I heard Jesus is Just Alright by the Doobie Brothers on the radio the this morning. It reminded me of an episode of Geeks and Freaks where the freaks have a party and this one guy starts playing it on the piano. It also got me thinking about religious references in songs. Most great songs have a religious reference of some sort, Paul Simon for example mentions something religious in almost every song but not as blatant as saying "Jesus is just alright with me."

I got into this whole idea of why certain songs pertaining the term "Jesus" get on popular radio while others are only on Christian radio. Why do some songs become contemporary while other are restricted. The Musician's other music is part of it, the Doobie Brothers of course have many other contemporary hits that were on popular radio before Jesus Is Just Alright. It also may be the connotation in the song. The title states that Jesus is just alright, it's not a praise and worship song, simply "I've got no beef with this big guy, he's cool with me" rather than "whoa! Hallelujah! he's amazing" (which reminds me of another religious reference in a song..."Hallelujah I Love Her So").

what about Musicians who are only known for their song that relates to Jesus. What if God Was One of Us is kind of one of those. I'd never heard of Joan Osborne before that song or since (maybe that's just because I don't watch anything in the media where I would have heard something else about her). Some people were also outraged by that song (One line of the Chorus goes "Just a slob like one of us" and many people were appaled that she would compare God's glorious creation as a SLOB *OH MY!*).

Anyway, I had to leave the computer for a long time to help my nephew make lunch so I kind of lost my train of thought on this whole thing. I think the general point was that it is interesting how some songs that specifically focus on religion get air play on popular radio while others are ignored. One other note is that when artists who were strictly Christian branch out to music that are just general love songs (Monk and Nagel come to mind as does Ginny Owens and Jill Philips) why arn't they considered for airplay on popular stations.


...The band Creed comes to mind on that subject, they've switch back and forth between the "Christian" and "Rock" grenres every time they break up or the lead singer gets saved again.

Do you know of any other songs that have blatent religous referances and are/were played on popular radio? Can you name some Christian artists who write music that has a "secular" subject matter in addition to their normal Christian music.