Transubstantiation
Our lives depend on a peculiar kind of magic. We possess the unique and awesome ability to take things that mean nothing in-and-of-themselves and turn them into the most meaningful of things. Show me a flag, and I will speak of a great nation. Take me to the river, and I will emerge reborn. Point to the night sky, and I will trace tales of gods and fortunes still to come. We transform everything in the world around us — a world that has no a priori meaning — and turn it into symbolic patterns and narratives that give our lives meaning and purpose. We turn these symbols and stories into dramatic rituals, and by doing so make manifest that meaning. Out of thin air, we turn nothing into something. Voilà!
Symbolic ritual is fundamental to any spiritual practice. Baptism initiates you into the faith, into the herd. Confession and fasting cleanse and renew. Recitation and prayer are conduits to the divine. When you participate in ritual, you transform the profane space of meaninglessness into the sacred space of meaning. In the Catholic Church, the Eucharist is, perhaps, the most sacred of rituals. The consumption of bread and wine memorializes Christ’s sacrifice and symbolizes spiritual renewal and nourishment. Fundamentalists believe in transubstantiation — that the bread and wine literally become the body and blood of Christ. For the faithful, the ritual of the Eucharist is an affirmation, the fulfillment of a redemptive promise.
But what happens when you don’t believe? When you’ve cast off the mysticism of the 6th century? When you journey in a world of matter absolute, a world devoid of symbolic import? When bread is bread and wine is wine? What happens when the magic is gone? What then?
God may not be dead, but he’s certainly bleeding out.
The number of Americans who regularly attend religious services has been on the decline for decades while the number of Americans who identify as atheist or agnostic has risen sharply. According to recent Gallup polling, “Two decades ago, an average of 42% of U.S. adults attended religious services every week or nearly every week. A decade ago, the figure fell to 38%, and it is currently at 30%.” That’s a 12% decline over the last twenty years. At the same time, the percentage of Americans who have no religious affiliation has more than doubled, from “9% in 2000-2003 versus 21% in 2021-2023.”
In real numbers, that’s nearly 42 million Americans who’d rather sleep in on the weekend. More and more people don’t need god. They don’t need him to explain the mysteries of the universe, to offer moral guidance, to offer a community of likeminded people, to offer comfort in times of despair. Perhaps the proliferation of chaos, violence, suffering, and inequity at a global scale is enough for many to reject the paradoxical narratives of a loving, omnipotent god. Perhaps the promise of an afterlife just seems far-fetched. Perhaps Pascal's wager is a losing bet.
Like many millennials, I cut bait on the whole Jesus cult decades ago. The more I read, the more secular wisdom and art I was exposed to, the less I was convinced of that particular brand of magical thinking, of the feeble certainty that grounds fundamentalism.
Still, an atheist needs something to believe in. We still need to turn a meaningless world into a meaningful one. We still need some secular rendition of transubstantiation. So, I’ve replaced hidebound religious symbols and practices with more inclusive, humanistic symbols and rituals. I’ve found new, more intellectually and spiritually fulfilling paths of enlightenment and transcendence.
I’ve traded homilies for rock ‘n roll. Music is a straight shot — an emotionally and psychologically powerful medium awash in signs and signifiers. Three chords and the truth, that’s enough for me. Thus, I am always seeking artists who offer some new way of being, who write songs that wrestle with the existential struggles of everyday life.
One such artist is MJ Lenderman. Lenderman is this generation’s slacker rock idol; he’s a savvy and clever lyricist who deftly narrates the current milieu. Lenderman does for songwriting what Raymond Carver did for the short story — pruning overgrown images into introspective, surreal, moving lyrical topiaries. Amidst soundscapes that gambol between avant-garde folk, anti-countrypolitan, blasé Americana, hooky grunge, and nerdy shoegaze, Lenderman sermonizes.
Lenderman’s songs are replete with Biblical allusion. Six of the nine songs on his most recent album, Manning Fireworks, allude to the Bible and religion. On the title track, a character opens “the Bible in a public place” and turns to “the very first page” before launching into a “tired” lecture on “original sin.” On the next song, “Joker Lips,” Lenderman sings that “Every Catholic knows he could’ve been the pope.” The leading role in “Rudolph” is played by a horny seminarian who “flirts with the clergy nurse ‘til it burns.” “Amazing Grace” gets a shoutout on “Wristwatch,” and Noah’s ark takes the spotlight on two songs near the end of the record. Supplication is the subject of the penultimate tune “On My Knees.” Lenderman proclaims "everyday is a miracle” while he stares out the window “speaking in tongues.”
The album is likewise populated with restive, wayward, post-pubescent young men clumsily fumbling their way through life without a clear purpose. They are mostly bored and lonely, lost and yearning, sad and vulnerable. These are feelings they fight against; they fight boredom, hangovers, each other, themselves. These are young men, as Lenderman sings on “Rip Torn,” who “need to learn / How to behave in groups.”
While others manage to find “passion” and “purpose” during their terminal paths around the sun, the young men in Lenderman’s songs spend a lot of time in their rooms: listening to Clapton, watching Men in Black, playing Guitar Hero. When they do get out, they seem hellbent on transforming the banality of their lives into something exciting (if not absurd and self-destructive): they sneak backstage, play the horses, shoot fireworks, take shots of Kahlúa, get DUIs while riding scooters, rent Ferraris, roll the dice in Vegas. They can act like real jerks. Jerks caught in the Neverland between post-adolescence and adulthood. Jerks no one gives a shit about. Jerks who don’t give a shit about you. Jerks — like some Jackass Generation 2.0 — doing all manner of stupid stunts to distract them from the existential question haunting every moment.
No amount of inane fun or peril can obfuscate the truth, however. These young men know that they will live and die and be forgotten. It’s almost as if every dangerous, terrorizing stunt they engage in is some desperate attempt to make them feel seen and heard, to offer them a chance to impress themselves on those who ignore them. These are young men in crisis. And they know it! In the final song on the record, “Bark at the Moon,” the unadorned lyric “SOS” sits hauntingly between the second and third verse.
Sure, they beat off in the shower, binge drink, and take dopey risks, but this generation is not irredeemable. Quite the opposite. These young men desperately seek meaning, acceptance, affirmation, love, and human connection.
It’s no accident that the lost souls in Lenderman’s songs are juxtaposed in harmony with all these Biblical allusions. In a world where god is dead (or on life support), in a world devoid of religious ritual, the everyday absurdity of their lives needs to be transfigured into something meaningful. Thus, Lenderman’s songs often feel more like agnostic hymns than rock tunes. They feel like the soundtrack to a new communion.
No matter our faith, we all need to believe in transubstantiation. I’m not talking about bread and wine or some figure on a cross; I’m talking about that peculiar magic of turning the meaningless, routine tasks of your day-to-day life into something meaningful, into something holy.
Turn everything you do into a sacred ritual: your morning routine, that cup of coffee, your drive to work, answering all those emails, vacuuming, cracking open a beer, ordering DoorDash, brushing your teeth, taking your pills.
Lenderman’s right: everyday is a miracle. All you have to do is believe it. Voilà!
