Host Dick Staub leads us in a discussion of Michael Pollan’s best-selling book The Omnivore’s Dilemma and the synergistic movie Food Inc. Our guests are Mark Canlis co-owner of Canlis restaurant (one of Seattle’s finest), The Reverend Jennie Spohr, producer of TKM, film critic & ordained Presbyterian clergy and Dr. Jeff Keuss SPU professor and an engaging interpreter of theology in popular culture.

 

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Host Dick Staub leads us in a discussion about a world described by the SF Chronicle as “savagely beautiful that comes alive in a strange and compelling novel.” The book is The Lovely Bones, by Alice Sebold. The NYT said it is “mesmerizing ~  taking the stuff of neighborhood tragedy and turning it into literature.” Both the book and Peter Jackson movie version intertwine elements of a coming of age novel, a mystery, an exploration of the afterlife & heaven and an exploration of one family’s dysfunction & discontent exposed more clearly by tragedy. Our guests tonight are The Reverend Jennie Spohr, producer of TKM, film critic & ordained Presbyterian clergy and Dr. Jeff Keuss SPU professor and an engaging interpreter of theology in popular culture.

 

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Dick Staub welcomes you to the annual Theology of Academy Award Nominees show in which we ask three questions of the best picture nominees: 1) Where is God or Who is God in this film? 2) What is the human condition/dilemma addressed in this film? 3) What is redemption in this film and how is it found? On our panel is Jeffrey Overstreet, film critic and  author; Jennie Spohr, producer of The Kindlings Muse and Gregory Wright, managing editor of Hollywood Jesus.com & Past the Popcorn   and publisher of W. John MacGregor’s West of the Gospel, due to be released this summer. The ten nominees are: Avatar: An Education; Up in the Air; Inglourious Basterds; A Serious Man; Hurt Locker; Up; District 9; Precious and The Blind Side.

 

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Dick Staub discusses The Gospel According to Motown with guests Dr. Jeff Keuss a professor at SPU and an engaging interpreter of theology in popular culture. Rev Jennie Spohr ordained Presbyterian pastor, producer of the Kindlings Muse and a gadfly on a myriad of issues and Chris Estey who has been writing about music in Seattle since 1986. He has written for The Rocket, The Stranger, Seattle Sound Magazine, and other publications. He has worked at labels since the late 90s. (Or the alternative bio: Driving Mrs. Estey crazy with music and conversation about it; giving her a break tonight by talking about it with other people someplace else besides their apartment.) Motown was a record company founded by Berry Gordy, Jr. More than a record company it was really a movement that played an important role in the racial integration of popular music featuring African-American artists who achieved crossover success. It launched The Motown Sound ~ soul music with a distinct gospel and pop influence.

 

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In her book Fingerprints of God NPR religion correspondent Barbara Bradley Haggerty set out in search for a science of spirituality. Interviewing leading neurologists, physicists, psychologists and a burgeoning breed of scientists intent on researching the physical imprint of the spiritual, her book offers a travelogue through the world of research into the reality of the unseen. In this podcast host Dick Staub discusses her findings with Adrian Wyard, founder of counterbalance.org, Reverend Jennie Spohr and Cindy Fitch, professor of biology at Seattle Pacific University.

 

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Music is a language of the gods and when the lyrics are thoughtful all the more so. Tonight our topic is Beatnik Spirituality for Today: The New Dylans”A look at Dylan, Low, The Long Winters, Parenthetical Girls, Bright Eyes and Cold War Kids with Chris Estey, and special guest musicians Robert Deeble and Molly Rose. Chris Estey has been writing about music in Seattle since 1986. He has written for The Rocket, The Stranger, Seattle Sound Magazine, and other publications. He has worked at labels since the late 90s. Seattle Sound Magazine said, “Molly Rose draws intricate landscapes of narrative poetry. Her music is as driven by the intrinsic rythms of her words as by whatever nameless muse guides her. There’s nothing conventional about her songs, but she’s hardly a weirdo folksinger. She’s just a lovely songwriter, and if you’re ready to listen closely, you wont be disappointed.” Robert Deeble’s music has been described as “Wistful folk-pop, sparsely arranged, gracefully performed, and achingly beautiful to behold.”Jack Kerouac introduced the phrase “Beat Generation” in 1948, his social circle to characterize the underground, anti-conformist young (50’s early 60’s). When asked, what is beatnik spirituality?” at a Brandeis Forum titled Is There A Beat Generation? he answered, ““It is because I am Beat, that is, I believe in beatitude and that God so loved the world that He gave His only begotten son to it… Who knows, but that the universe is not one vast sea of compassion actually, the veritable holy honey, beneath all this show of personality and cruelty.”

 

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Host Dick Staub and guests Dr. Jeff Keuss a professor at SPU and an engaging interpreter of theology in popular culture, Jennie Spohr producer of TKM, Ordained Presbyterian Clergy, shameless U2 stalker and Chris Estey, who has been writing about music in Seattle since 1986, discuss U2’s album which Rolling Stone describes as “Hymns for the Soul”, saying it fuses their spiritual uplift from the 80’s with their future-schock sonics of the 90’s.

 

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Dick Staub hosts a Theology of Music Show with guests Jeff Keuss and Nigel Goodwin. The discussion includes a look the idea of “new spirituals” through the music of Bob Dylan, Sufjan Stevens and Fleet Foxes.

 

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A discussion of the theology of the five nominees for Academy Awards in the Best Picture category. Hosted by Dick Staub with guests Gregory Wright Managing Editor of HollywoodJesus.com and Past the Popcorn, Jennie Spohr film critic, ordained Presbyterian clergy and Dr. Jeff Keuss a professor at SPU and an engaging interpreter of theology in popular culture.

 

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Twilight in book form is a runaway best seller. Twilight, the film has been described as “a full-blown cultural phenomena” (LA Times), “The most epic romance since titanic (Hollywood.com), “Phenomenal, magnificent” (Wireless Magazine). Twilight opens with these lines, “About three things I was absolutely positive: First, Edward was a vampire. Second, there was a part of him-and I didn’t know how dominant that part might be-that thirsted for my blood. And third, I was unconditionally and irrevocably in love with him.” Host Dick Staub facilitates a discussion about Twilight with guests Jennie Spohr film critic, ordained Presbyterian clergy and Dr. Jeff Keuss a professor at SPU and an engaging interpreter of theology in popular culture.

 

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