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TELEVISION Ties that bind


What’s the Point of Religion? BBC1


o mark the Jewish New Year, the Chief Rabbi, Lord Sacks, was awarded a whole half-hour to tackle a big question in What’s the Point of Religion? (27 September). It was no surprise that he found religion very important indeed. Religion, that is, rather than faith. This


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televisual essay concentrated on the familial and societal benefits of organised religion rather than on belief: the word “God” did not appear once. Instead Sacks dealt with religion as a “vital antidote” to society’s problems, starting with family break-up. In this he found cautious support from a pair of academics: Robert Putnam, an American sociologist, famous for Bowling Alone, which used the decline in the numbers of people playing in bowling leagues as an indicator of the collapse of community life; and Maurice Glasman, a British academic and Labour peer, whose expertise is in political theory and community organisation. The opening of the programme found Sacks wandering through Regent’s Park, which he presented as a metaphor for an ideal society, being a public space policed, for the most part, through unspoken rules. Those rules, he contended, are learnt in the first place in the family. In this he had the support of Putnam, who said the family is where we “learn the skills for dealing with other people”.


POP AND JAZZ Star quality


Laura Marling A CREATURE I DON’T KNOW


a more arresting opening line in pop, or one that more unexpectedly invokes the deity. But here’s Laura Marling kicking off her third album with “God’s work is planned”. It isn’t clear whether Marling, the 21-year- old darling of the small but buoyant English indie/alt.folk scene and a nominee for the Mercury Prize with her second record, I Speak Because I Can (opening track: “Devil’s Spoke”), is singing as herself or in character, because she seems to be affecting a gospelly southern accent on “The Muse”. It makes for a powerful start to the new


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CD, A Creature I Don’t Know (Rough Trade/Virgin), on which Marling mixes sim- ple, folky melodies with a hint of Joni Mitchell-inflected jazz phrasing. The former Noah and the Whale member started out


ot since Nick Cave’s “I don’t believe in an interventionist God” has there been


Lord Sacks: Regent’s Park –metaphor for an ideal society. Photo: Mazur@catholicchurch.org.uk


Naturally the Chief Rabbi spoke up for marriage. Putnam said that he did not wish to be “moralistically critical” of other forms of family, but conceded that traditional marriage has advantages as a way of raising children.


Sacks looked to his own family background as a way of illuminating his points, and stressed the importance of, for instance, the rituals of the Sabbath in binding families together. Putnam tentatively concurred, saying that religion was important in building a sup- portive “web of love”. Glasman, in contrast, suggested that it was belief in the family, rather than religion, that was the key point. Community, meanwhile, is as broken as family life in Sacks’ view. He visited Finchley Synagogue, where Sarah Brown, wife of the former Prime Minister, was giving a talk. These regular events, it was apparent, are


very much as a MySpace enthusiasm, and has managed to retain much of that home- made, girl-plus-guitar feel despite the attentions of big-name producers such as Ethan Johns. After half a dozen tracks, it’s easier to think of this record, far more than its predecessors, as a series of acting jobs. Marling has the ability to seem ambiguous even while singing very simply. It isn’t quite clear what “Sophia” is about, but it does exude a quiet wisdom, while “Rest in the Bed” is either chaste or sexy, depending on how you listen to it, and “Night After Night”, even with its references to prayer, has a dark and troubling quality. Marling is already a star. Like Nick Cave, she gives the impression of being able to go any- where from here. Not so very long ago, trumpeter Wynton


Marsalis was publicly critical of elder brother Branford for betraying the true cause of jazz and going off to tour and record with Sting. Recently, though, Wynton has been schmooz- ing with some big mainstream stars himself, first with Willie Nelson and now with Eric Clapton on Play the Blues (Reprise, also DVD). He would doubtless argue that these are both great exponents of American roots music.


popular as opportunities to meet and chat, building community cohesion. Secular organ- isations (Glasman mentioned trade unions and pubs) can provide similar opportunities for informal networking, though it was Sacks’ contention that religion provides “something extra”.


But again, it is involvement rather than faith that is most important. “Belonging matters much more than believing,” said Putnam. “If you’re an atheist, or someone who goes to church just because your spouse does, our data shows you’re just as nice as someone who’s deeply religious.” In fact, he said, you’re nicer – measured by altruism and community involvement – than someone who is privately devout but who does not have any friends at church. Sacks’ rosy view of religion was a matter of


assertion rather than argument. Belatedly he acknowledged that there are other opinions. To many secularists, religion is as much a force for division as it is for social cohesion. Interestingly, both academics gave some cre- dence to this view; and it is belief, rather than practice, that does the damage. Glasman talked about working with different faith com- munities. When they concentrated on acting together on social projects and towards com- mon ends, harmony prevailed; when talk became theological, it “broke down”. Putnam, too, sounded a warning note: “Religion is a powerful medicine. It has power - ful effects. But taken in high doses, it can be lethal for a civic community.” It was this metaphor, rather than the Chief Rabbi’s limp closing pronouncement that religion is “more relevant than ever”, that stuck in the mind as the programme ended. John Morrish


Certainly, the artist formerly known as


“God” knows the blues inside out and in this setting is able to replicate the kind of music he listened to while growing up awkward and unhappy in Ripley, Surrey. His guitar playing doesn’t quite chime easily with Marsalis’ trumpet, but it’s an effective and at times quite moving combination and when an old “blues” tune is revealed as “Layla”, it’s clear they’re having fun. Sezen Aksu is known in Turkey, where they


have more starry female pop singers to the mile than anywhere else on earth, as the “Little Sparrow”, so named after her second record, Serçe, rather than any resemblance to Edith Piaf. Aksu pretty much laid the foundations for


Turkish pop in the late 1970s and 1980s. Thousands of tourists probably heard her music blaring out of cafes without ever regis - tering the name. The new record is called Öptüm(World Village). It’s as full of poignant love songs and passionate rabble-rousers as ever, with “Vay” the emotional highpoint. As taboo-breaking blondes go, she’s way more interesting than Madonna and is set to sell almost as many records: 20 million to date and still rising. Brian Morton


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