ROCK OF SAGES SERIES: "Paint It Black" The Rolling Stones (#1)
GOLD IN THE GREATEST SONGS
The scent of fresh-cut grass, charcoal smoke drifting from nearby grills, and the rhythmic whap of a frisbee hitting open palms—these are the visceral memories of summer in Oshkosh, Wisconsin. We’d gather near the breeze-blown shores of Lake Winnebago at Menominee Park, flip hacky sacks and frisbees barefoot in the warm dusk, and let the boombox blast our shared life-anthems: classic rock and roll from WAPL, affectionately known as “the Rockin’ Apple.” It was more than music—it was a worldview, a weather system we lived under. And though we didn’t know it then, those anthems carried truths raw and real enough to shake a soul awake.
As I navigate the complex landscape of aging, I find myself in a surprising re-evaluation. While I readily acknowledge that much of the era’s content strained or splintered a healthy perspective, I’m also rediscovering a raw honesty and profound insight in some rock classics that, if probed more deeply, might well transform the way we think, believe, and relate.
This article begins a series of such unearthed gems. We start with none other than The Rolling Stones’ "Paint It Black," a song that plunges into the depths of despair only to reveal a deeper truth about the temptation—and the redemption—of the blackened heart.
The Sound of Despair: A Generation Stripped Bare
To understand "Paint It Black," one must enter the soul of the mid-1960s—a cultural moment riven with unrest, searching, and disillusionment. While The Beatles offered a polished optimism, The Rolling Stones became the blues-infused prophets of darker terrain. They didn’t just entertain; they testified.
Released in 1966, "Paint It Black" arrived as the Vietnam War escalated and the counterculture’s innocence began to fray. The sitar’s eerie drone, played by Brian Jones, lent an exotic unease. Mick Jagger’s voice shed its swagger, revealing instead something wounded. Keith Richards’ guitar, Charlie Watts’ drumming, and Bill Wyman’s bass enveloped the listener in a relentless pulse—a soundtrack for a soul in torment.
This wasn’t merely a song; it was a lament. It stripped away societal pleasantries and exposed a chilling vulnerability: not just sadness, but spiritual nausea.
The Despair That Demands a Darkened World
From its opening riff, "Paint It Black" immerses the listener in grief so profound it rejects even the memory of light. "I see a red door and I want it painted black." Red—life, passion, hope—is unbearable to the narrator. The demand to paint it black is not metaphorical. It is existential.
This is not merely a depiction of grief. It is grief weaponized. The world must mirror the internal void. It is a tantrum of despair, a radical rejection of meaning. "I look inside myself and see my heart is black," he confesses, and the refrain intensifies: "I wanna see it painted, painted black. Black as night. Black as coal."
This is more than mourning. It is the decision to turn away from all color, all joy, all transcendence. It is the moment when suffering is not simply endured but chosen, perpetuated, enforced. A desire for the entire cosmos to validate one’s personal darkness.
When Pain Becomes Identity
Herein lies the song’s great insight—its genius and its warning. "Paint It Black" names the primal temptation in suffering: not merely to grieve, but to remake the world in the image of our sorrow. It is the spiritual equivalent of drawing the blinds and rejecting light, not for healing, but for permanence.
This human impulse—to collapse external reality into internal despair—is mirrored in ancient spiritual wisdom. Buddhist detachment, Stoic endurance, and modern psychology all acknowledge the pull toward distortion when pain overwhelms. Yet Christian theology pierces deeper still. Christ enters this temptation. In Gethsemane, He tastes it. On the Cross, He takes it. But unlike us, He does not submit to it. He transfigures it.
He doesn’t paint over the blackness—He redeems it from within. He transforms death by dying, and grief by entering its pit. And in doing so, He offers not a denial of suffering, but an invitation through it—into resurrection.
The Modern World: Painting in Shades of Grievance
This temptation to "paint it black" reverberates today in countless ways. We see it in political polarization, where disagreement becomes demonization. We see it in the cultural reflex to cancel, to label, to reduce others to their worst moments. This isn’t ideological strategy—it’s a manifestation of wounded souls unable to bear complexity.
