holy heteroclite:: "Burn Down the Mission,"...just don't build a new 2.0 "missional"one

Whether lyricist Bernie Taupin was referring to American Civil War, Spanish Civil War, or Vietnam War....or none of the above, all the above, or more follow the debate here)..

..the lyrics (and music) of Elton John's vintage "Burn Down the Mission" were haunting when I first heard them (1971!) and haunting now on a whole nother level; as accidentally (?) prophetic about the times we are embedded in.

Elton himself said (as he introduced the song in the amphitheatre in Ephesus (how biblical a backdrop can you ask for... see the video below), "It's very much influenced by the gospel side of things." Hmmm..

I read them as about church, as about the shift/Reformation/Reorientation/Rummage Sale we are in the midst of these forty years later. I read them in tandem with Peter Rollins' "The Fidelity of Betrayal." Time to burn down (or sell, as in the Rummage sale reference) the worst of the old school mindset/wineskin. It was sold as a missionary mindset, but it was often the bankrupt attractional model of modernity...which often lead to colonialism, clericallism, ethnocentrism, hierarchicalism, denominationalism...........and just plain schism.

When we "burn down the mission," we do it (hopefully) in the name of the "Lord." Or to take the lyrics literally, we pray the Lord himself does the burning down. (And pray we do/pray all this in a nonviolently violent way this time. And what emerges from the ashes is no building (and edifice complex...Howard Snyder term), idololatry of place and fortress mentality, but simply a bunch of people on equal playing field...leveled ground. Holy Ground.

It's too cliche to say we move from "mission" to "missional," but that's partly what I mean.

If we just erect a "missional" building/monument in place of the "mission" one, we are busted.

What can save us from marketing "missional" as the new stategy, the new attraction(al)?

Deep groaning prayer, gentle fearlessness.....and engaging with thinkers like Brad Brisco, Len Hjalmarson, Frost/Hirsch...and uh, Sir Elton John.

As Taupin/Elton sang in another chilling song from this era, "The King Must Die" "The king is dead..long live the King."

(And if my hands are stained forever/And the altar should refuse me/Would you let me in/Should I cry sanctuary

/The king is dead, the king is dead...Long live the king")

Here are some comments on the "Song Meaning" thread, followed several versions of the song and lyrics themselves:

In many areas around the world, the "mission" was a place of residence owned by the Roman Catholic church, where priests could engage in the conversion of heathens to christianity. Many times these missions were protected by soldiers or free men who served a higher power, such as a royal family or the papacy.

Many times these missions were not welcome, especially when poor, starving people would look and see missionaries and priests eating well, and living under good shelter. This was especially true when the hypocrisy became apparent between what the church preached and what it actually did.

I think the song simply reflects an uprising by the people who the missionaries are trying to convert. They are freezing and starving and have had enough. They burn down the mission for warmth and shelter.

At the end.. the high powers come to seek justice and drag the man, who we must assume is the ringleader, away.

-link

You tell me there's an angel in your tree
Did he say he'd come to call on me
For things are getting desperate in our home
Living in the parish of the restless folks I know

Everybody now bring your family down to the riverside
Look to the east to see where the fat stock hide
Behind four walls of stone the rich man sleeps
It's time we put the flame torch to their keep

chorus

Burn down the mission
If we're gonna stay alive
Watch the black smoke fly to heaven
See the red flame light the sky
Burn down the mission
Burn it down to stay alive
It's our only chance of living
Take all you need to live inside

Deep in the woods the squirrels are out today
My wife cried when they came to take me away
But what more could I do just to keep her warm
Than burn, burn, burn, burn down the mission walls

Now everybody now bring your family down to the riverside
Look to the east to see where the fat stock hide
Behind four walls of stone the rich man sleeps
It's time we put the flame torch to their keep

Burn down the mission
If we're gonna stay alive
Watch the black smoke fly to heaven
See the red flame light the sky
Burn down the mission, Lord!
Burn it down to stay alive
It's our only chance of living
Take all you need to live inside

Studio version: