(RNS) — Four decades after the popular Catholic music ministry Jésed formed in the Archdiocese of Monterrey, Mexico, Fede Carranza, whose father founded the group, thought it was time to be more explicit about the concept albums that are Jésed’s bread and butter.
While his father still leads the band’s “spiritual committee,” Fede said, he took over as “chief creative officer “of Jesed — the name is taken from the Hebrew word “Hesed,” meaning “grace” — a decade ago and has increasingly put his stamp on their sound. Feeling that fans sometimes missed the through line of their albums built around the Virgin Mary, Augustine, Francis of Assisi, Thérèse of Lisieux and other saints, Carranza wanted to alert listeners to the storytelling of Jésed’s latest album, “Santurrón” (which roughly translates to “Jesus freak” or “religious nut”).
“I want to tell you the story of a person who yearned for heaven but grew up and stopped believing it was attainable,” Carranza sings in Spanish in the album’s prologue. Carranza, who wrote and produced the record, is inspired by Kendrick Lamar and British musician Jacob Collier, and the influence is evident on the album’s boldest track, “Canción Protestante,” whose title can mean “protest song” or “Protestant song.”
But Carranza, an alum of the Franciscan University of Steubenville now based in Sinaloa, Mexico, puts questions about how to live a holy life at the center of his music, delivering lines such as “If you prefer the condom and the pill, don’t ask the Lord to give us many priests.” The song Carranza said, came in part from watching Catholic teens perform dances at major events that he viewed as “heretical” and “provocative.”
Religion News Service talked to Carranza recently about his album, Lamar and what he means by “Santurrón.” This interview is edited for length and clarity.
What makes “Santurrón” different from other Jésed albums?
I’m being very explicit about our intentions. What I had to come to terms with is that concept album-making is a very American thing to do.
I am a huge Kendrick Lamar student. He is not explicit about his intentions, and you have to sit down and put the pieces together of what this album means. His first album, “Good kid, m.A.A.d city,” is a little bit more explicit because it’s called a short film. “To Pimp a Butterfly” is a poem. “DAMN.” is this time-traveling story. “Mr. Morale & the Big Steppers” is a morality play. He’s telling you his own story of therapeutical processes and how he struggles with sin.
Kendrick Lamar is one of the most Christian artists today. (I ask myself) how do they get away with it? And then I remembered something a teacher of mine said at Franciscan, “If you admire what secular musicians are doing, you should feel ashamed that you, having the power of the Holy Spirit on your side, are not doing things on that level.”
I’m no longer trying to hope that people will get that this is a conceptual album. I’m actually poking people. It’s a tap on the head, that’s a “sape” (in Spanish). I’m (tapping) people like, “Hey, listen to the stuff we do.”
The Jésed group in 2015. (Courtesy photo)
What inspired you to write “Canción Protestante,” a track with some pretty hard-hitting lines about issues in the church, including those who criticize the pope?
The song started to take shape during the pandemic. People didn’t get the point of the pandemic at all, spiritually speaking. We couldn’t go to Mass. We couldn’t have the Eucharist. What is God trying to tell us? “What is your actual relationship with me? Are you coming to Mass just to be here? Because that’s not what I want. What if I took that away from you, what would you do?”
You know what we did? We did online retreats, and we did Zoom Masses, and we did Zoom this and Zoom that. Instead of going through a caterpillar transformation, what I saw was hibernation. I kind of prophesied to my wife. I fear the day we go back to normal things because people are just going to go insane on the things they didn’t do during the pandemic because that’s Catholicism today. What group are you part of? What’s your ideology on this?
Within the Catholic Church in America, people do Communion in the hand. That’s the norm. It’s standard procedure. But in Latin America, it’s not as common. And the bishops were ordering people to receive Communion in the hand. So you had people calling bishops heretics and calling bishops demons. And it was so easy to condemn the pope through your screen, through your cellphone.
How is “Canción Protestante” received live?
I’ve never done the song live, but I’m planning to soon at an event we’re gonna have in October in front of like 40,000 kids. When I pull that one out I’m gonna be like, I know some of y’all are here to sell drugs. I know some of y’all are here being groomed by the cartels. If you believe that coming here makes up for that bad stuff, you’re still going to hell, my friend, there’s no sugarcoating it.
No amount of events, no amount of World Youth days, no amount of jubilees will make up for not giving away your sin and putting it in front of the Lord. Nothing makes up for a life that is not lived in sanctity, which is the point of the album. Holiness is not something we get when we go to heaven. It’s the way we get to heaven.
What is the main takeaway you want Catholics to take from the album?
Overall, there’s this message in the whole album, which is how unaccustomed we are to mercy. I think that’s the undertone. Mercy is a two-way interaction every single time, especially when it comes to God. It’s the only time we only receive mercy. We can’t give him mercy, but it’s within each other with ourselves. How little mercy we give to ourselves.
The original lyrics for “La Fiesta del Amor” (“The Feast of Love”) were “La Fiesta de los Pecadores” (“The Feast of the Sinners”). I had to scrap it, because it’s too on the nose, and too open to misinterpretation, but the spirit is there and a lot of the songs have to do with really encountering mercy.
I believe that’s because of where I am in my life now. We’re six years into our marriage. Our third kid is coming up, and we are vehicles of mercy all the time. Sometimes our kids are being rowdy, and they’re being kids, but they’re disrupting your life — you have to be merciful. And then you got in the way of your spouse, so now you have to be merciful and receive mercy from your spouse.
And then you do something that you shouldn’t have done with your kids, and now you have to ask them for mercy. Have you ever asked a 3-year-old for mercy? It’s beautiful. It’s eye-opening how quick they are to forgive.
Holiness in a way is deeply related to mercy. I see holiness as the absolute understanding that we are created and set apart for whatever God’s purpose is for us. The meaning of the word holiness, its roots, is sanctity and sanctus, which is set apart.
How have people received the album and what do people think of the name “Santurrón,” which can mean “sanctimonious” or “religious freak”?
I’m blown away. It’s our most streamed release in its first month. A lot of people pushed back on the name. They were, like, why? I was, like, because it’s a joke. “Santurrón” is not about how I perceive myself. It’s about how other people perceive sanctity. It’s like a slap back to people who insult you. If they say that I’m a santurrón, I’m gonna say that they’re right, because what they have to offer doesn’t compare to what I have. So if they think that calling me normal is what I want, they’re wrong.