Consider the darker edges of modern activism. While legitimate grievances cry out for justice, there is an increasing tendency—especially in some "woke" circles—to absolutize grievance, to define the self entirely by harm. History is not to be learned from but perpetually relitigated. The past becomes an eternal tribunal.
Social psychologist Jonathan Haidt calls this the rise of "victimhood culture," where individuals are conditioned to seek out microaggressions, to amplify offense, and to demand societal conformity to individual pain. It is the cultural equivalent of "painting it black." In such a framework, forgiveness is betrayal. Nuance is compromise. Color is complicity.
Beyond the Black Door: Christ and the Promise of Transformation
But Christ offers a different way. He doesn’t whitewash despair; He washes wounds. The invitation is not to pretend, but to behold. To bring our real pain to a real Savior who bleeds and breathes with us.
Dr. Bob Schuchts, Catholic therapist and founder of the John Paul II Healing Center, reminds us that suffering can be redemptive when united to Christ. In Real Suffering, he writes of the different forms of pain—physical, emotional, spiritual—and how Christ’s Passion is not a detour but the map. Forgiveness, he says, is not forgetting. It is freedom.
Forgiveness is not weakness—it is defiance. It is the refusal to let bitterness rule. The Mayo Clinic and APA affirm what Scripture proclaims: that forgiveness heals not just the spirit, but the body. It restores.
History offers incandescent witnesses. Immaculée Ilibagiza, who forgave her family’s murderers after the Rwandan genocide. St. Josephine Bakhita, who endured slavery and torture and still thanked her captors, for through their cruelty, she met Christ. Viktor Frankl, who taught us that between stimulus and response lies a space—and in that space, our freedom.
This is not saccharine optimism. This is a war cry. The Enemy wants us to stay in blackness. To rehearse our grievances, to fixate on flawed messengers of grace, to cancel the Church because of its broken members. But Christ speaks a better word. He did not come for the whitewashed. He came for the wounded. And He turns victims into victors.
From Lament to Liberation
This is the true miracle: not that we can avoid blackness, but that we are not alone in it. And more, that we are not meant to stay there. "Paint It Black" describes the cliff’s edge. Christ shows us how to step back. He doesn’t hand us a brush—He offers resurrection.
The scars remain, but they shine. They are no longer symbols of despair but of dignity. Christ doesn’t just repaint our lives. He remakes them. He restores the red door.
Indeed, countless rock icons have found this to be true. Van Morrison’s spiritual seeking, Bob Dylan’s born-again years, Alice Cooper’s journey from addiction to faith, Lou Gramm’s transformation, Dave Mustaine’s redemption. They remind us: even in the world’s most dissonant songs, there is a deeper harmony longing to be heard.
And perhaps that is the final note: "Paint It Black" is not a destination. It is a cry. A longing. And the answer is not in denial, or rage, or resignation. The answer is in a Love that steps into our night and sings until we see again.
The dark is not the end. It is not the final word. And we are not alone before it.
“The light shines in the darkness, and the darkness has not overcome it.” (John 1:5)
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Greg Schlueter is an author, speaker, and movement leader passionate about restoring faith, family, and culture. In addition to directing communication and marketing for the Institute of American Constitutional Thought and Leadership, he leads Image Trinity (ILoveMyFamily.us), a dynamic marriage and family movement, and offers thought-provoking commentary on his blog, GregorianRant.us. He hosts the popular radio program and podcast IGNITE Radio Live alongside his wife, fostering meaningful conversations that inspire transformation. They are blessed with seven children (one in heaven) and a growing number of grandchildren. Recent books: The Magnificent Piglets of Pigletsville, Twelve Roses, and Slaying Giants (SlayingGiants.us).
HELP US SLAY GIANTS at SlayingGiants.us, with a forward by Fr. John Riccardo—a story being called "Captivating," "Beautiful," "Powerful."
I so love this commentary. Paint it Black is a song that has always haunted me as to its meaning. It is so dark (no pun intended) but so compelling. So catchy. As you have articulated, it is the cry of the wounded soul. A sad attempt to remake the world in one's own grief.