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The Catholic Imagination of Bruce Springsteen

The Catholic Imagination of Bruce Springsteen 1"e Catholic Imagination of Bruce Springsteen Andrew M. Greeley The imagination is religious. Religion is imaginative. The origins and the power of both are in the playful, creative, dancing self. Once influenced by Catholic imagery, that self is forever Catholic. Hence, the popular rock star Bruce Springsteen, perhaps without knowing or understanding it, is a Catholic meistersinger. This essay is the third and final installment of an investigation I began last summer of the relationship between religious imagina­ tion and the persistent loyalty of American Catholics. In the first essay, "Why Catholics Stay in the Church" (America, 8/8/87), I argued that a sociological analysis reveals that Catholics remain in the church because their faith provides them with iden­ tity, community, and sacra.mentality-the last of which constitutes, at the deep levels of the personality, paradigmatic symbols that be­ come templates for living and life. One clings to Catholic images and stories because of the richness of meaning they provide-a meaning that is frequently implicit. (Theologically, lest I be accused again of denying the work of God, these phenomena might be con­ ceived as the secondary causes through which, in Catholic theology, God normally works.) In the second essay, "Empirical Liturgy: http://www.deepdyve.com/assets/images/DeepDyve-Logo-lg.png Black Sacred Music Duke University Press

The Catholic Imagination of Bruce Springsteen

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Copyright
Copyright © 1992 by Duke University Press
ISSN
1043-9455
eISSN
2640-9879
DOI
10.1215/10439455-6.1.232
Publisher site
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Abstract

1"e Catholic Imagination of Bruce Springsteen Andrew M. Greeley The imagination is religious. Religion is imaginative. The origins and the power of both are in the playful, creative, dancing self. Once influenced by Catholic imagery, that self is forever Catholic. Hence, the popular rock star Bruce Springsteen, perhaps without knowing or understanding it, is a Catholic meistersinger. This essay is the third and final installment of an investigation I began last summer of the relationship between religious imagina­ tion and the persistent loyalty of American Catholics. In the first essay, "Why Catholics Stay in the Church" (America, 8/8/87), I argued that a sociological analysis reveals that Catholics remain in the church because their faith provides them with iden­ tity, community, and sacra.mentality-the last of which constitutes, at the deep levels of the personality, paradigmatic symbols that be­ come templates for living and life. One clings to Catholic images and stories because of the richness of meaning they provide-a meaning that is frequently implicit. (Theologically, lest I be accused again of denying the work of God, these phenomena might be con­ ceived as the secondary causes through which, in Catholic theology, God normally works.) In the second essay, "Empirical Liturgy:

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Black Sacred Music – Duke University Press

Published: Mar 1, 1992

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