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Why are Christians so easy to please?

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dunadan
Apr 23 2006
12:52 pm

I think it’d be hard to argue that "good artistic taste was killed off during the Reformation". Remember that medieval art had a strong strain of didacticism that has, to some extent, reappeared in the evangelical requirement that music serve as a transport capsule for theology. And post-Reformation literature, music and art exploded onto the European cultural "scene" in the Renaissance. Sure — the Reformation created a separation of church and art (though not religion and art) even broader than that between church and state. But the roots of evangelical bad taste (as well as evangelicalism itself) are found closer to our time in the pietism of the late-19th and early-20th century. In reaction to a world despiritualized by science and higher criticism, early evangelicals emphasized a heavenly mindedness to the point where it became earthly mindlessness.

But I agree with your conclusion that evangelicals could really use an artistic compass.