If you've not seen the move "Ray" (a film that depicts the life of Ray Charles Robinson--one of the great musicians of the 20th Century) you need to pay the $7.50, and take a friend with you.

Ray Charles is depicted as a musical genuis (which he was) as well as a womanizer, drug addict (until the late 70's)...but more than the music success or the personal failure, "Ray" is about the life of an African-American man seeking to find redemption in whatever manner life offers.

As a young boy he witnessed the tragic accidental death of his younger brother who drowned. The loss of that pure relationship as well as the dynamic between Ray and his mother sends him on a life long journey to find meaning, worth, and transcendence.

He also battles the inherent but prevailing deuhumanizing attitudes of racism in conjuction with the death of his brother, and ensuing blindness. Still, nothing can quench the life the stirs within this young boy.

Creating music, not a church or community of faith per se, becomes salvation. With the help of his inner circle (mother, and devoted wife) he overcomes the social stigma attached to blindness and drug addiction becoming one of the true great artists in modern America.

One biblical scholar, whose name I've forgotten, suggests that biography is the "purest of all theological reflection". Ray Charles' life is one of struggle, fame, deceit, forgiveness and redemtpion. If we will simply listen long enough to the cadence of culture we might hear the desperate cry for belonging, relationship, and transformation.

And we might recognize our own peculiar journey's in light of those around us.

JG