Aloha !

I initially wanted to reply in the These Days ratings topic but considering how replies rarely lead to anything in those topics as everyone's way too busy rating This Ain't A Love Song with a 2 or 3, I figured I'd open another topic for it.

There've been discussions about this before with religious nutcases thinking that as soon as the word believe or God is mentioned a song is a religious song. "I pray to God, for one more chance girl...YES IT'S A SONG ABOUT GOD". No it's not, derp. It's not just on here, it's with many other artists as well. Mention God once and people will go insane, which is why I doubt Jon will ever mention those things ever again in his songs.

None of Bon Jovi's lyrics are overly religious though and Jon doesn't practice any religion at all anymore. I doubt he'd admit it considering he doesn't want to lose fans over it (the political way etc.) It's funny how the closest Bon Jovi has come to writing a gospel song is Lay Your Hands On Me, and that one's pretty much a song about temptation, sex and doing everything the Bible forbids you to do. Funny how the two of them meet, right?

For me, it's quite clear how I Believe and Something To Believe In aren't religious songs, they're just songs about believing in either yourself or something/someone else. Keep The Faith isn't about you continuing to go to church every Sunday either. I can see how a religious people can take them as great inspiring songs that support religion, but even Jon himself admitted back in 1993 that he'd seriously started to question the existance of God. Lyrics are open for interpretation, it's a thing that's obvious. With that said, when Jon sings "I lost faith in God" he's not saying he stopped believing. Those are two different things, yet a persons interpretation might make him jump to conclusions that don't really add up.

What I don't understand though is that if you can't like a song as Hey God simply because it questions God's motives, how can you like other songs coming from the same hand? I'm not talking about the writer "writing from another perspective", it's quite clear when Jon does this and when he doesn't. So in other words, if the writer feels he can question Gods beliefs, and you dislike those songs, how can you support such the writer when he writes songs about subjects you like? Wouldn't that go against your own personal beliefs and ideals, and therefore against your God's wishes?

Salaam Aleikum,
Sebastiaan