This same dhimmitude is encroaching the Christian West with increasing success - even in your backyard. For years, in Hamtramck, Michigan, mosques have broadcast (with loudspeakers) the call to prayer, five times a day. Such a sound fills the air and covers the whole region. It's distressing that the culture of the Koran is becoming a characteristic of our own neighborhoods.
There are other characteristic sounds around here in Lafayette. I think not only of church bells, but also of police, ambulance and fire sirens (interesting word, that). In a real sense - both in mythology and in our communities - it is a death peal. And so the sounds of death, destruction and distress ring out through the city and wake me up at night (I live on a main thoroughfare). Such a mournful sound, though, is part of any culture, because death is ubiquitous.
Another sound is what I call the infernal thump of hip-hop music. It's not that I mind the music itself. But I am always annoyed when it becomes a public phenomenon. Because of its dominating character (and it's certainly played loudly in order to be shared), it leaves me without a choice but to submit to its sound. It drowns out thought, conversation, and any other beautiful sound. It offends elderly folk and it wakes up napping babies in every home by which it passes. But it happens to be a sound of our culture. It has, unfortunately, become characteristic.
Grumbling, rumbling, roaring and screaming shakes my windows and also shocks me out of slumber as Harley Davidsons and Suzukis belch their demonstrations of strength and mobility. There are lots of motorcycles around. And I like motorcycles. But the fact that they are deliberately designed for such noise displays (and that there's a market for such foolishness) makes me think that Sauron's moved his industrial machinations to Lafayette for a convenient takeover. And the question inevitably comes to mind, To whom does Lafayette belong?
Well, Lafayette, like every place, belongs to Christ. He owns property. He owns the world. Whole cultures owe Him their allegiance. And when every nation bows to Him, the cultures those nations produce will be beautiful to every sense, including the sense of hearing. I'm not suggesting that the sounds those cultures produce will be identical. God loves variety. But I am suggesting that it is part of the Christian agenda to beautify every area of life and, as such, to make it distinctively Christian. As such, I say, because beauty belongs to God. He thought of it. And the place of holiness is a beautiful place.
I think this change, this enculturation, will take place from the inside-out, as more Christians are born and more human institutions come under the dominion of Christ. But it follows that such a heart-transformation works itself out in the way we live our lives - on every level. And so, why not expect for the sounds of any Christian area to be recognizable as developing from a Christian culture?
Presently, there is only one mosque in Lafayette and it's on our college campus. It doesn't broadcast prayer calls (yet). But we can all be very assured that the geo-political agenda of Islam recognizes the symbolic importance of the public square, and that the muezzin's chant is coming to a mosque near you. Christians have historically recognized that Jesus' crowned rights must be claimed on the public square as well as in every heart. But our evangelical version of Christianity with its soft gnostic underbelly doesn't get this and, therefore, we no longer have a response to the threat of Islam. The truth is that, just like every individual, every king and every nation must choose its god. There is no such thing as separation of church and state. Perhaps ringing a church bell is both an act of Kingdom conquest which shakes the gates of hell and the declaration of a whole community's loyalty. The only response to Islamization is Christendom.
I sure would like our church to contribute to (and shape) the sounds of our culture with a beautiful-sounding church bell, ringing in morning and evening prayers. Our battle cries need to be in the air to compete with the sounds of the Muslim onslaught. Christ is the Lord of the Dance, not Allah, and the church ought to play the tune to which the culture dances.
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