Rap artist Kanye West has released a gospel album called Jesus is King. Yes, that Kanye West. The same rapper who made millions selling music loaded with sexual content, expletives, and derogatory comments about women with song titles like Gold Digger and Devil in a New Dress.
Kanye has made references to religion in his music before, but this is the first time he has released a whole album dedicated to faith which, he claims, shows a true change of heart.
“I told the devil that I’m going on strike. I’ve been working for you my whole life,” he writes in a song called Hands On.
Another track, called Closed On Sunday, says: “Follow Jesus, listen and obey, no more livin’ for the culture, we nobody’s slave … I bow down to the King upon the throne, my life is his, I’m no longer my own.”
On the album, he repents of arrogance and for souls damaged on his account and sings about teaching children to love God and avoid temptation.
(Someone on Twitter even made the comparison that Jesus is mentioned 29 times in Kanye’s short album, and only 16 times in the much longer final document of the Amazon Synod).
Genuine or not, his Jesus-centred gospel album has received plenty of backlash claiming he only released it for the money or the fame, or that it’s not even that good musically. Of course, anyone who lives in a spotlight can expect that kind of reaction.
But what troubled me was the reaction of the Christian community. In Kanye’s own words: “Told people God was my mission. What have you been hearing from the Christians? They’ll be the first ones to judge me, make it feel like nobody love me.”
I’m not here to argue whether his conversion is genuine.
But around the time the Jesus is King album came out, I happened to have my bookmark in the middle of St. Augustine’s conversion in Confessions. As I read, it struck me that St. Augustine’s change of heart likely also had a chilly reception from the Christian community.
Augustine was an arrogant, self-professed sex addict. Before his conversion, he was a professor of rhetoric, a smooth talker who enjoyed debating Christians and likely caused many people to question their faith. He admits in his Confessions that he dabbled in astrology and other pagan philosophies and enjoyed telling persuasive lies to win arguments.
Augustine slowly changed his mind about Christianity as he came to know and understand it. But it wasn’t until he took a little holiday with friends that his heart was able to accept God and experience conversion.
I imagine that emerging from the cottage and going public with his conversion didn’t exactly meet a lot of enthusiasm in the Christian community. Perhaps people also asked themselves: is he just doing it for the money, or the fame, or to trick us later?
I’m sure as Augustine was baptized, embraced celibacy, and eventually became a Catholic bishop, it took time for Christians to warm up to the idea that an enemy had become a brother.
I’m not trying to argue whether or not Kanye is a saint. It’s not up to us to judge. But God forbid that while angels rejoice over the repentance of a grave sinner, we Christians boo, hiss, and wonder why we didn’t get the robe and fattened calf.
Time will reveal Kanye’s true intentions. I hear he plans to release an album titled Jesus is Born this Christmas.
To paraphrase a quote from a dear priest friend of mine: “If we find ourselves judging someone more often than we pray for them, we are the ones who need to change.”
