete” Peterson. Watch the recording here!Week Two: Chapters 5-8 July 13 @ 6pm CST: Zoom w/A. S. “Pete” Peterson & Nan Gurley. Watch the recording here!Week Three: Chapters 9-12 July 20 @ 6pm CST: Zoom w/A. S. “Pete” Peterson & Carrie Tillis. Watch the recording here!Week Four: Chapters 13-15 July 27 @ 6pm CST: Zoom w/A. S. “Pete” Peterson & Deborah Seidel. Watch the recording here!Week Five: Movie Night August 3 & 5: No Zoom. Watch The Hiding Place in theaters across the U. S. A. and Canada Week Six: Movie Discussion August 10 @ 6pm CST: Wrap-Up Zoom w/A. S. “Pete” Peterson & cast and crew from the film. Watch the recording here! If you don’t have a copy of the book, you can purchase it through the Rabbit Room store here. Use the exclusive discount code: BOOKCLUB25 for 25% off your order. A. S. “Pete” Peterson’s filmed stage adaptation of The Hiding Place will bring Corrie Ten Boom’s story to theaters across the world for the first time in nearly 50 years. Seats aren’t guaranteed for this limited release, so secure your tickets now! Book tickets and learn more information about the film at https://www.thehidingplacefilm.com JOIN THE BOOK CLUB #semifeature

There was a time towards the end of Hutchmoot UK this year when I experienced one of those fleeting moments of sharpness in life. Do you know the kind I mean? The moments when you suddenly become painfully aware of the ordinary beauty all around you. The moments when, hurrying through a faceless crowd, dozens of extraordinary individual lives burst into instant bloom to your left and right. The moments when a line of writing hurls itself from the page to pierce through to your inmost being: to somewhere you thought no one else knew. There is a kind of poetry in these moments of sharpness. Oddly enough, when I experienced one at Hutchmoot, it happened during a Found Poetry workshop I was hosting in the leafy surroundings of Swanwick, Derbyshire. Around 180 of us had gathered at The Hayes for a few days of feasting together on music and story and art. Perhaps 20 or so had come along that afternoon to share a couple of their precious Hutchmoot hours with me. As I waited in the sunshine, the group came drifting back from the first task, which had been to roam the site finding fragments of text which we would then tear up and remake into poems. They had gone hunting in books, on signs, in leaflets. They had overheard shards of conversation, sifted through papers, and scoured the old wartime photographs on the walls. The sharpness came upon me suddenly as they pressed these “found: words into my waiting hands, scribbled on bright strips of colored paper. I was awe-shocked by these Hutchmooters: they had reveled in being given permission to look differently at their surroundings. There had been a thrill for them, I realized, in eavesdropping a little; in freeing text from its everyday moorings ready to make it new. (It is a thrill those of us who write regularly know well). As my hands filled up with paper and words, I was pierced once again with the sheer wonder of it all. There is earthy, God-fueled poetry everywhere. I mean: everywhere. Even on emergency exit signs. The moment flared and faded. I was soon absorbed in witnessing my newfound poets play with these fragments of text, in reading and discussing the extraordinary poems they forged. If you have never dabbled in found poetry, I highly recommend it. You may have had the misfortune to have been told—or indeed to tell yourself—that you are not a writer. Go tear up other people’s words and write them into something new. You will be surprised at what you find. Anyway, the day continued, the night passed. Hutchmoot UK was soon, with regret, finished for another year. I came away with my heart full and my hands aching to write. And yet I cannot tell you a polished, flowing story about what I, or any of us, found at Hutchmoot. I found it in fragments. I found it as poetry. Ruth Moore But as the weeks since have drifted by, I have noticed that found poetry is a strong metaphor for what it was like to experience Hutchmoot. I have not yet had the delight of visiting the mother ship, the original version in Nashville. I hear it can be a little tricky to secure a ticket! Here in the UK, this was our third edition—my second—and the first on either side of the Atlantic to be residential. We came from all over the UK, Europe, and far beyond. We ate breakfast, lunch, and dinner together; we bore witness to the joys and struggles of the creative life together; we prayed; we listened; we made. We slept, we woke, we dived in again. I came away with my heart full and my hands aching to write. And yet I cannot tell you a polished, flowing story about what I, or any of us, found at Hutchmoot. I found it in fragments. I found it as poetry. Take, for example, the moment when I looked around a crowded seminar room where people were claiming space on the floor and the window ledges to hear Doug McKelvey speak On Weakness. What an extraordinary thing: to know that it is not only me whose heart has been broken lately by community. To hear it ventured that, in fact, my very brokenness is what can make community anew. Or the first night, when our Music in the Round brought the wondrous voices of Andrew Peterson, Christopher Williams, Miriam Jones, and Matshidiso into conversation; when we listened to them trade smoky, tuneful tales from far-flung cities while the Derbyshire dusk deepened outside. Or joining strangers at the breakfast table one morning to find myself engulfed in stories of wild Alaskan adventures and joyous, cramped family caravan holidays in Wales. There was poetry in the hands of the people as we gathered to hear acclaimed artist Alistair Gordon’s keynote, as we pressed our fingers into air-dry clay to form physical responses to the hard-won words he offered on God and art. There was poetry in the bar late at night, as I eavesdropped on old friends re-finding each other, and as new friendships swirled over a sip or two of whisky shared. There was poetry—mischievous, brilliant poetry— in serving alongside the team, a heady blend of Brits and Americans. The year before, we had labored many hours together over chopping boards and sinks due to a last-minute catering catastrophe. This year, it was a joy to watch these gem-like sisters and brothers express their gifts at a more leisurely pace: there is a great deal of poetry, I find, in being unhurried. There were times when the sheer volume of this found poetry threatened to overwhelm. The fabric of the conference was rich and varied: you can see more for yourself here of the excellent artists who shared their work and wisdom from the trenches. It began to feel that every time I sat down to another meal, or outside in the unseasonably strong sunshine, I would find myself in the midst of something unbearably real, or funny, or deeply challenging. I wasn’t always sure there was enough of me to absorb it all. But that’s the thing with Hutchmoot poetry, isn’t it? There comes a time when it has been enough, even if it breaks your heart a little. There comes a time when you must pick up your bag and return to the real world. But here I am, weeks later, and of course, the poetry is still with me, because its Writer is as close beside me as ever He was at Hutchmoot. It is He who leaves these treasure trails of sharp moments, of poetry found and remade. Whether you journeyed with us to Derbyshire this year, or whether such an experience or community feels painfully beyond your reach, hear this: There is an earthy, God-fuelled poetry everywhere. I mean: everywhere. Go find it and make it into something new. Get to work. *** A deep and heartfelt thank you to my fellow UK teammates: Glenn Johnston, Heidi Johnston, Jason McFarland, Mark Meynell, Jo Tinker, Michael Tinker. Thank you for welcoming me into your midst. And to the splendid fluffle of Rabbit Room staffers and supporters who crossed the ocean to labor alongside us. Thank you for everything, even the goat yoga…

November of last year, with autumn awakening in me again the desire to write, I set myself the task of fifteen songs and fifty poems. Any poetry I had written up to that point I had written for myself, as a spiritual and creative practice. But I wanted to see if I could make something beautiful, or at least good, in the realm of poetry, to see if I could make a warm little house on a rainy, treeless hillside, out of poems. The forthcoming collection, Snowmelt to Roots, turned into a little house of more than one hundred poems. But however cozy the house may be, sometimes I forget I invited God to stay here as well. And it hardly seems fit to welcome him… (let the reader understand) God and the Guest Room I asked God to come live with me only I didn’t mention what a mess my house is and now I’m in the guest bedroom trying to shove everything into the closet anxious sweat on my brow trembling hands, shuffling and shoving, but when I go out to explain the state of his room I can’t find him the living room is empty I look out the front window— maybe he’s gone? brow-knitted, I turn and decide to make tea put the kettle on, wondering walking down the hallway to grab my book from the nightstand only to find that God has taken my room and in a tone that betrays an amusement with my surprise he says, “thanks for having me” Check out more information and support Zach Winters’ newest project over at Kickstarter here.

