Dad,
I was driving to work this morning and heard a familiar rock band on the radio. Their name is TOOL. You might have heard of them. They have a very famous first video. I had always known that this band is very dark and self-admitted satanic. They're so dark that I don't think they've ever shown their faces on a video or album cover (which is symbolic). Their videos and albums are disturbing to look at & they just creep me out. For example, there is a picture of an extremely obese naked woman lying with a skinny man. The disk itself has a picture of a guy giving himself oral sex. There is also a picture of a burning pig. It just makes my skin crawl. People really follow this band. One of their albums has a hidden track (all the way up to track 69). It is kind of like that Beatles "revolution number 9" song. You can hear "back-masking", someone making prophecies as well as someone on a bad drug trip. This also leads to my next conversation topic. With this disgust fresh in your mind, reply about 2 things. One is rock and roll and its effect on the degradation of today's youth as well as your take on the end of the world. These topics coincide on many levels. I know you don't necessarily like to discuss the end of the world, but want to get your "official" opinion here.

Lyrics to Aenima by TOOL.

Lyrics to Eulogy by TOOL.

I have read the lyrics to Tool’s songs that you had sent. I thought that some were likewise very disturbing, but at the same speaking to the sense of frustration that I know I’ve felt at times at the world around us, “it’s a three ring circus around us. The only way to fix it is to flush it all away.” I also noticed the quasi-religious lyrics as they ask Jesus to come down from the cross cause we need the space for the next fool. It’s easy to see that they think they have heard the Christian message, but don’t get what it all about. Let me give you my two cents worth again at what I think your main questions are:

1. Rock and roll and its effect on the degradation of today’s youth and,

2. The end of the world

The Effects of Rock and Roll

I guess this is a much larger picture than just rock and roll. I have always contended (as have many others) that rock music whether the message is played backwards or forwards. My famous saying is, “you can’t fall into a mud puddle without getting dirty” or from my most favorite writer of devotionals, E. Stanley Jones, “what gets your attention, gets you.” This could of course be the end of the whole discuss and sum up my feelings. BUT if you want the longer version, read on.

Dr. Leonard Eron, a University of Illinois professor, decided to see what long term effect there were between television and violence in children. He visited the town where the first TV program was ever broadcast, Hudson N.Y.  His study started in 1960 by observing children at play, the type of programming the children viewed, and the amount of time they spent watching it. His conclusions were that the more TV that was watched, the more violent the behavior. He came back in 1971 to observe the same the same children and to his amazement he found those same children were still more violent and were more often in trouble. He then came back in 1981 for a restudy and found now that those adults were more aggressive, violent and more often in jail. This same study was later written up in Newsweek Magazine, many professional journals, and written into a book.

In 1973 Tammie Williams found a community in British Columbia that never had TV, the only community in North America than never had TV. Her studies found that when TV was introduced, aggression doubles, creativity was down, and participation in community events were down considerably.

Dr. Gerbner did a study on TV violence and found that TV often creates the illusion that there is almost no difference between reality and fantasy.

Dr. Centerwall has gone as far as to predict using a scientific model that there would be approximately 10,000 fewer homicides per year if there were no thing as TV.

Of course you remember the famous movie "Picnic" that used subliminal advertising to pursuade the audiance to eat popcorn and drink Coke. This type of advertising was so effective that the Federal Government outlawed it.

• From 1960, violence has doubled. This year coincides with the mass introduction of TV to America
• By 18, the average child has witnesses 200,000 acts of violence and 28,000 simulated murders on TV
• Violent heroes are more dangerous than violent villains – people model heroes
• US troops in Vietnam stood a better chance of coming home alive than a black American has of avoiding being a murder victim
• There are more gun dealers in the US than gas stations
• More kids die from gun violence in California each day than car accidents

I believe these facts could easily be applied to listening to Rock and Roll music. Music is probably an even more power influencer than watching a TV program. For one, this person is willingly giving themselves over to the moment at a concert and letting it in their mind and soul. All five senses are involved. Secondly music has a magical influence on people senses. Look at the goose bumps on the arms when you really get “into” music at an inspirational service. People are swaying and soaking up the moment.

What a person must do is realize that we are not powerless in this situation. Everything seems out of control until you do something! How about writing to TV stations like you did about The Family Guy, and ask that violence should be reduced?  How about …….. I always loved the Christopher’s motto, “that it is better to light a candle than curse the darkness.” They also say, that “I may only be one, but I am one.” And above all, we must remember that 99.9% of kids just want to be loved, and they are good kids. We need to influence them in the right ways.

