Interview:

I believe that music helps us in exploring and connecting with deeper areas of who we are and in growing to become the person we were meant to be. This is true both in participating in the process of creating music and in engaging with music others create. If humankind is created in the image of God, who brought into being and sustains the universe with all it’s amazing beauty, complexity, wildness and mystery, then the act of creativity is part of fulfilling our purpose in this life. I believe that in the same way my kids’ creativity brings me pleasure, so God enjoys, is moved by and desires our creativity.

Music is relational – whether in the collaborative process of making music or in the way it can connect across cultural and social divides. Again I believe this is a reflection of the God in whose image we are created – a God who made us for relationship and who pursues relationship with us. Music has the ability to move us in profound ways: it can bring solace, it can uplift or challenge us, it can communicate in ways that words cannot – whether we are moved or consoled by the profoundly beautiful or shocked and confronted by the unexpected, challenging or powerful. Music holds a mirror up to our culture and worldview. It can challenge us to look at how we live, at how we treat others – showing us the world from a different point of view. From Dylan to U2 to Arvo Pärt to John Zorn – we hear and see new ways to understand our world.

So, for me, music plays a huge part in my spiritual journey – a journey of coming to know God more and of growing to live my life in the way that I believe God intended.

“Music holds a mirror up to our culture and worldview. It can challenge us to look at how we live, at how we treat others – showing us the world from a different point of view.” – Chris Mason-Battley, composer and saxophonist