On my expansive old porch stands a large, ungainly, potted plant. It is a night-blooming cereus (NBC). It is an exotic, meant to be vining up inside a tree in the tropics. I keep it compact—or I wouldn’t be able to keep it. I have had it for decades since I was given a typically indestructible cutting from a plant then decades old. (I carried it home, a trip of weeks, squashed in my suitcase.) I think that this plant is wonderfully ugly! (Partly due to its containment, I realize.) In no orderly pattern it produces skyward stalks, which transition into large, succulent flatnesses which might be leaves. These have nodes along their edges, out of which might come another stalk, another leaf, or… …a tiny reddish sputnik of a bud. That little alien swells slowly, retaining its shade of an angry welt on your skin. It enlarges eventually to the size of your hand. There comes a summer evening when you realize that the massive bud is bending to point upward, and its sepals are starting to stand out from it. (It reminds me a bit of a lion fish!) The time has come. Grab your lawn chair and your flashlight and your camera. Grab your unsuspecting neighbors, if they’ll let you. This will be an event. Snap a pic every five minutes or so. You can’t help it; you can Google any number of videos people have made! But you can’t capture the magic of the event. By morning, I note, the show will be over. Behold! A massive white blossom, the most stunning you have ever seen, opens out to you, like a generous hand, graciously uncloaking its majestic interior of ranks of stamens and a crowning pistil, perfuming the warm summer night! It’s as if the blossom looks you in the eye and says beguilingly, “Here I am!” That blossom opens and somehow invites you in. It’s as if it says, “Welcome to my home.” To which the only appropriate response is, “Whoa-a-a-h . . .” “Oh-h-h-h!” “Ah-h-h-h!” You now are no longer able to see that plant in the same way. In your rapturous encounter you gaze at it with a kind of surprised recognition. “So! It is You!” we might find ourselves saying. And then and there, you give your heart to an ugly plant, to love and cherish as long as you both shall live. For these decades, I have dragged my “NBC” indoors in the fall, and back out in the spring. I have pruned it with apology, adjusted its lighting and feeding, and attended to it continually in hope of other moments of bud glory. I have enthusiastically bestowed cuttings on unsuspecting friends. In all the places I have lived, I have invited neighbors over for the show. (The neighbors I invited most recently actually came back over and sat on my porch again later in the dead of the night, just to watch!) This event of epiphany and encounter typifies human persons’ involvement with the real. Real? What real? might be your first question. By “real,” I mean the things before you, everything beyond you with which it is your privilege to be involved. In my NBC blossoming I am describing that magical place of meeting where you and the real face and touch and encounter one another. I am here to say that this is the arena of the philosophical. You might have thought that philosophy concerns the abstract and universal and inscrutable. I dissent from this. Philosophy concerns you and your involvement with the real, in attuning, understanding and action, at its nearest, felt, and most concrete. Great philosophizing pours forth from the night blooming cereus! Great philosophizing permeates our day to day lives. We may allow it to shape and heal us philosophically. The blossoming of the real shouldn’t be a rare or occasional thing; it typifies—or ought to typify—every touch and seeing. In Marilynne Robinson’s novel, Gilead, Rev. John Ames is an elderly, terminally ill, pastor writing at length to his very young son. Ames’ final exhortation: “Wherever you turn your eyes the world can shine like transfiguration. You don’t have to bring a thing to it except a little willingness to see.” Beauty is the real’s hospitable welcome. We respond in rapture. It attunes us to do so. Esther Lightcap Meek But sadly, we often don’t notice. We objectify, pragmatize, quantify, commodify the real. Or we suspect it, distrust it, disavow it. We “depersonify” it. Or, in a sense even more tragic, we degrade it by according it only spiritual utility: it merely marks some secret meaning, some divinity, hidden behind or within it. We put ourselves in the first person: “I.” We put the real in the third person: “it.” We blind ourselves to its second person in epiphany. The real shows up. It addresses us: “you.” We discount our own “second personhood,” blind to the invited encounter. But it is in the second person that we are meant to be involved with the real. Philosopher D. C. Schindler writes that human persons are “ordered to” communion with the real D. C. Schindler writes—meaning, that is our reason for existence! Human persons are made for communion with the real. We are meant to be lovers of the real. Knowledge, according to Schindler (and me) is intimate contact with reality. Epiphany. The real graciously shows itself. The real manifests in self-revelation. The blossom says, “Here I am!” Encounter. The real addresses you. It has found you and addresses you. To which you respond: “So! It is You!” Philosopher theologian Hans Urs von Balthasar writes that things—the everyday things of the real—self-show (beauty), self-give (goodness), and self-say (truth). There is no such thing as a passive object. All this heightens the gravitas of things; it heightens the gravitas of you. Encounter begins with epiphany—not mine, but that of the real. The real graciously self-shows, opening our eyes. Beauty just is this epiphanic appearing initiated by the real. Beauty is the beguiling “Here I am!” of a real thing. Beauty is the real’s hospitable welcome. We respond in rapture. It attunes us to do so. We respond, following its beckoning, following where it leads. It is giving itself; we give ourselves in response. We long and love to know the real—that is, come to commune with it. Our fidelity to it invites its further disclosure and our deepening understanding. This real opens out into joyously bottomless depths and vistas. “Things can fully manifest themselves in their being only to an intellect that is naturally ordered to being [the real],” Schindler says. Ferdinand Ulrich writes: “What everything in the cosmos seeks, we might say, is an ever deeper Yes to be spoken to it, an affirmation of its being.” The real is asking for our yes. Does this sound fanciful? Gullible? Marginal? This too would be a philosophical assessment. I would have you trim your philosophical sails and reset your course. My 2023 book, Doorway to Artistry, is a hospitable welcome of a book. In it I enact the face to face, second person, epiphany and invited encounter that is our everyday brush with the real. Hospitable welcome is tellingly not something you are satisfied only to hear a report about; you want to have been among those attending the party! Within this encounter, we trace our journey of involvement with the real, from threshold and hearth, through study, garden, workshop and veranda, to feast. This is the unfolding of any discovery we make. It is the unfolding of every relationship. It is also the unfolding of every creative act. The act of artistry is exceptionally attuned to the epiphanic encounter with the real; to be authentic, artistry cannot keep it at bay. Artistry is deeply philosophical: it gets at the “Here I am!” of our epiphanic encounter with the real. You as a human person are philosophical; you also are already artful: you already put things together creatively to produce new or better things. In artistry you attend to the things before you: your materials and skills and situation and guiding maxims. You attend from them in a manner which invites their farther depths of reality. You do this out of a posture of, I will say in the book: noble courtesy. Our noble courtesy reciprocates the welcome which the real has proffered. Again, Schindler: “A sense of beauty demands that we extend courtesy to things. In such a world, things may indeed serve human purposes, but if they do so it is not an abject slavery; rather, they offer themselves for this use in something analogous to a noble freedom in which their own reality preserves its integrity. The service takes the form of a gift gratefully received.” Things call forth from you (from YOU) a reverence, a courtesy, a reciprocated honor, and gratitude, a nobility in your manner toward them. This approach shifts how we look at and engage with the real. It is a shift necessary to our human personhood. It is necessary to our artistry. It is necessary to the real. Welcome to my home.

There was a time, not too long ago, when the church had a Music Problem. Check that—there have been lots of times when the church has had a Music Problem, but this is the one I remember. This particular Music Problem was born with the rise of so-called “Jesus Music” in the 1970s (if you’ve seen the Jesus Revolution film you’ve got some context). Jesus Music became Contemporary Christian Music, and many in the established church in the United States decried the perceived nefarious influence of “pagan” music on a format formerly reserved for pipe organs and hymnals. For me, a teenager who appreciated hymns, CCM, and, well, the other stuff, this meant I received photocopied pages from a well-intentioned lady at my summer job, all about the Satanic messages in rock music. I felt I had a good understanding of my faith and a good head on my shoulders, and these diverse genres (the other stuff included) could coexist in my ears. I thanked the lady, read the articles, and made counterpoints in my head. I’ve been moved to worship by many secular songs, I thought. I’ve experienced a very basic joy of living through good music, regardless of its genre. And besides, I added, there’s U2. I became a fan of the Irish quartet when my big brother let me copy his cassette of War, U2’s third studio album. I loved the urgency in the music, born of punk rock, and the earnestness, born of a decidedly post-punk worldview. The pounding drums from the teenage-looking Larry Mullen, Jr. shook me in the same mystic way that pounding drums have shaken adolescent boys since the dawn of time, the same way that moves well-intentioned ladies to declare that rock is the devil’s music. The ringing, soaring guitars of the mysteriously-named Edge evoked an emotional response in a boy that did not yet read poetry—goodness, I barely read prose back then. But it was the lyrics that were the linchpin. Because—and this is essential—the lyrics were Christian. Rarely is such a swirl of emotion, spirituality, and nerve expressed in such real-time: in chiming electric guitar E-minor chords, in gentle autumnal piano, in a Latin praise chorus, and in an overflowing wail of weather-worn joy. Mark Geil It’s right there in what became the U2’s first breakout hit, “Sunday Bloody Sunday:” an invocation of the name of Jesus, and a juxtaposition of the victory of Easter Sunday with the Troubles of our own bloody Sundays. Whatever lingering inner conflict I carried from the nice lady at work or the preachers who anguished over the number of unbuttoned buttons on Amy Grant’s album covers, it all crumbled in the face of U2. The band became my unassailable counter-argument: the non-CCM, very mainstream, very loud, and very Christian case-in-point. What I did not know at the time was that the very same tensions I faced here in the US were happening for years as well over there in Ireland, and almost brought the dissolution of U2 long before War ever came to be. To hear the story in real-time, you have to listen to the band’s second album, the one that a lot of people overlook, October. * * * The making of October is the stuff of legend. The band’s proper debut, Boy, occupied a particular space that could not be replicated on a sophomore record: it was a first-person exploration of the end of adolescence. October, then, would have to chart new territory, and its creation would have to compete with the relentless touring of an Irish band trying to make a name for itself around the world. Two particular stories from that creative process stand out. Story One: The band that has improbably maintained its original lineup since 1976 actually broke up during the recording of and touring for October. While in high school, three members of the quartet had become part of a fellowship in Ireland called Shalom. As the band’s success grew, leaders of Shalom came to embody the “secular rock naysayers” of my own youth, and essentially gave the band an ultimatum: It’s either God or this rock music thing. At various times, Edge and Bono quit the band. Larry quit Shalom. U2, on occasion, ceased to exist. The band that I contend has been used by God as part of the faith journey of me and millions of others were dissolved for the perceived purpose of being used by God. Story Two: We’ve all experienced the lost file. You forget to hit “Save,” the computer crashes, and hours’ worth of paragraphs that feel like pieces of your soul are irreparably gone. That’s what happened (in analog form) to Bono. He’d been writing while touring and had a notebook full of lyrics for their next album when, at a tour stop in Portland, it went missing, presumably stolen from his dressing room, never recovered. Back home, the band convened at their former high school, trying to cobble together what was lost before entering the studio. There wasn’t much to go on when it was time to record the album. Bono recalls writing lyrics at the microphone, feeling the pressure of the ticking clock (and the studio rental fee of fifty pounds per hour). Combine these stories and you’ve found the DNA of October. The band has decided that reconciling art, calling, and vocation is possible, even in the world of post-punk music, and they’ve had to rather hastily find the words to express it. To borrow a lyric likely written at the microphone, the band asked, “Where do we go from here? Where to go?” The shouted, wailing answer? “To the foot of He who made me see. To the side of a hill—blood was spilled—we were filled with a love. Jerusalem.” Given all that, what does October actually sound like? It’s glorious. It’s a polished sort of raw, with producer Steve Lillywhite allowing unbridled rock power to coexist with ethereal layers in a way that befits the unfinished feel of the songs. The opener and most well-known track, “Gloria,” fades in. Who fades their album in? Side two opens with the sound of Edge tuning his guitar before Uilleann pipes take over. One song, “Scarlet,” had a single lyric, repeated thrice—“Rejoice”—sung not with raised hands and a Sunday morning smile, but with fortitude and intention. * * * I had a pastor for a time who incorporated a call for evangelism into every single sermon. No matter the topic of Biblical text, he would at some point use it—however tenuously—to motivate us to share our Christian faith with others. You might not say October is evangelistic by nature. While the lyrics do include lines like, “Oh Lord, If I had anything, anything at all, I’d give it to You,” nothing directly implores the listener to turn to Jesus. However, I contend that it’s more evangelistic than some of those sermon applications. People criticize Bono for his earnestness, which is easy to intermingle with hubris, but behind the sunglasses he is, and has at least always seemed, genuine. In his 1981 Hot Press review of the album, Neil McCormick wrote: “’October’ is a Christian LP. People will react to this fact in different ways: snide, disappointed, alienated, unconcerned, overtly happy. I accept it because at the core of U-2 is honesty.” There, on this wonderful album, are the tense realities of early adulthood and the conquer-the-world earnestness of adolescence, and an unabashed, perhaps naïve, determination willing to shout it all to anyone who might be wandering by—not necessarily to proselytize, but to simply express what is bubbling over inside. Few would list October as their favorite U2 album. It’s likely that casual U2 fans have never listened to it. If you look at the list of all the songs U2 has ever played live, only one song from October features in the top forty (“Gloria”). “Is That All?” has never been played live. But I love this record. Rarely is such a swirl of emotion, spirituality, and nerve expressed in such real-time: in chiming electric guitar E-minor chords, in gentle autumnal piano, in a Latin praise chorus, and in an overflowing wail of weather-worn joy. October is not U2’s best album, but U2 would not exist without it.

