The Bible and Music

In class on March 26th, we looked at the work of the composer John Rutter. I found it really interesting that he was not of the Christian faith necessarily but was still able to create works that all people in the church could use as a tool for worship. It reminds me of several other artists from the Renaissance who may not have been a part of the church but still painted beautiful works that would make any person viewing the work believe that the artist was indeed a member of the church. The one thing about John Rutter that I don’t really agree with is when he said that he throws himself into the religion of whatever it is he is composing for only for the amount of time he is creating the piece. In my own religious beliefs, we believe that you need to be all in with whatever path you’ve chosen, you can’t just jump in and out of different beliefs. I respect that he believes differently but I don’t necessarily think that becoming a Christian temporarily would make a person a better artist.