Rappin' priest to tackle issues

When Rev. Stan Fortuna, CFM, talks about faith, "I'm not going to take the easy way. I'll throw fastballs right down the plate. Why hold back?"

The Bronx-based Franciscan priest, musician and rapper will appear with Hudson-based Christian band Dimension 7 and abstinence speaker Kyle Warmington during Youth Appreciation Night at Hudson Middle School, May 21, 6-10 p.m.

The event is sponsored by local churches and Hudson's Alight Pregnancy Center. Admission is free, and hundreds of teens are expected to attend.

Deep thoughts

Father Stan's snappy, quick rhymes deal with critical issues facing teens: abortion, drugs, sexuality, family and suicide.

"A lot of times, those are the things that people talking to young people avoid and feel uncomfortable addressing," he noted. But pop culture doesn't have that uneasiness; the result is that teens are hit with messages that promote permissiveness, negativity and sin.

Although rap has a reputation for violence and vulgarity, he said, the genre in itself can be a powerful tool to reach youth in what Pope John Paul II calls the "new evangelization."

Rappin' priest

Father Stan believes that rap's influence can be used to bring the Gospel "to the heart of contemporary culture, so that the Gospel can elevate and transform that culture."

Many of his ideas for songs come from situations he's seen in his South Bronx neighborhood. For example, he's re-written the well-known hymn "Kumbaya" to oppose teen suicide and spoken to the anguish fatherless families feel in "Daddy Wound." Children who have been aborted speak through "Never Been Born."

He exhorts teens to live their faith like "walking billboards" for Jesus, calling Him "the most beautiful reality; if we believe Him, why do we put Him in our pocket?"

Papal influence

One of the priest's heroes is the Pope because "he is not afraid. That's one of the first things that popped out of his mouth when he put that hat on: 'Be not afraid.' He's said the heart of what I'm about; he said that the Gospel lives always in conversation with the culture, for the eternal Word never ceases to be present to the Church and to humanity. If the Church holds back from culture, the Gospel itself falls silent."

Many older people, he said, think that young people, who are engrossed in a radically different culture from their own, can't be reached.

"That's untrue," he said. "They have to be willing and daring to tell young people the truth. If anybody, young or old, dares to risk the truth, speaking from their heart, young people are going to listen. And there is nothing more daring than plainly speaking truth. Our job is to plant the seeds; it's God's job to make them grow."

(5/20/04) [[In-content Ad]]