Just over a decade ago, I discovered the TV show Being Erica. In the heroine, I found a character who works through past regrets in order to move forward in her present life (by doing time-travel therapy, but that part doesn’t apply here). I was inspired by Erica’s career journey, first starting out as an editorial assistant at a major publisher, then moving on to start her own boutique publishing house with a friend. I never once suspected my own journey would even vaguely resemble Erica’s (minus the time-travel therapy). I’d gone to grad school with the idea of getting into publishing and doing more of my own writing. I was even eyeing editorial assistant jobs in New York as I hit the halfway point of my studies. That fall, I did a presentation on how a writer could submit work to Farrar, Straus, and Giroux, the publisher of greats like Madeleine L’Engle, T.S. Eliot, and Flannery O’Connor, and dreamt of submitting my own work there—or maybe even being on the other side of the desk. By the time I graduated in May of 2009, every single point of my presentation from six months earlier was moot. The entire landscape of publishing had changed following the economic recession, and FSG was now a subsidiary of a larger company, no longer accepting submissions directly from authors. The same was true nearly everywhere, and with the consolidation of publishers came the disappearance of jobs. I didn’t go into publishing. I turned to another skill and found myself starting a career working in the non-profit communications world, becoming facile in writing web copy and emails and social media marketing. But the dream of Being Erica never really left me. The idea of helping good books make it out into the world continued to niggle at the back of my mind as I watched the detritus of the post-recession publishing industry collapse settle, and then reform itself in new ways. The new ways were interesting—niche genre publishers with the weight of a 25-year industry expert at the helm or low-overhead business models that shared profit with authors through immediate royalties rather than advances. There were so many new ways to make and release books into the world, and so many writers and readers for them. Some of the gates of the traditional publishing industry were knocked down by little upstart independent companies. The old ways were no longer the only ways, and over the course of a decade, a new publishing landscape—far more faceted than the old—developed. But here’s the thing. Erica didn’t start her company alone. She had a partner—a frenemy of sorts—who had skills Erica didn’t, and who brought her own experience to the table. The vague idea that formed in my brain somewhere in the 2010s that I could start a publishing company always found itself face to face with the reality that there was no way I could run a business alone. Also just over a decade ago, I discovered the Rabbit Room, and one of the greatest gifts I found in it was a new community. It was a community of people who not only enjoyed critically examining art and culture the way I did (like my friends in my AP classes in high school had) but also did so through the lens of biblical Christian faith (which I’d missed among those AP classes in my public school). Over the years I build relationships among the Rabbits and pursued creative endeavors with some. The key relationship that matters in this story was one that started in the old Rabbit Room website forums. Someone had set up regional connection points, and Rachel Donahue posted that she’d just landed back in the Charlotte, North Carolina area after living overseas and wondered if anyone else was nearby. She had just started writing and was looking for a connection. I lived 20 minutes away, and we were both headed to an Andy Gullahorn and Jill Phillips concert the next week. We met there, set up a coffee date, and by the end of telling each other our stories, we were fast friends. Both of us had been praying for what I call a “soul friend”—a kindred spirit, to use Anne Shirley’s terminology—and God answered our prayers in each other. Those who love what is Good, True, and Beautiful often love small things—and that’s who we’re making books for. Carolyn Givens Rachel and I began co-hosting quarterly writers’ brunches under the umbrella of an arts group here in the Charlotte area and through those I met Rachel’s sister-in-law Annie Beth, another writer. One Saturday morning our brunch was composed of five women who were all looking for a critique group—so we formed one. We started by reading Diana Glyer’s book Bandersnatch about how the Inklings influenced one another and shaped our writer’s group on the principles she explores in the book. For a year or so, we met monthly, reading our work to one another and giving feedback, drinking tea, and eating gluten-free snacks. And then the pandemic arrived. Those early months of 2020 were mostly consumed with each of us keeping our heads afloat. I was running the website for a church that had moved entirely online. Rachel was homeschooling half her kids and trying to manage digital kindergarten at the local elementary for another while the youngest found herself bored with only brothers to hang out with. One of the women in our group had a young baby and a husband finishing seminary. We didn’t move our group online. It was just too much. But when the seminary grad was called to a pastorate in the Midwest that summer, we knew we needed to meet one more time before our friend left. So, socially distanced in a hot garage with the door open and fans blowing on a North Carolina July day, we gathered for one last meeting of the Band of Bandersnatches. Rachel, Annie Beth, and I each had a work that was about ready for publication, and our conversation that afternoon turned to how we could support one another in the work. Perhaps we could all self-publish, we thought, but help market each other’s books. And at some point, either aloud or in my head, I pondered, “Bandersnatch Books would be a good name for a publishing company.” Like any good communications professional in the 21st century, I went home and bought the domain name and grabbed the social media handles that evening, and then wrote a long email to Rachel with a crazy idea: what if we started a publishing company together? We had skills that many of the areas of publishing beyond the writing—especially if Annie Beth joined in, too—and we knew so many writers with great work but none of those skills. Should we do it? Should we see if Annie Beth would want to be involved, too? I had no sooner pressed send on the email to Rachel than a text from Annie Beth came through, “Twitter just informed me my friend Bandersnatch Books has a profile. Are we starting a publishing company?” I forwarded her the email and got a nearly immediate response. Yes, we should do it. Yes, of course she should be involved. The journey of becoming Bandersnatch Books has been an adventure for all of us. Even with the skills we had, we found so much to learn. While Erica and her partner started out as frenemies and I began Bandersnatch with soul-friends, we still had to learn to work together well, to push each other forward and respect each other’s boundaries. We’re proud of the work we’ve done and the books that have found their way into the world through that work. We also each want to spend more time writing our own books, so we plan to slow down a bit next year. We’ve got dreams for the future, like a Classics set and a children’s poetry anthology, but we take every dream one step at a time. In our very first business meeting, Annie Beth pointed our attention to Zechariah 4:10, “Do not despise these small beginnings, for the Lord rejoices to see the work begin” (NLT). It’s a theme for us—a reminder that we’re committed to the treasures found off the beaten path, and those are sometimes small things. But those who love what is Good, True, and Beautiful often love small things—and that’s who we’re making books for.

We have an exciting announcement for our Rabbit Room members! Next week, we’re sending out a very special collection of coloring pages from Stephen Hesselman, the editor, and illustrator of the graphic novel adaptation of The Golden Key. The collection will not only include some of our favorite inked drawings from The Golden Key, but also a series of whimsical summer-themed drawings (which may or may not include a sketch of Tolkien, MacDonald, and Lewis celebrating the 4th of July). We cannot wait for you to see them! Amidst another joy-packed FIKA, Stephen and I sat down at North Wind Manor to talk about The Golden Key and his upcoming coloring collection. Read the interview below and become a member today to support our programs and enjoy a lovely afternoon being swept into the lovely imagination of Stephen Hesselman. Stephen, thanks for coming! Before we jump in, can you tell us how you got into art in the first place and how you got connected with the Rabbit Room? I really got interested in art maybe around junior high. I had some friends that were into comic books at the time so I started out with lampooning comics. I did “Splatman” instead of Batman as a first attempt. But I gradually got a bit more serious. I still have a bit of that “you make fun of the things you like” when it comes to art for some reason…but it was a fun way to start. Please tell me you still have some of those Splatman drawings. I do! I totally should’ve brought them. I’ll bring them up to the Manor another time. Soon after that, I started making up my own characters and once I got through high school I got interested in book illustration- children’s books and classics. A lot of my art was inspired by those stories. Where does the Rabbit Room fit into this? Stephen: Years ago, when I was on Facebook, I heard about it through my love for Andrew Peterson’s music. Sounds like a familiar story! I figured that’s how a lot of people find themselves here. It was fun discovering a community where it’s not just Andrew’s music that everyone relates to, but also Tolkien, Lewis, and others. After that, I knew that the Rabbit Room people were my people. It’s fun seeing how so many people get connected this way, and then end up contributing to different aspects of the community. I’m sure it was quite surreal to hold your finished edition of The Golden Key and now work on this Membership project with our team as well. Would you mind diving into a bit more of these projects? Maybe starting The Golden Key? Yes, absolutely. Tell us a bit about The Golden Key, how did this come about and what made you want to tell this story? Ten to twelve years ago, I discovered George MacDonald, (not like he was lost, I just didn’t know about him). I had exhausted the fictional worlds of Lewis and Tolkien when my sister told me that they were heavily influenced by MacDonald’s work. There’s this great collection of George MacDonald short fairy tales called “The Complete Fairy Tales” from Penguin Classics that includes a lot of his short works, one of those being The Golden Key. Out of all of those, I would have to say that The Golden Key was the most gripping one for me. It’s a fascinating story with so much visual language and meaning. I relate to a lot of the story and am so compelled by the imagery that just grabs you. I would say it’s the most visually gripping story that I’ve probably ever read. Going along the lines of imagery, how do you transfer this fairy tale to paper? Did you grow up with illustrated versions? No, I didn’t grow up with any illustrations like this. This graphic novel came really from the words of MacDonald and my imagination. It was a bit of a discipline not to look at anything others had created before me because I knew these stories have been around for a while. I’ve heard of others doing different versions, but I didn’t want anything else influencing my idea of it. I wanted to give it a stab at whatever I could come up with so it ended up being just me trying to work with MacDonald and see what my imagination conjured from his words. That just sounds so complex. Because you’re not just dealing with a story set in this colorful, complex, fairy world, but you’re also dealing with a classic author from the 19th century, which adds its own level of difficulty. I just wanted to say that looking at the book from start to finish, it just ended up being such a beautiful portrayal and really honored the visual complexity and beauty of MacDonald’s writing. Well thank you, I really appreciate that. Would you mind showing me your favorite page in the book? Absolutely. To give you some context, the two main characters, Mossy and Tangle are in this place called the Shadowland and they end up losing each other. From this scene when it closes, all you know is that Tangle doesn’t know where Mossy went. Getting to tell this scene and interact with this concept of the Shadowland was very interesting to me. It felt like a metaphor for us struggling through life. I love hearing that you’re most proud of this scene because I wouldn’t necessarily expect that based on so many of the images in the book. It’s these giant two-paged, complex, colorful prints that seem to stick out the most when you flip through all the pages, yet the scene you’ve chosen is very different from this. Its beauty seems to lie more in the story itself rather than any extravagant or colorful images. Yes, I think that’s why I like it so much. I love the images that were chosen to promote the book, I’m so proud of them. But this scene, in particular, holds a lot of complicated and powerful meaning for me. It was really hard to put it to paper when you don’t necessarily know how to do it justice. I ran what I had by a few friends and I ended up reworking several times. Besides how it turned out, I think that the collaborative part also makes it a special scene for me. I’m scared to go into this next question, but a project like this had to take a lot of time. Can you walk us through the timeframe? Stephen: This has taken years. I will say it wasn’t the only project I was working on at the time so that didn’t shorten the length by any means. I have a very distractible personality so there are plenty of other things that came up that prolonged the process. I remember starting it seriously when I moved to Nashville in 2014. Now it’s eight and a half years later, but I wrapped up the part of the process I did alone after about seven years. So you pencil sketch the drawings and then ink them yourself. After that what happens? You send it off to be colored and then what? I gave a draft of black and white with my ideas on word placement and MacDonald’s text with speech bubbles, thought bubbles, and narration. I knew it wasn’t the final placement of everything, but it was enough to send over to Pete and get his thoughts. When we felt ready to move forward, we brought Hayley Evans to color it and then Jonny Jimison to letter it. This is quite the collaboration piece between visual artists. I feel like that’s typically not something you have the opportunity to do as much. Yes, I loved that. It isn’t often you get to collaborate with other visual artists on a single project so it was nice from both the color and lettering standpoint. I feel like a lot of times you get a better result when you have several people involved, even though a part of you wants control of every aspect of the project. Around the time I finished inking, I was in a good spot to let go of those details and glad to have the help. I’m glad I was because it’s typically hard for me to give up control of my projects. On top of that, it’s like “I’ve already been working on this project for 7 years….” Exactly! I don’t want to spend 3 more years coloring or whatever it would’ve taken me. Do you typically color your stuff or just pencil and ink? Typically just draw and ink. Something that is helpful to know in terms of this art, is that, most of the time, comic book artists will do one part of the comic and pass it off. Because they are productionized and have to release a new comic monthly, they almost always work collaboratively, with a writer, a penciler, an inker, etc. But for me, it’s really tough for me to let other people ink my stuff. I do a lot of things with the inking that goes beyond the penciling. Penciling doesn’t look like my final product. So in terms of penciling and inking, the average time it takes me can add up to a total of 8 – 10 hours per image. Because of this, I haven’t really been into the process of coloring. Most of my stuff is just black and white illustration but I’m starting to play around with some watercolor stuff for fun. Would you want to do another project like this? Has a different fairy tale caught your eye? I had originally hoped to do a trilogy in terms of George MacDonald. Who knows if that will still happen, but it’s on my mind! I know we all love to hear that! With everything you’ve recently been involved in at the Rabbit Room, it felt silly to not ask you to draw some coloring pages for our Members too. I’m really happy you did. This has been so much fun for me. And I’m really happy you said YES! So just a few questions about that…our members will receive some of your inked images from the Golden Key and these summertime-inspired drawings. Tell us about the drawings you specifically created for the project. Is there a theme or are you just having fun? I jotted down about 10 ideas in my sketchbook with things I might want to do with it and decided on 6. So I’m basically sticking with the summertime theme and trying to also think about what would fit with the Rabbit Room community. I also considered what would be fun to color if I were the one with markers and colored pencils. I’m assuming somewhere in these drawings, you see bits of yourself and your own style come through. Where do they pop up in this collection? Well, I threw in a minion in this one garden photo. I feel like there needs to be a fantasy element to any sort of Rabbit Room piece. So I have this garden gnome who’s up to mischief and it feels like we should put a Minion in here, you know? The gnome obviously needs a friend. My mind is random like that. There’s another one where you have a willow tree kind of the concept from the Willow in The Lord of the Rings, but I want him to be super distracted. There’s a bit of humor in all of them and pokes fun at things that I like. Is there one you’re most excited to share? Probably the goofiest of them is the one I’m most excited about. It’s one with Tolkien, Lewis, and MacDonald wishing everybody a “Happy 4th of July” because it makes absolutely no sense. I can already tell you that that’s probably going to be the crowd favorite of them all. I can’t wait to see people take a shot at coloring these. If people want to support any upcoming projects or check out more of your work, where can people follow you or hear more about what you’re up to… Stephen: You can follow me @stephen.hesselman on Instagram to see some ink art. I’ve done a few pieces for a project with Jonny Jimison that’s coming up, and then I’m still thinking about what the new big project will be. Probably something MacDonald related but we shall see! * * * To our members, look for the collection in your inbox next week, and be sure to share your coloring talents with us! You can email us or tag us on social media using @rabbitroom to show your finished product and share it with others. As always, thanks for supporting the work that goes on here. We’re grateful for your partnership and investment! You can get a copy of Stephen’s adaption of The Golden Key at the Rabbit Room store and receive the coloring collection by becoming a member today!

