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A review by jtbone
Blue Like Jazz: Nonreligious Thoughts on Christian Spirituality by Donald Miller
3.0
"Today I wonder why it is God refers to Himself as 'Father' at all. This, to me, in light of the earthly representation of the role, seems a marketing mistake." Blue Like Jazz hooked me early on, in part due to lines like this. But mostly, I was hooked because the themes are right down my alley, so to speak. I consider myself a Christian who is very uncomfortable with calling myself a Christian. I shy away from the title, just like the author does when asked to defend Christianity on a radio show. He, like me, is conscious of the distorted non-Christlike character of American evangelicalism.
In one passage, the author recounts an encounter with a writer who presents a “trendy” spirituality: “I felt as if I were being visited by the ghost of Christmas future, and the ghost was saying, ‘Hey, Don, you’re going to end up like this guy: a yuppie Christian writer with no backbone!’” Funnily enough, this is exactly how I began to feel towards Donald Miller as I continued to read this memoir. The aspects of the book which I related to early on became an unsettling mirror reflection.
Miller says things like, “Jesus did not mix His spirituality with politics.” What could be more obnoxiously trendy than that? He looks back on the days in which he protested Bush’s invasion of Afghanistan as if that were a childlike thing to do, as if a follower of Christ should not be calling out injustice.
This book might appear to offer insightful reflections about Christianity, but Miller makes sure to stop short of any intellectual engagement. Instead he describes the feelings he has about a given topic, and decides that’s enough: “My dislike for institutions is mostly a feeling, though, not something that can be explained. There are upsides to institutions, of course. Tradition, for example. The corridors at Harvard, rich with history, thick with thought, the availability of good, hot Starbucks coffee at roughly thirty locations within five miles of my home. And what about all those jobs? Without the corporate machine, where would people work? I suppose we need them. The institutions.”
For another example, consider his disdain for anything “trendy” or “cool”. This disdain, accompanied by his one-dimensional understanding of those concepts, makes him unable to embrace the progressive spirituality that he’s searching for. An intellectually mature person has to be able to argue against the things he dislikes, and defend the things he stands for. But for some reason, Miller consistently refuses to do either.
It’s not clear what postmodernism means, and Miller does not attempt to define it. But in this book he is trying to contextualize Christianity within a postmodern age. In that sense, he is too late. Maybe this book would have carried weight in the ‘60s or ‘70s, but it feels hopelessly out of touch today. If you’re interested in that topic, this may be worth checking out, but if you’re not then I would stay away.
In one passage, the author recounts an encounter with a writer who presents a “trendy” spirituality: “I felt as if I were being visited by the ghost of Christmas future, and the ghost was saying, ‘Hey, Don, you’re going to end up like this guy: a yuppie Christian writer with no backbone!’” Funnily enough, this is exactly how I began to feel towards Donald Miller as I continued to read this memoir. The aspects of the book which I related to early on became an unsettling mirror reflection.
Miller says things like, “Jesus did not mix His spirituality with politics.” What could be more obnoxiously trendy than that? He looks back on the days in which he protested Bush’s invasion of Afghanistan as if that were a childlike thing to do, as if a follower of Christ should not be calling out injustice.
This book might appear to offer insightful reflections about Christianity, but Miller makes sure to stop short of any intellectual engagement. Instead he describes the feelings he has about a given topic, and decides that’s enough: “My dislike for institutions is mostly a feeling, though, not something that can be explained. There are upsides to institutions, of course. Tradition, for example. The corridors at Harvard, rich with history, thick with thought, the availability of good, hot Starbucks coffee at roughly thirty locations within five miles of my home. And what about all those jobs? Without the corporate machine, where would people work? I suppose we need them. The institutions.”
For another example, consider his disdain for anything “trendy” or “cool”. This disdain, accompanied by his one-dimensional understanding of those concepts, makes him unable to embrace the progressive spirituality that he’s searching for. An intellectually mature person has to be able to argue against the things he dislikes, and defend the things he stands for. But for some reason, Miller consistently refuses to do either.
It’s not clear what postmodernism means, and Miller does not attempt to define it. But in this book he is trying to contextualize Christianity within a postmodern age. In that sense, he is too late. Maybe this book would have carried weight in the ‘60s or ‘70s, but it feels hopelessly out of touch today. If you’re interested in that topic, this may be worth checking out, but if you’re not then I would stay away.