As the world caught wind of the new Taylor Swift album The Tortured Poets Department (TTPD), many adherents of the Catholic Church have been arguing for and against it.
The conversation was all over social media, but an opinion piece on the website Catholic365 caught some attention.
An article written on Tuesday (Apr. 23) by a man with the alias "The Catholic Philadelphian" claimed that, based on her most recent materials, Swift was allegedly promoting satanic influences.
"Like many artists in today's music industry, she has fallen prey to the influence of Satan," the writer claimed. "If someone were to scold her in front of her fans, the Swifties [common term for Swift's fans] would gang up on the person or people like banshees. Her latest album has recently been released after 18 months and a long World Eras tour. It is safe to say that Swift has gone too far with her music. It is even deemed anti-God."
The author then cited some examples from some of her songs in TTPD, such as "I Can Fix Him (No, Really I Can)," "But Daddy, I Love Him," "The Alchemy," "Guilty as Sin," and "The Smallest Man Who Ever Lived."
"The lyrics show that she at one point was betrayed by those who claim to be Christian, yet those self-righteous people have caused her pain," he added. "However, God should never be mocked."
Several Catholics on social media have pitched into the conversation regarding the article, garnering multiple viewpoints.
There were some who outrightly dismissed Swift and her music.
"[She] and her entire discography is trash (with a few exceptions)," one user wrote. "I really don't know why people are obsessed with her generic music. I really tried to listen one time, but her tracks sound like wet cardboard."
"Obviously. It's torture to listen to her music," said another.
"I can't stand her music," a third added. "Her melodies are basic, her voice is average, she has little vocal range, and the fact she's been with dozens of men and they all end up in her songs makes her a harlot just so she has content."
There were also those who had reservations but did not consider Swift's influence satanic.
"[To be honest,] her new album is cringe af, and all the songs [sound] the same, and she is not a tortured poet, she hasn't struggled, she's a pampered celebrity surrounded by yes men," another said. "But while the lyrics are undoubtedly tasteless and moronic, I don't think they're anti-God."
"I took one for the team and listened to this the day it came out, as my daughters are big fans of her 1989 type stuff," the user added. "She's definitely a trashy sellout, but these relics aren't explicitly anti-God. She hasn't gone that far yet."
"TTPD is just her giving up with providing fresh content because she thinks her fans [are] stupid enough to eat up an album that has at least five songs sampled from her past releases and a couple more that have word salad as lyrics." a disappointed Swiftie honestly chimed in. "And if you really want to listen to her songs so badly, her [pre-TTPD material is] much better."
Resonating with Swift's Artistic Process
Meanwhile, two Catholic Swifties were exclusively interviewed by HNGN, on the condition of anonymity, about some of the criticism from the Catholic ranks.
Both of them practice the faith and even attend Traditional Latin Mass, the religious service the Catholic Church has been practicing before the Second Vatican Council.
One of the Swifties interviewed is a female convert to Catholicism who recognized that there were conversations about what some call "sacrilegious themes" in some of Swift's newer material, which could be traced back to the album Folklore.
"For me, all secular music is headed in this direction," she said. "The Church teaches that if you engage in something that leads you to sin, don't push through with it. Now, the question in this is, does TS's music lead you to think sinfully or act sinfully?"
"As much as I agree that [Swift] has become bolder in her expressions, it is just what they are: expressions of her grief and how her personal life has been in a constant stream of emptiness despite having everything," she added. "She does not have any outlet for that except her music. Because making music is what she does best."
The female Swiftie also thought the pop star was not "proselytizing through her craft."
"It's just that people build their fanbases dedicated to her, and they could be very dedicated," she explained.
She also stressed that Swift has since been selective about what details of her life she would divulge to the public and how she would like to do so.
Regarding the lack of discernment by some Catholics about a person's life and the importance of applying psychology in their critiques, the female Swiftie claimed that many people who adhere to a religion "just take too much of a sanctimonious position about secular things."
"Well of course they might reason out that music is part of culture that shapes one's understanding of the world, faith even," she explained. "However, to be too particular about things to the point of picking out on certain modes of artistic expression and then condemning them is just unfair."
She concluded that as an artist herself, she understood Swift's creative process as much as she was also able to create literary and artistic works whenever she was overcome with sadness and grief.
"There are just lots of Catholic bloggers that take things to the extreme," she said. "Remember, artists and creatives see the world differently.... I relate with Taylor so much because we somehow share the same tendencies in terms of art because I've been engaging in creating literary works for a long time now."
Swiftie Stresses the Importance of Listening to Music at 'Face Value'
A second Swiftie, a man in his early 30s, interviewed by HNGN, dismissed the Catholic365 article entirely, saying that he was solely focused on the music and not on analyzing the lyrics or any other distantly related context.
"I listened to the lyrics itself," he said. "She was in a catharsis."
The male Swiftie also recognized Swift's affiliation with the Democratic Party, but when asked about how the criticisms were connected to her fame and influence, he admitted so.
"She has expressed her disappointments with them in some of her records, and this is a pattern with every single popular artist." he explained.
When asked about what made Swift different from her contemporaries in the music industry, he pointed out her "honesty and how she delivered it."
"She expressed it in her records and the fans and public are the ones who decode them," he added. "She came to the era of 'authenticity and reliability,' where people are now looking for someone who is real with the advent of social media."
"And the mere fact that she is generous to her fans and literally scrolls their social media posts, she is doing what Madonna was doing," he added, admitting that he was also a fan of the 80s and 90s pop icon.
As for conservatives who criticize Swift, the male fan thinks they were "missing the point."
"Sometimes, you need to be loose," he explained. "Just enjoy the records [at] face value. People did that and they became Swifties, especially when she puts out her re-recordings, [in order] to allow new people to immerse themselves in her entire catalog."
He was also optimistic about the mixed reviews the new Swift album garnered, saying that people would eventually understand her artistic process, citing the criticism she received for the albums Reputation and the first version of 1989.
"Some records are not really received well on their initial release, yet in time, it will get a cult following, and retrospective reviews will come years later," he explained, citing Madonna's Erotica, Lady Gaga's ARTPOP, and Britney Spears's Blackout and Britney as examples.
"These records are now hailed as classics, and [have already been included or inducted] into the Library of Congress and the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame, in the case of Erotica and Blackout."