I saw a tweet recently that said “contrary to what people on twitter will tell you, watching 1960s latvian arthouse films or whatever doesn’t make u a better, smarter or more interesting person. in fact, it usually just means you’re extra annoying]. watch whatever u like. the fast and the furious is perfectly fine.” For whatever reason, this tweet got under my skin. What’s wrong with movies made in the country of Latvia? My wife is from Czech Republic; is it “annoying” to watch movies from there, too? And how do you define arthouse, anyway? Something made for less than $200 million? Is my barrage of questions for this innocuous tweet an extreme reaction? Sure, maybe. But the more you think about a declaration of pretentiousness and elitism against the entire filmography of the country of Latvia, the more extreme it feels. At best, it’s artistically close-minded and ignorant; at worst, it’s downright ethnocentric. All of this is part of a broader trend of anti-intellectualism, especially in spaces like TikTok, where there’s been an ongoing meme about “pretentious cinephiles” supposedly becoming enraged when you tell them you’d rather watch a Marvel movie than “a 2 hour movie about the Serbian government shown through the eyes of a pigeon,” or “some 40s Italian film about the loss of a man’s bike in the midst of poverty,” or “a Croatian film about a man’s divorce process with his wife.” These are all direct quotes from viral TikToks in the last year. Ignoring the fact that all of those movies sound like total bangers, there’s an even more pressing fact to acknowledge: contrary to the claims of the tweet from earlier, watching foreign cinema can make you a smarter and more interesting person. At least, it certainly makes you more well-rounded and thoughtful. Sure, for the odd self-righteous nerd here and there, a little taste of obscure art can make them feel enlightened and above their “normie” friends who still only watch films made in America. But for the vast majority of people who truly broaden their horizons, watching foreign cinema has the opposite effect; it makes you feel humbler, less knowledgeable, more curious about the areas of cinema and art that you don’t know and haven’t explored. There could be something amazing lurking around every corner if you’re willing to put aside your preconceived notions, “overcome the one inch barrier of subtitles,” and see the world with fresh eyes. This is all prelude to what I actually wanted to talk about: the way that foreign cinema can train and prepare us to understand and interpret The Bible, or any other ancient text. Does that feel unrelated in a vacuum? Sure. But if you know me, you know I’m all about connecting unrelated things. It all started when I was (once again) rewatching RRR this month with some new friends. RRR is an amazing movie, and part of its amazingness arises because it is equal parts specific and universal, culturally particular yet wildly accessible. There’s a scene at the end of the movie, though, when that accessibility might start to wane for American audiences: the film ends with a lengthy musical sequence as the stars dance together in front of massive portraits of seemingly-random Indian people in the background, none of whom are characters we’ve seen. Shortly after, another grey-bearded Indian man (who hasn’t appeared in the rest of the film) shows up onscreen to much fanfare and starts to dance with our characters, too. In order to view things with new eyes, sometimes we need to allow ourselves first to simply be re-enchanted again. Houston Coley It’s only after some gaining further context that Westerners can piece together what’s going on: the portraits are well-known Indian revolutionaries being honored for their sacrifice. The bearded man is the director of the film, SS Rajamouli, a huge star and beloved storyteller in India’s cinema landscape. The musical sequence is a celebration of the film, but also a celebration of Indian independence. Suddenly, it all clicks into place. RRR is an accessible movie, but there are still a good amount of little moments that are likely to confuse American audiences—especially when something happens that is clearly significant but we don’t quite understand why. When Bheem puts on a white “kufi” prayer cap on his head before going into Delhi, I usually whisper to the person watching with me that it’s important to know he’s going undercover as a Muslim. If you don’t pick up on this detail, the movie still works just fine—but if you know it beforehand, you’ll really understand the big twist on display when Ram sees Bheem bowing to the statue of a Hindu god, revealing that he’s not who he thought he was. I didn’t pick up on that detail during the first viewing. Many repeated watches (and subsequent research) made it click. I don’t say all of this to brag about my oh-so-cultured understanding of Indian cinema, because to be honest, I’m still just trying to watch through SS Rajamouli’s filmography before even branching out into anything else. I’m a total newbie. Rajamouli’s movies aren’t even remotely the most layered or complex stories I could be watching, either. But they’re still stories from another culture, and that means there will be significant beats and symbols and undercurrents that fly completely below any Westerner’s radar on an initial viewing. My argument is this: humility and curiosity fueling our search for meaning and context and significance in an alien storytelling landscape is a very healthy feeling to experience. And it’s also what reading The Bible should be like. During my time at L’Abri in England back in 2020, one of the dilemmas that was most plaguing my mind was why, if The Bible was indeed some kind of transcendent book, the so-called divine author would have made it so difficult and complex to understand. If The Bible is from God, why did he make it so capable of different interpretations? Why did he make it so dense and historical? Why did he choose to root it in the particular culture of Ancient Israel? Why are there still so many things about it that I feel like I need to study and re-read to grasp, or other things that feel like they completely contradict each other? I posed these questions to a friend of mine at a lunch discussion during that term at L’Abri. He didn’t answer me right away. Around that same time, in the spring of 2020, I was still just getting off the high of seeing Bong Joon Ho’s Parasite in theaters eight times and recommending it to anyone who would listen, including everyone at L’Abri. Parasite was one of the first true experiences with foreign cinema I’d had in a packed theater, and I kept going back because it felt like there were still so many layers to unpack—layers to the social commentary, layers to the visual language and symbols, and layers to the cultural specificity that were foreign and overwhelming to me in all the best ways. My friend didn’t respond to my question about the overwhelming complexity of the Bible that day. A few days later, though, we were cooking a meal together and he brought it up again. “I was thinking about your question about The Bible from last week. Do you think Parasite would have been a better movie if it was less complex? Would you have seen it eight times if it was simple to understand?” That question totally changed my outlook on studying The Bible. Suddenly, the heavy layers of culture and ancient history and literature—layers that had once felt like an obstacle to understanding the Bible—were reframed to become the very things that made it so special. Like Parasite, maybe I needed to go back and see it again—but probably more than eight times. It might take a lifetime. And maybe that was what made it so divine and mysterious and inexhaustible. There’s an author named John Walton who wrote a book called The Lost World of Genesis One. In the book, he tries to take back the “strangeness” of the first chapter of Genesis and remind the reader of how many modern suppositions we have about science, story, planet earth, and reality that were not shared by the original audience of Genesis. It’s called The Lost World because the world of Genesis 1 should seem truly foreign and alien to us—until we remove the baggage and assumptions and questions we’ve gleaned from post-enlightenment modernity and enter the story again through fresh eyes. These days, I think it’s pretty fascinating that God chose to communicate (if you believe that sort of thing) through the extremely specific culture of Ancient Israel during an extremely specific time in ancient history—and I’ve lost all interest in trying to divorce it from that context or try to make it somehow speak directly to my situation. Maybe the very nature of understanding a foreign culture (to better understand God in turn) is part of the heart posture we were meant to develop toward this text all along: abandoning our pride, abandoning our assumptions, and trying our best to “incarnate” our eyes and ears in a different context. John Walton said, “The Bible’s message must not be subjected to cultural imperialism. Its message transcends the culture in which it originated, but the form in which the message was imbedded was fully permeated by the ancient culture.” In order to view things with new eyes, sometimes we need to allow ourselves first to simply be re-enchanted again. That’s why CS Lewis wrote The Chronicles of Narnia: to steal past the prim-and-proper terminologies of religion and get at people’s hearts with a story that hit the same beats as the Bible—but to do so without the baggage. This is going to sound like a contradiction to the intense study and humble understanding that I described moments ago, but I promise it’s just as necessary: I re-read the entire Tanakh (also known as the Old Testament) last summer, and one of most significant things during that process was a reframing of my mindset; rather than pausing at every individual instance of confusion to try and understand the ethics of a story, the science of a story, or the reliability of a story, I tried to take everything I read at face value and divorce myself from analysis, at least at first. I trained my brain to react to every piece of insane information with the same phrase: “Woah, dude! That’s WILD.” Shadrach, Meshach, and Abednego were thrown into a furnace and somehow survived unscathed because of a mysterious figure in the fire with them. “Woah, dude! That’s WILD.” Saul went to find somebody called The Witch of Endor to try and get advice from the spirit of the prophet Samuel? “Woah, dude! That’s WILD.” Samson tied a bunch of foxes together by their tails and set them on fire to destroy a field of crops? “Woah, dude! That’s WILD.” God parted the entire Red Sea for the Israelites to escape on dry land? “Woah, dude! That’s WILD.” As I’ve eluded earlier, I don’t think this approach is the only step to reading The Bible; you have to dive into it with a more analytical eye at some point, too, and there can be a danger (especially for protestants) of taking everything at face value and assuming that we can “get it” without any additional expertise or wisdom beyond our own. But just as RRR is capable of first being viewed as a story with some confusing points of a foreign culture that can be unpacked with repeated viewings, I do think it’s important to experience something before you understand it. When something seems significant and you’re not sure why, it’s all the better to try and figure out what the original audience would have made of it. When something seems to contradict itself, it’s worth asking questions rather than writing it off. One of my favorite authors, Rachel Held Evans, said in her book Inspired that reading The Bible is often “not just about knowing what is true; it’s about knowing when it’s true.” This is something that can only be discovered through repeated immersion. More study. More context. More pondering. More discernment. More life experience. More fresh eyes. Recently, I’ve come to more deeply understand the great importance that oral, communal storytelling (and questioning, imagining, and re-enacting) would have played in ancient Hebrew culture, in a way that makes our one-on-one intellectual “quiet time” study of The Bible feel quite individualized by comparison. That’s an interesting point on its own merits, but it’s also something that I’ve only come to understand as I’ve continued to grow, read, listen, and learn about another culture. John Walton said this: “Given God’s decision to communicate, he had to choose one language and culture to communicate to, which means that every other language and culture has their work cut out for them. As readers from a different language and culture, we have to try to penetrate the original language and culture if we are to receive the maximum benefits of God’s revelation…It is relieving to recognize that the basics of God’s revelation of himself (including his Creator role) are easily skimmed off the surface, but it is not surprising that God’s Word contains infinite depth and that it should require constant attention to study with all the tools we have available. God is not superficial, and we should expect that knowledge of him and his Word would be mined rather than simply absorbed.” There are a lot of things about Walton’s quote that remind me of how any film fan approaches foreign cinema. Just like with RRR—or anything, really—there are things we can “easily skim off the surface” and things that must be “mined” to be fully grasped. Exercising these muscles of both humble, wide-eyed experience and thoughtful, studied analysis is a good and healthy thing to do. And so, circling back to that tweet we read at the start: maybe to some, watching 1960s Latvian arthouse cinema will make you more annoying. But that annoyance should pale in comparison to the wisdom and discernment—and hopefully humility—gained from broadening your horizons. It’s worth it. And it might be worth it for more reasons than good movies.

