The Fredösphere

Who is this Van Morrison?  I've owned and loved the Avalon Sunset CD for years, but I would never have found it on my own; an old friend got me hooked on it.  Morrison mumbles his way through his songs in a way I normally dislike; a further strike against him is his habit of dropping the occasional grand philosophical statement into his conventional pop lyrics.

Right now I'm listening to Daring Night.  The chorus reads like a not terribly inspired top-40 song:

In the daring night when all the
Stars are shining bright
Squeeze me don't leave me
In the daring night

but suddenly, in the second time through the chorus, he adds:

In the firmament we move, we move and we live
And we have our being
Squeeze me don't leave, leave me in the daring night

He gives us mangled quotes from the King James Bible!  Bizarre. 

A couple of other songs on the album are overt worship songs, like "Whenever God Shines His Light" or "When Will I Ever Learn to Live in God", the latter which informs us:

You brought it to my attention everything that was made in God
Down through centuries of great writings and paintings
Everything lives in God
Seen through architecture of great cathedrals
Down through the history of time
Is and was in the beginning and evermore shall be

The vibe has become almost liturgical.  And yet, besides the cathedrals, Morrison appreciates other, uh, conduits of the beatific vision -- from the song "Coney Island":

Coming Down from Downpatrick
Stopping of at St. John's Point
Out all day birdwatching
And the crack was good

These juxtapositions are violent:  the bluesy delivery, the pop music conventions, the high-falutin' ideas that should sound hopelessly silly and pretentious, but instead break in like rays of light.  The whole album has an endearingly improvised quality; as he approaches the coda of Daring Nights, Morrison directs the band to switch to the closing chord vamp with an urgent murmur, "one, four.  One, four!"

How does he pull it off?  What's going on with his spirituality, which seems almost orthodox, but jarringly not quite?  I want to know.  These songs only hint at the answers.