Chris Martin made me sad (what he said he experienced)

Dan Kimball reports:

Earlier today I read the new issue of Rolling Stone and they had an interview with Chris Martin in it. The interview made me quite sad for numerous reasons. I like Coldplay and have seen them live two times and from what Chris is telling about his upbringing, his feelings and conclusions about the church and hell seem very understandable. To me, his words reinforce why it is very important to be teaching a biblical and holistic understanding of "hell" and what it is or isn't. Not by any means hiding or avoiding its horrific reality, but not using it manipulatively especially in the way he described here. (I talked about this with my thoughts on hell here and here).

Here's a bit of the interview:

You grew up in a rural part of southwest England, in a pretty religious environment. How did that affect you?

I grew up with the prospect of heaven and hell looming ever large. What I grew up with was, if you even think about boobs, you're going to hell. It was drilled in: These things are wrong. It was black and white, the way it still is for millions of right-wing Christians in the middle of America. I spent a year thinking I would be punished if I sang "Sympathy for the Devil".

Punished as in go to hell?

Yeah. When I was about 14, the first band I played in wanted to play "Black Magic Woman". I was like, "I can't sing that because I will get bad karma." As a kid, you don't know any better. But then as you go on, the cracks begin to appear and your'e like "I'm not sure about this hell thing. And I'm not sure whether it's really right or wrong to be gay, and I'm not sure whether we're right and they're wrong.

Did you ever think you might be gay?

It was more like "Oh, s#%, what if?" Because I was brought up to think that was really wrong. But it struck me. Who gives a s#%? And then it wasn't a problem. It sounds silly to say it now, but when you're a kid you think "I'm going to burn in hell for eternity if I like other guys or if I marry someone Jewish".

What was the first music you responded to?

Probably Bad, by Michael Jackson, and "Take on Me." by A-ha. We'd always be in church, so the thing I heard most was hymns. That's probably where all the life-and-death stuff in our music comes from."

- Rolling Stone, Issue 1055, June 26, 2008