Our good friend Jamin Still is back with further adventures in the fantastical world of Hibaria in his forthcoming full-length novel, Tales of Hibaria: The Master of Tides. With a new Kickstarter campaign, Jamin is now offering readers the chance to be the first to receive the new book along with several other exciting offers. If you’ve been around the Rabbit Room for any length of time, you likely already know Jamin’s work—whether from his writings on the blog, his podcast “The Artists &” with Kyra Hinton, or his artwork as an incredibly gifted painter/illustrator. We loved his previous book, Tales of Hibaria: The Awakening, and look forward to immersing ourselves in his latest work coming this fall. Pledge for Jamin’s Kickstarter Campaign In order to get more perspective on his vision and work, Jamin recently sat down with Kyra Hinton to talk more about his love of fantasy, why he’s so compelled by magic, and the story that unfolds in Master of Tides. If you want to listen to the audio interview only.

We are excited to welcome our new Executive Director, Dave Bruno! Here are two letters from Andrew Peterson (Rabbit Room’s President) and Pete Peterson (Rabbit Room’s Vice-President) that look back to where the Rabbit Room has been and look forward to where we’re going. A Letter from Andrew Peterson: I can’t remember the first time I met Dave Bruno, but I know I crashed at his house in San Diego about twelve years ago. His daughters were little, he and his wife were kind and hospitable in a chill, Southern California way, and I was a road-weary musician who had just done a concert—which is why the details are hazy. I think Dave’s book, The 100 Things Challenge, had just come out, and as an advocate of simplicity, I was intrigued and had lots of questions. Dave and Leanne were humble and down to earth, so easy to talk to that I remember thinking that I had just made some new friends. I’m pretty sure that if you had told either of us that night that all these years later Dave would be stepping in as the executive director of the Rabbit Room we both would have laughed—not only was there no such role (and there wouldn’t be for several years) but California and Tennessee are a long way from each other. It’s one of those things that I never would have guessed, but in hindsight feels meant to be. God seems to work that way, doesn’t he? When I founded the Rabbit Room back in 2006, I had big dreams: a coffee house and bookstore, a publishing house, a concert series, a web store, a community, some kind of bricks-and-mortar gathering place for people drawn to the vibrant intersection of robust Christianity and good, true, and beautiful works of art. I hoped that the ministry would not only support writers, artists, and musicians but would also inspire others to engage in their own creativity as a way of heralding the Kingdom of God. A tall order, to be sure, and we had no idea what we were doing. Yet after sixteen years, we’re still here. I stand amazed at the way the Lord has not only sustained the Rabbit Room through some tough seasons but caused it to flourish. The Lord worked through so many people along the way—from volunteers to members to donors to the board to the hardworking staff. One of those people, of course, is my brother, Pete, who’s been the executive director for the last seven years. He spent countless hours managing the growing team, the growing press, the growing budget, the growing Hutchmoot, the growing demands of this little ministry that was no longer so little. I have no idea how he did it, but while holding down all the executive stuff he also managed to write and stage several amazing plays, longing all the while to focus more on being a playwright. With the launch of Rabbit Room Theatre and The Hiding Place, the time has come at last to allow him to lean wholly into his gifting as a playwright and publisher. It makes me so happy that he’s stepping into this role with all of his creativity and (I would argue) genius. And that’s where Dave Bruno comes in. After an extensive search and interview process, the board unanimously agreed to offer him the position. Dave was one of the early writers for the Rabbit Room, he attended the very first Hutchmoot (and most Hutchmoots since), started multiple successful businesses, moved to Nashville to work at Lipscomb University, and helped with many Local Shows over the years—and now he’s found himself in this place and time with a remarkable set of gifts and passions that make him well suited to fill the role. It brings me great pleasure that he accepted the position as the new executive director of the Rabbit Room. As I said, twelve years ago Dave and I would have laughed at the thought. Now we thank God and say, “Of course!” I couldn’t be happier—for Pete or for Dave or for the Rabbit Room—and I can’t wait to see what marvelous thing the Lord will have us laughing about twelve years from now. -Andrew Peterson A Letter from Pete Peterson Serving as the executive director of the Rabbit Room for the past seven years has been one of the greatest adventures of my life. In that time Rabbit Room Press and Rabbit Room Theatre have matured into fully-fledged programs requiring all of the attention and creativity I have to offer, and I’m thrilled that the Rabbit Room board of directors has given me the mandate to pursue those programs with all my energy. This move to more focused work, however, which began over a year ago, has led us on a journey of asking who would step into the leadership position that I was transitioning away from. It’s something that’s weighed heavily on the minds of the Rabbit Room leadership for a long time. The organization stands at the brink of a fresh and exciting phase in its life, and after a lot of prayer and discernment, we’re finally taking our first steps into this new era by announcing Dave Bruno as our new executive director. Dave comes to us from Lipscomb University where he served as Vice President of Marketing, but he’s been part of the Rabbit Room story for more than a decade. Dave longtime supporter and contributor to the Rabbit Room and an integral part of the community here in Nashville. More importantly, he’s a kind, soft-spoken, pastorally-gifted person who loves Jesus, believes in the value of teamwork and collaboration, cares deeply for the people around him, and is committed to the thriving of the Rabbit Room, its mission, and its work. I could not be more delighted to welcome him aboard. I look forward to his wisdom and leadership, and I can’t wait to see how his talents are going to serve this community as we continue to cultivate and curate good work for the life of the world. Welcome aboard, Dave. We’re glad you’re here. -Pete Peterson #semifeature

Bespoke is not a word we use very much. The word means “custom made” and is most often employed in the clothing industry. I’ve never had any clothing custom-made for myself, but I understand the appeal. There is a welcomed utility in something made for the masses but there is a unique beauty in something made for the particular. With some creative license, I’d like to use this bespoke language in relation to worship music. The American church seems to be rather enjoying the utility of mass-produced worship music while simultaneously missing out on the beauty of locally-sourced music. A recent study found that a vast majority of chart-topping worship songs are coming from only four different churches. “If you have ever felt like most worship music sounds the same,” the study’s authors wrote, “it may be because the worship music you are most likely to hear in many churches is written by just a handful of songwriters from a handful of churches.” This is the sad reality but I wonder: what has been lost in this mass-produced stranglehold on worship music? The True Religion of the Place In Wendell Berry’s Jayber Crow, Jayber offers the following commentary on a church service: “I thought that some of the hymns bespoke the true religion of the place…I liked the sound of the people singing together, whatever they sang, but some of the hymns reached into me all the way to the bone.” Much of Berry’s Port William novels focus on the “membership” of a people and a place. It doesn’t take much imagination to see how the local church operates at this same intersection. Liturgy is often defined as “the work of the people.” Not a generic people but a specific people. A people inhabiting a place. A people in fellowship with one another. The local church needs custom-fit songs because we are uniquely-shaped people. Parsing the Heart With this grassroots vision, I tried my hand at writing worship songs a few years ago. I have no formal music background but I didn’t let that stop me. In 2017, I wrote a song called Our God is Good because a divorced woman in our church told me about how hard it was to attend service by herself. For many weeks, she didn’t feel as if she could authentically voice the words to the songs that were being sung. She found comfort in the fact that though she could not sing them herself, that her friends and community around her could sing for her. The bridge to the song I wrote proclaims: “A broken hallelujah is still a hallelujah.” In this past year, our church resurrected the old hymn We Have an Anchor* and put a new tune to it. Our three-year-old church plant is full of people who are hurting and doubting. Our congregation does not usually sing very loudly but we have noticed these lyrics bring out their voice: “Will your anchor hold in the storms of life, when the clouds unfold their wings of strife? When the strong tides lift, and the cables strain, will your anchor drift, or firm remain?” Marilynne Robinson, in her novel Home, describes preaching as, “parsing the broken heart of humankind and praising the loving heart of Christ.” Preaching is not singing but worship music has the same potential to parse the heart of humankind and point to the loving heart of Christ. Creating New Culture In his book Culture Making: Recovering Our Creative Calling, Andy Crouch says: “It is not enough to condemn culture. Nor is it sufficient merely to critique culture or to copy culture. Most of the time, we just consume culture. But the only way to change culture is to create culture.” It’s easy to condemn the American church and our infatuation with generic, mass-produced music. Instead of complaining, we have a chance to create something new and beautiful. When we handpick songs for our congregation, when we write grassroots songs, and when we support artists creating bespoke music, we are creating new culture. We are parsing the heart, pointing to Christ, and heralding music that pierces the soul. * This song will be released on Folk Hymnal’s ‘We Have an Anchor’ album in August.

