About six weeks ago we held a Movie Night at St. Luke’s featuring the documentary film Young@Heart. The film is the story about a community chorus made up of seniors (age 70+) from Northampton, MA.  It’s a delight and you should put it on your Netflix queue.

In addition to its entertainment value, it seems to me that the story of this chorus has a message to send to the Church today.

About 20 years ago this group quit singing the ‘old standards’ of their day and began taking on selections from more contemporary artists.   They traded in Sinatra and Gilbert & Sullivan for Sonic Youth and Jagger & Richard.  The result was in international explosion of popularity for the group and a rethinking of what it means to know one’s audience as well as one’s message.

As the relationships in the chorus are explored so to is the relationship between the chorus, their music and the audience.  In the midst of it all I found myself thinking that the Church has an opportunity to vary our repertoire as well.  Not to pander to the audience, but to transform our expectations of just what is at the heart of the good news of the Gospel of Jesus.  Just as these folks found and expressed meaning in music they wouldn’t have considered otherwise, so too can our Churches find and express new meaning in proclaiming the Word made Flesh to folks we might not imagine being interested.  It would do us all good.

Do yourself a favor, watch the clip below and view the film.