You cry out in your sleep,
All my failings exposed.
And there’s a taste in my mouth,
As desperation takes hold.
Just that something so good
Just can’t function no more

It is well known that music can touch our deepest parts and lift us up to encounter the divine in ways outside of our normal experiences. It is also funny how certain songs and pieces of music can have had a profound effect on us that quite possibly could be meaningless to other people. I guess that is the personal nature of our God and his unique love for each and every one of us. I have been inspired by many pieces of music over the years, but three stand out for me as in times when God has reached out and touched my heart, lifting me beyond myself in an encounter with the transcendent.

As a teenager I was very much into the punk and “alternative” rock scenes. A huge part of that scene was to listen to the ‘John Peel Sessions’. Favourite bands and newcomer bands would be showcased on the BBC radio programme. In late 1979 I listened to a John Peel Session featuring the band Joy Division. I had heard of them but hadn’t heard their music as they weren’t exactly the punk rock that I was into at the time. I don’t know where ‘Love Will Tear Us Apart’ came in the set of those four songs but when I heard it it hit me like an emotional thunderbolt. It is impossible to say exactly why. The simplicity of the tune, the powerful words, the strong overlay of bass and keyboard? I guess it spoke to what I was going through at the time. Being awakened to romantic love and also hurt by it. Maybe it played into my cynicism directed at the world and at the common romantic love songs of the time. What I didn’t realise back then was that I had awoken to the reality of love being the embrace of suffering…another irony was that I was in a punk band at school called ‘The Crux’! (the passion of Jesus was already introducing itself in small ways!)

I remember Joy Division being the next big thing among my music loving friends at school during the early part of 1980. And I heard of the suicide of the lead singer Ian Curtis at school. It just didn’t make sense, but then God was calling me to be alive to his presence in my whole being and not this over-reliance on my mind and its ability to understand. ‘Love Will Tear Us Apart’ called me to that place, it touched my soul. And as with all these musical encounters, it still does whenever I listen to it.

The second piece of music was a world apart from Joy Division and probably remains my favourite piece of music of all time. I don’t think anything more beautiful has ever been written. It came into my life during an intense period of searching. I had been moved by the Luis Palau ‘Mission to London’ in 1984 and had that summer gone hiking on my own in Connemara carrying a tent on my back and a book of the Gospels. Late in 1984 I moved to Southampton, ostensibly to get more sailing experience. My landlord had spent some time in an anglican religious community. One evening he played me the CD of a piece of music. It was by the composer Gregorio Allegri and called Miserere. The recording he played me, by The Tallis Scholars preformed in Merton College Chapel Oxford in 1980, has been revered as one of the best recordings of the piece up to this present day. The voices were sublime. The sound hauntingly otherworldly. It took me to another realm of reality. It was only a good while later that I fully realized and appreciated that the words were those of psalm 50 (51)…

Miserere mei, Deus: secundum magnam misericordiam tuam.
Et secundum multitudinem miserationum tuarum,dele iniquitatem meam.
Amplius lava me ab iniquitate mea: et a peccato meo munda me.
Quoniam iniquitatem meam ego cognosco: et peccatum meum contra me est semper.

Have mercy upon me, O God, according to thy lovingkindness.
According to the multitude of thy tender mercies blot out my transgressions.
Wash me thoroughly from mine iniquity: and cleanse me from my sin.
For I know my transgressions; And my sin is ever before me.

“The loving kindness of the heart of our God that visits us like the dawn from on high” (The Benedictus – Luke 1:78) had come to visit me in that moment. To take me on towards my baptism some two years later. Music can touch us, connect us and move us.

The third piece of music did not hit me like a bomb shell but sort of grew on me as I grew in relationship to my past, which echoed the lyrics of this song. I think I heard it first in the late 1990’s back in the day when I would still listen to music on the radio. I admired it as a great song every time I heard it played. It wasn’t until I heard it featured in the film ‘The Way’ (the 2010 film set on the Camino with Martin Sheen) that I finally checked out the lyrics…

How ’bout me not blaming you for everything?
How ’bout me enjoying the moment for once?
How ’bout how good it feels to finally forgive you?
How ’bout grieving it all one at a time?

Thank you India
Thank you terror
Thank you disillusionment
Thank you frailty
Thank you consequence
Thank you thank you silence

The lyrics completely resonated with the journey I had been on…coming to see all the pain and disappointments of the past as something to be treasured because they had been my teacher. They had led me into silent contemplation of God who is the source of my being. Those disillusionments had made way for the gratitude that I now had in my heart. They were to be celebrated not to be scorned and disposed of. Again the music has a great haunting quality that penetrates deep into the soul. Like the other two pieces of music, I never tire of listening to it. So ‘Thank U’ Alanis Morissette.

The moment I let go of it was the moment
I got more than I could handle
The moment I jumped off of it
Was the moment I touched down

How ’bout no longer being masochistic?
How ’bout remembering your divinity?
How ’bout unabashedly bawling your eyes out?
How ’bout not equating death with stopping?

Thank you India
Thank you providence
Thank you disillusionment
Thank you nothingness
Thank you clarity
Thank you, thank you silence

‘Thank U’ Alanis Morissette / Glen Ballard 1998

“If music be the food of love, play on!” (Shakespeare – Twelfth Night)

Music can truly move us beyond ourselves. At its base it has the ability to help us cope with times of despair. Because at those moments, though we usually do not recognise it, God is with us. He who is love has gone before us in his passion, and wants to lead us through our times of trial to the fulness of his resurrection.

It is when it seems to you
that you are most abandoned by God
that you are most loved by him
and he is the closest to you

Blessed Angela of Foligno