As an English professor who is particularly interested in mythology and the role that stories play in helping us making meaning of our lives, I’m pretty attuned to noticing when such references show up and how they are utilized, whether in films or books. Like many people, this past weekend I saw Oppenheimer, Christopher Nolan’s much-anticipated film on the “father of the atomic bomb”, J. Robert Oppenheimer, the theoretical physicist who headed The Manhattan Project during World War II. Nolan has explored myth, myth-making, and the power of stories to shape our personal and cultural realities in many of his other films, particularly in his Batman trilogy and Inception, and even though Oppenheimer is only his second film based on historical events (Dunkirk being the other), he still brings that mythological sensibility to the material. GIVER OF FIRE It’s not too difficult, because the material lends itself to myth-making, particularly due to the fact that Nolan based the film in large part on the Pulitzer Prize-winning Oppenheimer biography American Prometheus, written by Kai Bird and Martin J. Sherwin and published in 2005. Nolan references this at the very beginning of the film when the following words appear against the background of a roiling atomic mushroom cloud: Prometheus stole fire from the gods and gave it to man. For this he was chained to a rock and tortured for eternity. The myth of Prometheus comes to us from Greek mythology and first appeared in the writings of the poet Hesiod. In most versions of the story, Prometheus was a lesser god who was seen as a benefactor to mankind, in contrast to the mighty but petty Olympian gods who mostly just demanded worship from humans. After Prometheus steals fire from the gods and gives it to humanity, the angry Zeus orders that he is to be chained to a rock for all eternity, and that every day an eagle will come and eat his liver, only for it to be regenerated again every night. The connection between Prometheus and Oppenheimer was first made, not in the 2005 biography, but in a 1945 issue of Scientific American, which wrote about Oppenheimer and his fellow scientists: “Modern Prometheans have raided Mount Olympus again and have brought back for man the very thunderbolts of Zeus”. The main parallel that Oppenheimer’s biographers and Nolan also trace is the way in which Oppenheimer was treated by the United States government. He was initially hailed as a hero, but when he began to express doubt about his creation and opposition to more hawkish nuclear policies, he was branded a Communist sympathizer, disgraced, and had his security clearance revoked—made a scapegoat much like Prometheus. But ScreenRant writer Cathal Gunning sees an even deeper level to the Prometheus parallels in Oppenheimer, and I saw it too: Prometheus gifting humanity fire isn’t a straightforward, literal favor in the Greek myth. Fire can be seen to represent technology, scientific exploration, society or civilization, arts, and the humanities. With the gift of fire, humans could build communities and develop infrastructure but also destroy one another. Much like Oppenheimer’s nuclear tests paved the way for the arms race and Cold War that defined the coming decades, Prometheus’s decision brought humanity closer to the status of the Greek gods. However, in both cases, this decision was not necessarily the right one. The reason that an eagle was sent to eat Prometheus’s liver is that this organ represented emotion in Greek mythology.Thus, Prometheus was tortured not just by a big bird eating his insides, but by the human cost of his gift. Fire built civilization which meant, by extension, the discovery also played a role in tribal division, the development of warfare, and eventually even the atom bomb. The impact of Prometheus’s actions was impossible for him to predict but, crucially, the legacy of his gift lasted forever. Prometheus was tortured by his decision to share his ingenuity with humanity, which is exactly what led Oppenheimer to oppose the development of the hydrogen bomb mere years after he was instrumental in the invention of its predecessor, the atom bomb. Nolan seems to be drawing on this idea as well as he traces Oppenheimer’s eventual fall from grace at the hands of certain government officials in parallel to his own haunting visions of the future. The way that Oppenheimer’s regret emerges in the film also shares similarities with another scientist of a more modern myth. THE MODERN PROMETHEUS The mother of all tales of scientific caution is, of course, Mary Shelley’s Frankenstein, published in 1818. Interestingly, what most people probably don’t know is that Shelley was already making connections between Greek mythology and modern science because the subtitle of Frankenstein is The Modern Prometheus. While as far as I can tell Nolan makes no attempts to explicitly reference Frankenstein in his film, I can’t help but notice the parallels because it’s a text I’ve taught quite a lot in the past few years. It has become a parable that all other tales of scientific daring subconsciously allude to. The parallel is most clearly seen in the scientists themselves, Oppenheimer and Victor Frankenstein, and how they behave before and after their scientific breakthroughs. Like Frankenstein, Oppenheimer is portrayed as a scientific genius at a young age, eagerly curious to uncover the deepest mysteries of the universe, but a bit naive to the implications of uncovering those mysteries. They both only realize after it’s too late what they have unleashed on the world. Victor is so obsessed with trying to uncover the mysteries of life and death that he doesn’t realize he’s creating a monster until the moment it comes to life: I had worked hard for nearly two years, for the sole purpose of infusing life into an inanimate body. For this I had deprived myself of rest and health. I had desired it with an ardour that far exceeded moderation; but now that I had finished, the beauty of the dream vanished, and breathless horror and disgust filled my heart. Similarly, in Oppenheimer, the physicist continually retreats into theory when faced with the future implications of creating the atomic bomb. Only when he witnesses the horrific power of what he’s helped create does he start to have serious reservations. DESTROYER OF WORLDS Perhaps the most famous anecdote related to Oppenheimer comes from an interview he did in 1965 when he was recalling the moment of the Trinity Test: We knew the world would not be the same. A few people laughed, a few people cried. Most people were silent. I remembered the line from the Hindu scripture, the Bhagavad Gita; Vishnu is trying to persuade the Prince that he should do his duty and, to impress him, takes on his multi-armed form and says, “Now I am become Death, the destroyer of worlds.” I suppose we all thought that, one way or another. Wired writer James Temperton explains the larger context of this quote from the Hindu text: The Bhagavad Gita is 700-verse Hindu scripture, written in Sanskrit, that centers on a dialog between a great warrior prince named Arjuna and his charioteer Lord Krishna, an incarnation of [the Hindu deity] Vishnu. Facing an opposing army containing his friends and relatives, Arjuna is torn. But Krishna teaches him about a higher philosophy that will enable him to carry out his duties as a warrior irrespective of his personal concerns. This is known as the dharma, or holy duty. It is one of the four key lessons of the Bhagavad Gita, on desire or lust; wealth; the desire for righteousness, or dharma; and the final state of total liberation, moksha. Seeking his counsel, Arjuna asks Krishna to reveal his universal form. Krishna obliges, and in verse 12 of the Gita he manifests as a sublime, terrifying being of many mouths and eyes. It is this moment that entered Oppenheimer’s mind in July 1945. The reason the verse from the Gita came so readily to Oppenheimer’s mind is that he’d been a long-time reader of Hindu poetry and scripture, declaring the Bhagavad Gita to be the “most beautiful philosophical song existing in any known tongue”. More than that, he was taken by the philosophy of holy duty expressed in the text, once writing in a letter to his brother Frank: “Through discipline, though not through discipline alone, we can achieve serenity, and a certain small but precious measure of freedom from the accidents of incarnation… and that detachment which preserves the world it renounces”. Only through discipline, he added, is it possible to “see the world without the gross distraction of personal desire, and in seeing so, accept more easily our earthly privation and its earthly horror”. While it’s not explicit in Nolan’s film, the Hindu concept of holy duty may help explain how someone like Oppenheimer thought he could pursue such a horrific project like the atomic bomb in such a seemingly detached way. His country had called on his service, and there was a fear that the Nazis were attempting to build their own atomic bomb, so he applied all his scientific genius and energy to seeing the task through. However, Nolan’s film suggests that even Hindu philosophy failed Oppenheimer in the end, when faced with the horrors of Hiroshima and Nagasaki, and the Cold War nuclear armament build-up that followed. He could not achieve his desired serenity. As he said two years after the Trinity Test: “In some sort of crude sense which no vulgarity, no humor, no overstatements can quite extinguish, the physicists have known sin; and this is a knowledge which they cannot lose.” A WORLD ON FIRE All of these myths come to a head powerfully in the end scene of the film. Oppenheimer is having a conversation with Albert Einstein about the science of chain reaction, but you quickly realize that they’re talking about the geo-political chain reaction caused by the creation of the atomic bomb itself. Oppenheimer confesses to Einstein that he believes they’ve started something that will destroy the world. We’re then left with a close-up of his haunted eyes and a vision of the planet engulfed by fire. Like Frankenstein, he’s realized too late that what has been done cannot be undone. Prometheus’ fire has become a raging inferno with no seeming end. Christopher Nolan ingeniously employs these myths and plays them off each other to illuminate the real-life story of Oppenheimer and show how once again mythology and stories often help us make sense not only of momentous historical events, but the complex and enigmatic actions of humans like ourselves in the midst of such times.