A great quote from the Bible is the following:

Finally brethren, whatever things are true, whatever things are noble, whatever things are just, whatever things are pure, whatever things are lovely, whatever things are of good report, if there is any virtue and if there is anything praiseworthy – meditate on these things.

The End of the World

This is one difficult subject, and believe me, I have thought about it a lot. Actually it is not a subject that I don’t necessarily not like to talk about. It is just that it is shrouded in such mystery. There are many mediums who proclaim to have spoken with the dead, but most are charlatans. If you recall, The Great Houdini tried to contact his mom when she died, and was almost fooled by a medium. He spent the rest of his life duplicating the tricks that they performed and exposing them as fakes.

I guess no matter what you exactly believe will happen after death, it usually revolves around something that seems strange. After all, you wake up, brush your teeth, go to work, come home, have a beer, work around the house, go to sleep – an unbroken string of events. THEN a death happens. If it’s someone close you are shaken to the roots of your being. You finally grasp that there is no real unbroken stream of events in life. There is a stream like a river that continually changes. Sometimes the changes are so slow that they are imperceptible, sometimes so violently fast that it jerks you around and you and all the beer tumbles out (I think you get my analogy).

I tend to think of dying as being reborn. After all you, yes you Tim, once did not exist. You were living inside the womb, comfortable, no cares or concerns, and someone was trying to make you go out into this strange place called “life” filled with strange things. You were not articulate enough to express yourself, nor smart enough to grasp what wonderful things there would be out here (picnics, waterfalls, summer, snow, love, kumla and butter, etc). When we are “born” into the next life, no one could possible explain it to you – the wonders of the next heavenly life. Jesus came to explain this all to us, that God loves us and He has prepared “many mansions for us.” But how can we understand. My old Sunday School teacher always would answer me when I asked EVERY Sunday, “what will heaven be like” – I asked her that just to irritate her. She would say that God will never have us play harps on some clouds somewhere – heaven will be what you most enjoy, or it wouldn’t be heaven. So for me I know there will he libraries, BWCA like areas, Pale Ale, friends and family, and all of the things I enjoy (a lot of Norwegians!!).

Now for the mechanics. What does the Lutheran Church teach exactly about what happens after life here on earth. The stories are almost the same for Christians that have died and came back (near-death experiences). I told you about the famous book by Dr. Raymond Moody that details his study of 1000’s of near death experiences. They ALL floated above the operating room, looked back on their bodies, were greeted by friends and family that had died, felt fantastic, filled with love, went toward a tunnel of light, often meeting Jesus, and we then pulled back into their bodies. NONE of them wanted to come back. This is comforting to me to know that an after life really exists. Naturally the fact that Jesus dies and rose from the dead to convince us that we have eternal life is the clincher.

But what is this about Jesus coming back, the body being raised from the dead? Some talk about a rapture where Christians are taken to heaven and Christ rules on earth for a millennium (1000 years), then there is a judgement for all. Those who accepted Christ go to heaven, the others die eternally – some say in a lake of eternal fire.

There are 3 main camps of belief in the Christian theologies:

1. Post millennialism – The Kingdom of God (KOG) being advanced now (we are in this KOG now, and after a 1000 years of peace and righteousness, Christ will return.
2.  Amillennialism – The Bible does not predict a millennium of peace before the end. God’s Kingdom and Satan’s kingdom will exist in parallel until the second coming of Christ.
3. Premillennialism – The second coming of Christ will come then a period of worldwide peace called the millennium or the Kingdom of God will reign, then the great white throne judgement.

There are a bunch more of various variations on all this. Some very elaborate and stylized. All Christians though do believe that there will be a second coming of Christ. We will be resurrected just like Jesus was. St. Paul said that if Christ didn’t really raise from the dead, then our faith is in vain. You might as well eat drink and be merry and just die! So most believe that we die, Christ comes, we are resurrected, there is a judgement and those that believe in Christ have all sins forgiven, and we will live forever in heaven. Where is heaven? On earth? Outside the solar system? What ever you believe, it will not be just a spiritual realm. We will have a resurrection body like Christ’s (we are told). That mean it can walk through doors yet be touched and eat food. Can travel at the speed of light. Looks like ourselves, yet perfected.

I could go on and on with facts as to why I believe in the resurrection, but I think you get the drift. We are born into another life. Our souls are kept save until the resurrection and our bodies re-created (no big trick for God, after all he did the first time when you were born) and we inherit eternal life with God in something so wonderful that we can not understand it now. I have no doubt at all about this. As trees bud again the next year, or a seed is planted and grow the next year, so we will live again.

I hope that this answers your question as to what I believe.