This is a set of songs exploring how someone might go from being a confused young person to the kind of person willing to kill themselves to further a cause.

The music is my usual experimetal, except with alot more themes and melodic ideas that are meant to evoke middle eastern and modern christian music. The title of the suite itself is lifted from Rick Warren’s book, as that book is designed to make a similar change in someone. Yes, it has a different end in mind, but only slightly different as you’ll see in this post.

Purpose Driven I – Build Up The Pillars:

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All journeys must start at the beginning, and the start of the journey of a terrorist is a place where the person is not a terrorist. Usually they are confused about there place in the world, as is the typical teenage angst. All it takes is someone to come along and show them some love and compassion. Take them from their confused state and show them that there is a way to live that makes sense of their confusion. This is the typical recruiting tactic of most religions and causes, no matter what their ultimate aims.

This is obviously basing its language around that of Islam, but many religions start with emphasising the positive, loving, “In faith and peace” aspects before moving on to the need to be separate and different from the “infidels”.

Purpose Driven II – Change That We Can Believe In:

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The middle section is the taking of the new recruit, after they have accepted and internalised the main ideas of the cause, and showing them how those core ideas should lead to them taking action. Typically this is through the charisma and oration of an influential leader, or at least one who is wanting to become an influential leader.

The lyrics are a little different, as all the lines of the verse except the last are sourced from the speeches of Barack Obama. This is due to the fact that he uses alot of the same types of propagandistic psychology to get people on his side as many cult leaders, dictators and the like. The last line is quoted from Osama bin Laden to show this similarity of inspirational language.

Purpose Driven III – Through My Works:

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This is where the rubber hits the road and the cause is revealed, and by now the recruit is so caught up in the movement that they’re willing to do whatever is called for. They see it as their duty, something that they have to do, their cause and destiny.

At this point all the love, the preaching, the basic brainwashing has turned a confused youngster into a weapon to be used by the leader to fulfill their aims. Some leaders like Osama want to use them as a literal weapon and destroy his enemies and oppressors, some like Obama want to use them as a political weapon to gain power through democracy, some like Rick Warren want to use them as a spiritual weapon to evangelise the world.

At the end of the day they are all variations on a theme, and all are dangerous because of the lack of critical thinking shown by the initiate. The unfortunate thing is that everyone involved, expect possibly the leaders, is just deluded and thinks they are doing the right thing and that their cause is just and true.