Fifty years have passed since Corrie Ten Boom’s story, The Hiding Place, captivated audiences with her heroic testimony of a family offering resistance and refuge at great personal cost. In August, Rabbit Room Theatre, along with strategic partners, are excited to share the story anew with this global cinematic event following a four-week sold-out stage run in Nashville. From Tennessee to Tasmania, A.S. “Pete” Peterson’s adaptation will be hitting movie theaters next month, so we sat down to talk in-depth about Corrie as a true hero of the faith, the complexity of ideas involved, and finding such a reach beyond the Rabbit Room’s headquarters. [Ed note: In theaters on August 3 & 5 ONLY. Find a theater near you at TheHidingPlaceFilm.com.] Let’s start with the actual story here of Corrie Ten Boom and The Hiding Place. I’m interested to hear from you what made this a story you and others wanted to tell? I think Corrie’s story is so compelling because she’s such a fascinating person. There are things that happen in her story and ways that she talks about the world that are really difficult to make peace with or to justify—the idea of gratitude in the middle of a concentration camp is not an easy idea. It’s beautiful and wonderful and also complicated. So I think that intersection of complicated ideas is part of why people so revere here. She’s really a remarkable person and the conclusions that she came to are incredibly counter-cultural. In the 50 years since she told her story, there’s not been another retelling of it. In a sense, the generation that fell in love with Corrie Ten Boom as she traveled the world and as people watched the movie and read her book, that generation is in their sixties and seventies and eighties now. They love her desperately but there’s another generation that would say, “Corrie, who?” So I think it’s a privilege for me to take the impact of that story and hopefully deliver it to a new generation because it’s not a story I think should be forgotten. I think Corrie is one of the heroes of the faith in a capital letter kind of way. We’re on the verge of maybe forgetting that. We had to figure out a way to tell her story in a way that would open up the ears of those who don’t believe what I believe. A.S. Peterson A lot has changed since the first presentation of Corrie’s story and the culture in which the story is being told. What are the resonant points that you hear from people who’ve watched the play or the new film screening? One of the key things to remember is that when Corrie wrote the book and when the original film came out was in the ‘70s. Our culture was in a very different place as it relates to religion and especially Christianity. I mean, Christianity was the water that everyone swam in all of the time. People spoke the language whether they went to church or not, so that story was told in a way that was very Christian, very church-like, very Christian-ese. For better or worse, that language is much harder to hear by the culture at large because there’s so much freight attached to that way of talking about what we believe. One of our challenges going into it, because I wanted Corrie’s story to continue for another generation, was that we had to figure out a way to tell her story in a way that would open up the ears of those who don’t believe what I believe. One of my challenges to the folks we were making it with was that if we can’t present this show to a general audience in a way that they can enjoy and get the message out of it in the same way that I, as a Christian, can, then I don’t know if we will have achieved our goal to create something that can perpetuate for another generation. So it was interesting. We tested it and invited people who weren’t Christians or who were even antagonistic to Christianity and asked them what they thought of the show. I was surprised, really, to hear that people connected with it. They did not trip up over the way it presents faith and religion. At one point, we invited an actress to read the part of Corrie Ten Boom who was not only not Christian but who was antagonistic toward it. We wanted to see, first, if she could perform the part in a way that was believable and, second, what she would make of all of this. Well, she did an amazing job, of course, because that’s what actors do and that’s a testament to her as a professional. [Note that this was not Nan Gurley who eventually played the part on stage and in the film.] But someone asked her, ‘Hey, what did you make of the religion of the show?’ She thought about it a minute and then said, “You know, I don’t know that I noticed any religion in the show, but I did notice a lot of talk about Jesus and I love Jesus. It’s Christianity that I don’t like. So I really loved it.” That was interesting to me. That told me that we were on the right track, because we’re finding ways to tell the same story in a way that’s able to sneak past the watchful dragons of those who are on guard against all of the Christian-ese and instead they’re able to hear the truth about the person of Christ and how he changes your experience in the midst of the Holocaust. That, to me, is a powerful testament that we were on the right track. You had this great theatrical run where you sold out the last few weeks of shows and then suddenly it was done. Did you know there could be something like this theatrical release happening then or was it tough to think that all that momentum was suddenly over? It’s actually something that’s been evolving for years. We did a production of Frankenstein back in 2017 or 2018 that also sold out its entire run and then won some awards. We decided to go into the studio with the full cast and record an audio version of it. One of the reasons behind that thinking is that it felt so unfair that we put so much work and creativity into making this beautiful experience for people, and then on closing night, it vanishes and evaporates into thin air and it’s gone. So we thought, “What if we created an artifact so that people can continue to experience this in some way?” The first version of that was this [Frankenstein] audiobook. Then when we got into COVID and we couldn’t produce theater, we worked on a short film of one of Wendell Berry’s stories which he’d written for the stage called Sonata at Payne Hollow. We turned that into a short film and that was our first opportunity to ask, “What if we could capture theater on film in a way that’s really interesting?” We’ve all seen Masterpiece Theater or something like it, and it’s shot with a movie camera but it’s just filming a play. Even if it’s the greatest play in the world, it’s just not very engaging. We’ve all seen that, right? Well, we weren’t interested in that at all. Thankfully, we have some really creative filmmakers here in Nashville to work with. We continued developing those ideas through COVID, so when we got ready to put The Hiding Place on stage, we immediately thought, “You know what? Let’s try to do this at feature length.” We’d done it at the short film level and felt like it was well-executed, so we planned from the beginning to capture The Hiding Place because we felt like it was an important story that would have wide appeal and we were so proud of the cast members who were putting on these amazing performances. For me, I also wanted to give the cast the gift of seeing what they’d created. I’ve been working in theater for ten years now and it’s always broken my heart that we’ve put so much work into this and the cast that makes it happen never gets to see what they’ve created. They’re on stage the whole time. There are scenes, especially in The Hiding Place, where it’s got a non-linear structure. You’ll have a cast member ask me, “Why am I doing this right now?” I have to say, “Trust me, it makes sense to the audience.” So having the opportunity to show them what they’ve created was just so satisfying. And we also get to preserve it for the world at large—not just Nashville. It’s a movie that will instigate discussion. I guarantee you. There are difficult things that happen in this film that will trouble folks and inspire folks. It’s really ripe for that type of engagement. A.S. Peterson Glad you mention being outside of Nashville because this release has a global reach. What exactly is the reach and what are your hopes there? It’s in 800 theaters across the world. I was just on a call today where they were talking about the theaters they’re showing it in Tasmania, which just seems crazy to me. [Laughs] We also just heard that it’s selling out theaters in Australia, which is fascinating. So, yeah, it has a global reach right now which is exciting. From the Rabbit Room’s perspective, we do a lot here in Nashville. We put on the Local Show, we put on Hutchmoot, we do lectures, and we have open hours here at North Wind Manor. We’re constantly bombarded with people saying, “Hey, I don’t live in Nashville so how can I participate in all of this great stuff that’s going on?” So internally, we have a lot of discussion about how we can serve those people. We have a lot of things in development that I’m really excited about. But the truth is this film is one really big answer to that question. On a global scale, we’re saying, “Hey, you heard about this film when it was on stage in Nashville and now everybody across the world has the opportunity to participate in it themselves.” Because the Rabbit Room believes that art is a gathering point that creates community, it’s our hope that people will not go alone, that they’ll see it as an opportunity to do Rabbit Room-like stuff, get some friends together or a small group together, go see the movie, then go out to the pub and sit down with a drink to discuss it afterward. It’s a movie that will instigate discussion. I guarantee you. There are difficult things that happen in this film that will trouble folks and inspire folks. It’s really ripe for that type of engagement. What happens with this story after this theatrical release? Great question. We’ve been reaching out to various producers and touring companies to see if there’s a life for the stage show on a bigger scale. That could be off-Broadway or touring… we just don’t know the answer to that question yet. Theater is a very complicated and very expensive business and it has to make sense for everybody involved. So we’re not sure. We are holding onto the rights for performances by other theater companies until we know what the answer is. But at some point, certainly, it will be available for colleges and community theaters and regional theaters to do their own productions. So ultimately there will be a life for the material beyond this production. Beyond that, we’re not sure. We’re hoping for streaming opportunities but that all looms in a foggy future we’ve not yet defined. But what we are hoping is that this will do well and people will enjoy it because we want to do this again with a different show and the following year with a different show. I love to envision a future where the Rabbit Room has really created this sort of experience in which people can participate. I would love to be on stage with a show in Nashville and know that, at the same time, people could be in North Carolina watching it in the theater. #semifeature

In the early days of an artist’s career, there’s a good amount of wandering and experimenting, planting seeds that will someday blossom into their own kind of art. Many of us have watched that transformation happen in real time with Skye Peterson. Longtime Andrew Peterson fans may recognize her voice singing harmonies in the background of her dad’s records, going as far back as 2012’s Light for the Lost Boy. Growing up with a deep love for music and full immersion in Nashville’s songwriter scene led her toward collaborating on a number of projects — playing in the band Wake Low with her brothers, collaborating with NAMO and The Gettys, and releasing a few solo EPs of her own. She’s been sharpening her craft for years, and now on her full-length debut Where the Winter Was, we hear the sound of a young artist finding her voice. And the sound is beautiful. From start to finish, Peterson’s debut album features her best songwriting yet, blending rich theological insights and open-hearted storytelling. “Real Love” opens the record with an invitation into truth that is timeless and raw, but gently spoken through Peterson’s hushed, tender vocals: No, love isn’t always a voice in the room It pierces like an arrow when the sound breaks through It’s not always a Bible that points to the Truth No, love might bend you and break you but it’ll carry you too So look at me, lean in close, I’ll show you real love In a tight ten songs, Peterson plumbs the depths of story and the human heart, drawing from her lived experience as a young woman growing up in a complicated world. “Suburbs,” a tribute to her mother’s love, speaks from the liminal space of young adulthood, when growing up means finding new adventures and missing the only home you’ve known. It’s immediately followed by “Not So Sure,” a quietly yearning track offering a compassionate glimpse into middle school insecurities that haunt us into adulthood. Peterson’s songs resonate with the universal longing at any age as she sings on “Suburbs”: “the imprint of eternity / A sense that there is somewhere we belong.” Since graduating high school, Peterson has spent time studying theology in college, and these intellectual pursuits have added an extra dimension to her songwriting. Putting the old, old stories in conversation with her own gives some of her best songs an extra richness, like “Cedars of Lebanon.” In reflecting on the trees that built Solomon’s temple, she finds a prayer for future strength: “Let me reach the heights and scrape the skies / Let me rest upon the Promise like a cedar of Lebanon…” Fans of singer/songwriters like Taylor Leonhardt, Sandra McCracken, and Jess Ray will find a lot to love on Where the Winter Was. The layered acoustic sound draws you in, while the lyrics grow deeper and reveal new treasures on every listen. Jen Rose Yokel is a poet, freelance writer, and spiritual director. Her words have appeared at She Reads Truth, CCM Magazine, and other publications, and she released her first poetry collection Ruins & Kingdoms in 2015. Originally from Central Florida, she now makes her home in Fall River, Massachusetts with her husband Chris, where you can find her enjoying used bookstores and good coffee.

