Unpop Culture

Let me tell you about a film that’s garnered a lot of publicity. The story revolves around a wealthy and debonair businessman with serious control issues. His sexual tastes involve perverse fantasies, but he gets what he wants because he’s rich, powerful, and handsome. In telling this story, the movie doesn’t shy away from depictions of the sex act. The audience is inundated with sex, in fact. The debauchery is enough to make a lot of people sick, either with revulsion, pleasure, or a mixture of both. Do you think I’m talking about Fifty Shades of Grey ? Actually, I’m referring to The Wolf of Wall Street , which came out on DVD just last year. Many prominent Christian critics loved WoWS , as I pointed out earlier . Fifty Shades of Grey , on the other hand, has been either ignored or condemned. And yet there are some glaring similarities in how both movies handle sex. They both employ stylistic techniques that were labeled as hardcore porn just a few decades ago. These ...

After last year’s Video Music Awards, Christianity Today posted an article mourning over how Miley Cyrus gave in to the cultural idea that “in-your-face sexuality is the easiest way to get attention.” Four months later, the magazine used a different emotional tone when addressing Martin Scorsese’s film The Wolf of Wall Street , which revels in depictions of explicit sexuality. The article states , “ The Wolf of Wall Street is a great and possibly terrific movie.” In another corner of cyberspace, Christ and Pop Culture examined the implications of Miley Cyrus spending “the majority of her 6 minutes on stage ‘ twerking .’” The magazine summarized the sexualized spectacle as “exuberant, banal, nihilism.” Several months later, while examining Scorsese’s filmmaking and stylistic choices, this same magazine adamantly proposed that The Wolf of Wall Street was not only “redeemable,” but also “an incredibly moral film.”           ...

Over three years ago, I began a blog series on the most neglected entry in the Ten Commandments: “Remember the Sabbath day, to keep it holy” (see Exod. 20:8-11). Seven months and forty posts later, the series still hadn’t covered all the Scriptural material dealing with the Sabbath. Nevertheless, I had been duly affected by my study, and our family’s Sunday habits evolved into something more refreshing, restful, and relaxing than we could have ever dreamed. Imagine a poor landowner accidentally breaking open an oil reserve on his property. That is how we felt in our pursuit of the Sabbath—like God had a main conduit of blessing just beneath the surface and we found ourselves positioned to receive from its abundance. Our relationships with God and each other experienced an increase in joy and affection. Of course, it can be easy for our souls to turn habits and practices—even divinely ordained ones—into rote and bland traditions. Three years after my blog series, it can sometim...