We’ve been so glad to call Leslie Jordan a friend of the Rabbit Room in recent years because we so admire the gracious spirit and communal heart that accompanies her music—whether as a part of the duo All Sons & Daughters, her work with Integrity Music, or her solo releases. No matter the outlet, Leslie has always made sure that a meaningful connection was at the heart of the creative work. With a new EP just released entitled You Are With Me, comprised of five songs she’d originally written for other artists, Leslie has now put her own spin on songs that remain important to her for myriad reasons. We recently had the chance to sit with her and talk about the new EP, why the songwriting process is still magical, and how some ideas just fall out of the sky. You’ve written so many songs in so many scenarios—in co-writing rooms, songwriting retreats, personal practice—that it makes me curious about your relationship with the muse. How magical does it feel? Is it more workmanlike than that? No, it’s still magic for me. If somebody says they have the steps to writing a great song, they’re probably lying to you. Nobody really knows. It is a mystery and I love that about songwriting. One day I will feel like I’m a great songwriter and the next I’ll feel like I should quit and work at Starbucks and never write another song again. There’s something really humbling about that. I think if I were to ever get to either extreme, to ever really feel like quitting, or that I’d peaked, then I will have lost the magic and mystery and excitement of it. But some days it’s there and some days it’s not. The key is to not get too discouraged. I compared it once before to surfing. I learned how to surf back in 2015 with some friends out in California and we spent a long time just sitting on the board and waiting for the wave. Maybe we caught one or two but we didn’t go home and think, ‘Oh, what a waste of a day.’ It’s about the act of getting in the water, paddling out, sitting and waiting, anticipating, understanding what a good wave feels like, and learning how to hold on and let go. Also, the shore is never the point, which is also key in songwriting. If the emphasis is on getting a song… like I’ve been in a room where it’s like, “All right, we gotta write this up-tempo song to finish the record.” A lot of times you’re trying to squeeze the magic into the room and I think there’s resistance when that happens. You just can’t control it. You can be a good student of craft and you can practice and put your butt in the chair every morning and work on generating content. All of those things are good and important for songwriters, but for me, the act of sitting and waiting and anticipating the mystery to show up is the point nine times out of ten. Then when you get the song, when you ride the wave in, that’s when the excitement comes. But you don’t quit when you don’t catch a wave. The surfers are out there doing it the next day all over again. Do you remember the first song you ever wrote? I’m trying to remember. [Pause] I wrote a lot of really silly melodies and lyrics but the first songs I ever finished were likely all about how my life was falling apart. My parents went through a divorce when I was in sixth grade and I’d just learned how to play guitar in fifth grade. I was just a really sad teenager. [Laughs] I really used music as a tool for processing grief and asking questions. That’s pretty serendipitous to have learned that just prior and to then have that as a vehicle… For sure. My first instrument was the violin and I don’t think that would have been as helpful. [Laughs] Nobody wants to hear a sad violinist. We’d love to walk through the new EP with you and get the origin story of each, starting with “You Are With Me.” Yeah, that’s the oldest song on the record and I wrote it with Sandra McCracken in 2017. My husband and I were adopting and waiting for our son to come home. He’d been born and we were just waiting. I remember that as a pretty dark period in my life and wrote that verse, chorus, and bridge. I took it to Sandra [McCracken] and needed her help to finish it. I didn’t have an outlet for it at that point, but she put it on her record and I love that version. I also loved the chance to put it in my own voice for this project. I also love the production on this from Jess [Ray]. I sent her the stems for the vocal and piano and a few other things and she built a lot of that instrumentation around it. The first time she sent it back to me, I just wept. I felt like it transported me back to that moment. So sonically, I think that song does what it says. I feel a presence in that song when I listen to it. Love that. “A Thousand Shores”? I wrote “A Thousand Shores” with Zach Bolen [Citizens]. That was the first chorus I’d written by myself in probably years. A lot of times I don’t come into a co-write with an idea, since I like to let the artist dictate where the song goes if I’m writing specifically for their record. But I came in that day with that chorus and said, “I think I have an idea but it may not fit with Citizens.” He was so encouraging and wanted to write that song and the rest of it spilled out. I love that song and their version of it. I was driving through my little town while listening to that bridge and was going 50 in a 30 because it gets me so pumped up. [Laughs] [Laughs] What about “You Hold It All”? That was written on a Porter’s Gate retreat with three authors, actually. What I love about Porter’s Gate is that they’ll bring in authors, theologians, pastors, songwriters, and thought leaders together to talk about a subject and then we write a song about it. We were writing songs for a new record that came out last year called Worship for Workers and were talking about how we live in a very over-achieving society. We can forget to put all of that longing and striving in the Lord’s hands. So that was fun for me because those authors had never been in a co-write before and they were like, “Wow, I wrote a song!” It was so fun to see their expression and be proud of the work we did together. What’s the story behind “Let It Be Lovely”? That was written with Hannah Hobbs for her project, Sundown. We wrote on Zoom two years ago and she was trying to round out her record. She did something similar where she’s written so many songs we’ve sung in the church. She’s been a part of Hillsong for many years, and we met back in 2016. So she was just looking for a few original non-church songs, and her publisher hooked us up. I bought in that first verse and said, “I had this lullaby in mind.” We both have kids the same age and talked about singing the truths of scripture to our kids, so she started singing that chorus. It’s another song that kind of fell out, which is awesome. The last song on the new EP is “Good To Me”. It’s funny. It’s not out yet in its original form. It was recorded for a Porter’s Gate record called Sanctuary Songs and that whole album won’t come out until September but we recorded it back in February. Back in October 2022, we had a retreat for that record talking about mental health and the importance of creating resources for the church to use around this idea of being equipped to help those with mental challenges. I was struggling to write songs because I thought this topic is one the church doesn’t do a great job addressing it. We were at Keats Island in British Columbia and there was a blackberry bush that lined the road. I reached in to grab a blackberry and pull one out and in the process, I raked my finger on a thorn. Immediately this lyric came to me: “I can taste the sweetness of our mercy / But I feel the sting of grief still in my chest / Not sure I’ve known the one without the other / So I’ll cling to the belief I know the best / You have been, you will be, you are so good to me.” The things I’ve walked through in the last years of my life have been about the “both/and”. It’s not one or the other. It’s not the high or the low but the high and the low. A lot of times we don’t get to pick and choose whether it’s grief or joy. A lot of times those things come hand-in-hand, so that song is special to me as well. Matt Conner is a former pastor and church planter turned writer and editor. He’s the founder of Analogue Media and lives in Indianapolis.

I’ve been reading Thomas Merton’s The Sign of Jonas lately, while I watch my daughter take gymnastics. The room is a cavernous space, ceilinged by giant fans that only somewhat dissipate the odor of sweat. The floor is an evolving phantasm of trampolines and colorful foam sculptures, all designed to make falling a more pleasant experience. In between are various ropes, beams, rings, and bars more fit for an orangutan’s strength than a person’s. My daughter and her classmates do their exercises beneath these, venturing onto various apparatus at the direction of their coaches. The smaller athletes are not allowed to attempt just any old movement, yet they test the limits of their own boldness. It’s obvious they want to go further, to climb higher. The twelve-year-olds wish to be fifteen, the nine-year-olds to be twelve, the four-year-olds to be nine. In the same gym as these tiny sprites are 18-year-olds appearing to contend as world champion tumblers. Muscled like Delacroix paintings, these new adults launch upward as though leaving a trebuchet. It inspires some alarm to have Olympic aerials translated from television into real life. The parent in me cringes. Not to say the coaches and athletes aren’t careful. In point of fact, all the somersaults, handsprings, L-sits, dismounts, and flight elements follow meticulously constructed body patterns many seasons in the making. Each astounding turn of a gymnast is a lightning bolt tracing down an unseen trail of ions, a pathway of yearslong discipline. That invisible part is what my daughter is currently enduring. The younger children work on small drills, inscribing their bodily memories with rote stretches and minuscule swings, slowly teaching each muscle from week to week to leverage a little more weight over thin air. From the gallery, it appears to run the risk of boredom. While the advanced students wheel through the air around them, the newest amateurs merely hold their hands up and pogo down a long trampoline. Or they roll. Or they walk on a line. If we are compared to plants in Scripture, to vines and lilies and oaks, it stands to reason that the obedience of these creatures should be iconic to us. Obedience should stand apart from understanding. Adam Whipple Reading Thomas Merton provides a good metaphor for watching them. Any hagiography toward which we might be tempted in regards to Merton gets summarily swatted away in The Sign of Jonas. It’s a journal in which he struggles openly with his frustrations. Merton wants mostly to be left alone to seek after the Lord, but his superiors continue to give him work. In addition to the normal physical life of the abbey, there is so much writing. Plus, the abbey must contend with the fact that Merton is famous. Then there are all the vagaries of small church life: bad singing, mediocre teaching, irritating make-work. Through the sovereignty of the Holy Ghost, Merton is changed even by these frustrations. Yet like a child doing her gym exercises, this grown man often does not see the point while in the moment. We wrestle with what is formative. How long is it before these stretches, prancings, and small round-offs in the gym become ballistic feats? The children must ask themselves. Our initial sense of wonder drains like a leaky bowl when we’re surrounded by derring-dos we aren’t allowed to try. All gymnastics dads owe a debt of gratitude to the Suni Lees and Simone Biles of the world for their inspiration. No cajoling of mine could instill half so much dedication in a group of nine-year-olds. In gymnastics, obedience comes before understanding. Children do not learn centripetal force and the physical mechanics of the vastus medialis; they learn to lift their legs when the teacher says so. I watch them, relegated to my spectatorial seat. They remind me of fruit trees, limbs commanded into unexplained contortions over time. Long ago, perhaps millennia, plant husbandry began to take on various forms of espalier, a practice in which woody stems are forced to grow along a prescribed pattern. If you’ve never seen it, grape vines are an obvious example, though a wily one. More geometric horticulture exists: apple trees and quince trees trained up into candelabra along stuccoed courtyards, boxwoods quietly trimmed into the pride of an English household, hornbeams pleached into living fencework. The gardening even escapes the bounds of the individual gardener, becoming a grandiose labor of generations. In India, the fey ropings of the banyan tree are woven into bridges wide and strong enough to hold stepping stones. Building these is communal in the high sense of the word. Not only does it require the efforts of sometimes an entire village, but the bridge itself is a living connection, an architecture of agreement transcending the differences of people on either side. In this, one of the rainiest corners of the world, such structures withstand floodwaters even as poor concrete spans wash away. Some banyan bridges date back more than five centuries. The trees, as far as we can tell, never know. They live, striving for an ongoing cocktail of light, water, nitrogen, and carbon dioxide, never asking more than simply to obey the rules written into their bodies. If we are compared to plants in Scripture, to vines and lilies and oaks, it stands to reason that the obedience of these creatures should be iconic to us. Obedience should stand apart from understanding. Who among us is actually good at this, at obeying? Who is good at applying instructions like, If you love me, keep my commandments? It is an age of deconstruction, of asking skeptical questions, though I personally tend to doubt the applicable worth of vogue terms, of which deconstruction has become one. If such things are alarming to us, as perhaps they should be at times, we might still take comfort. Firstly, skepticism is nothing new, and while the line between healthy skepticism and the sin of unbelief may be a thin one, it is not a particular function of modernity (see Thomas, called Didymus). Secondly, questions in themselves are not evil (see Book of Job). Our children ask questions, and we don’t fault them, even though we may not always give them the answers they want. We as followers of Jesus are the children of God. Why should we avoid questions? Why should we expect that the Lord would give us our preferred answer, or any answer at all? We see Sayers and Teresas, Kings and Kellers, Lewises and Tolkiens, all leaping into the glorified air, and our movements seem mundane by comparison. Adam Whipple The trees have more to say about obedience than mere notions of utility or food. They were there in the very beginning, many groves of provision, along with the one tree in the center of Eden. It’s tempting to look at the Tree of the Knowledge of Good and Evil as an accident waiting to happen. Why place it there at all, a locus of entrapment in an otherwise perfect garden? Trained as we are by the unrealities of modern cinema, we are also inclined to look at this tree as a magic plant, its fruit glistening neon and pulsating with a nearly audible siren song. I wasn’t there, but I don’t suspect this was the case. What was at the center of Eden? It was obedience, a matter of choice. There are other words for this: love, worship. Without the opportunity to obey the Lord, we are not really souls. Without the choice to worship Him in our thoughts, words, and deeds, love is not love. The tree itself, I believe, was not powerful. The command was powerful. The choice to obey was powerful. It’s a slow process for us, this training up in the path we should follow. When you bend a tree to your will as a gardener, there is no fast way. In fact, there are often cross purposes. The tree buds in prolific fashion, venturing ever outward. Every spring, these buds must be rubbed off, effectively gainsaid. If the plant is left untended, limbs will sprout, constructing their own fractal trails through the air. These must be cut off in multiple acts of small violence. Then, for fruit trees, there is pruning. In the end, it makes for better apples and pears, but pruning is not the inborn will of the tree. Obedience is inherently, from our perspective, misunderstood. And irritating. Place this leg there, then down. Repeat. Repeat it again. Tie your musculature to this restrictive framework. When will it grow into something worthwhile? It is the gardener’s business to know the answer. As I watch the kids on the gym floor and pause for little breaths of Thomas Merton, I can’t ignore the parallels of my participation in the Body of Christ. There are so many irritating things I am commanded to do. Show up. Sing along. Listen. Allow houseroom for others. Don’t major in the minors. Repent. Obey. We see Sayers and Teresas, Kings and Kellers, Lewises and Tolkiens, all leaping into the glorified air, and our movements seem mundane by comparison. Yet it is in this slowness of exercise that we are made into what we already are. It is the way in which saints are made saints.