On the Outside Looking In – Should They Bother?
I hope it's all right that I'm posting this so soon after Chris's post. I thought that ideally we might have a small handful of topics that we can discuss at the same time here, rather than the standard blog procedure of moving to the newest post right away. Let me know if you guys wanted a different format than that.
The recent news of Anne Rice’s return to her Catholic faith and declaration that from now on, she would be “writing for the Lord” has inspired a lot of commotion in the secular world, especially amongst her fans who know her best for her Vampire Chronicles and Beauty erotica series. She’s faced some pretty harsh criticism both for her work and her decision, at least on vampire forums and Amazon.com. I haven’t yet heard the reaction from the Church, but to be honest, given recent history, I’m not optimistic.
Anne Rice is hardly the first Big Name Artist to kneel at the foot of the Cross. I’m reminded of artists such as Bob Dylan, who (at least, according to my trucker friend Frank) was shunned by the Church for the “worldly” songs he continued to play in addition to the songs he performed that praised his Lord, artists like Bono who express faith but don’t seem to have much to do with the Church one way or another (he seems a little too busy actually doing works), artists like Moby who express faith in Christ but reject the Church, and artists like Evanescence who can’t seem to decide whether or not they’re Christians in the first place. Yet even Church favorites like Keith Green butted heads with and was burned by representatives of the Church. Stories of such artists as Mel Gibson, who has been embraced by the Church even despite his denominational differences with much of it (and the gritty – dare I say “worldly” – content of his post-“Passion of the Christ” works), seem rare to me.
My question, then, is in regards to these artists who have become famous outside of the Church, but now intend to serve God with their art. How should we approach them? How should we approach their works?
I laud Anne Rice’s declaration; I’m very pleased, as a brother in Christ, that she has come to the conclusion that she has been reunited with her Creator and Savior. Yet even as glad as I am about this, based upon what I’ve read about her new book, Christ the Lord: Out of Egypt, I must admit to being a little nervous. She has been quoted as saying that while she focused primarily upon the Gospels for information about her story of the seven year-old Jesus, she has also drawn upon Apocryphal material (such as the story of young Jesus killing another child and then raising him from the dead) and has made a few mistakes (referring to the House of David as the “Tribe of David”, for example).
Does intention trump quality? Does artistic ability matter more than theological accuracy? How should we regard the celebrity who is respected as an artist, and yet is a Christian in their spiritual infancy? I have watched with some trepidation as many in the Church have encouraged celebrities such as Stephen Baldwin even as he has made flippant remarks about his willingness to do sex scenes in movies. At the same time, I have been angered recently by Christians who have shown more hurtful judgementalism toward those outside their cliques than most non-believers would dream of doing. It is, I think, inevitable that the Church would contain members who will display hurtful behavior; no grouping of humans is without their bad apples, and an organization like that of the Body of Christ, composed as it is of rejects, the broken and the hopeless, cannot hope to escape lapses of personal discernment. But Jesus’s call seems so clear that I don’t think it unreasonable to expect better. We should be better.
What are your thoughts, family of Christ?
The recent news of Anne Rice’s return to her Catholic faith and declaration that from now on, she would be “writing for the Lord” has inspired a lot of commotion in the secular world, especially amongst her fans who know her best for her Vampire Chronicles and Beauty erotica series. She’s faced some pretty harsh criticism both for her work and her decision, at least on vampire forums and Amazon.com. I haven’t yet heard the reaction from the Church, but to be honest, given recent history, I’m not optimistic.
Anne Rice is hardly the first Big Name Artist to kneel at the foot of the Cross. I’m reminded of artists such as Bob Dylan, who (at least, according to my trucker friend Frank) was shunned by the Church for the “worldly” songs he continued to play in addition to the songs he performed that praised his Lord, artists like Bono who express faith but don’t seem to have much to do with the Church one way or another (he seems a little too busy actually doing works), artists like Moby who express faith in Christ but reject the Church, and artists like Evanescence who can’t seem to decide whether or not they’re Christians in the first place. Yet even Church favorites like Keith Green butted heads with and was burned by representatives of the Church. Stories of such artists as Mel Gibson, who has been embraced by the Church even despite his denominational differences with much of it (and the gritty – dare I say “worldly” – content of his post-“Passion of the Christ” works), seem rare to me.
My question, then, is in regards to these artists who have become famous outside of the Church, but now intend to serve God with their art. How should we approach them? How should we approach their works?
I laud Anne Rice’s declaration; I’m very pleased, as a brother in Christ, that she has come to the conclusion that she has been reunited with her Creator and Savior. Yet even as glad as I am about this, based upon what I’ve read about her new book, Christ the Lord: Out of Egypt, I must admit to being a little nervous. She has been quoted as saying that while she focused primarily upon the Gospels for information about her story of the seven year-old Jesus, she has also drawn upon Apocryphal material (such as the story of young Jesus killing another child and then raising him from the dead) and has made a few mistakes (referring to the House of David as the “Tribe of David”, for example).
Does intention trump quality? Does artistic ability matter more than theological accuracy? How should we regard the celebrity who is respected as an artist, and yet is a Christian in their spiritual infancy? I have watched with some trepidation as many in the Church have encouraged celebrities such as Stephen Baldwin even as he has made flippant remarks about his willingness to do sex scenes in movies. At the same time, I have been angered recently by Christians who have shown more hurtful judgementalism toward those outside their cliques than most non-believers would dream of doing. It is, I think, inevitable that the Church would contain members who will display hurtful behavior; no grouping of humans is without their bad apples, and an organization like that of the Body of Christ, composed as it is of rejects, the broken and the hopeless, cannot hope to escape lapses of personal discernment. But Jesus’s call seems so clear that I don’t think it unreasonable to expect better. We should be better.
What are your thoughts, family of Christ?
posted by | 3:07 PM
3 Comments:
Its an interesting question, Devin - and obviously doesn't have any easy answers. I'll bet Dan could give some insight based on what the early church went though, both with the Judaizers, and - maybe more along the lines of what you're discussing - with the conversion of the Roman Emperor, Constantine. Talk about a celebrity!
I've been well-read on this subject since about... yesterday. I must admit you've sparked an interest in me. I don't know much, but I'll enjoy learning along with the rest of you, as well as sharing my thoughts and the little bits I do know, or discover along the way.
I don't know to what degree this has to do with the question at hand, but of course, Constantine played a significant role in church history, despite being relatively unversed in theological matters. He's often erroneously charged by those who don't know any better as being the one responsible for "creating the Bible as we know it" and "turning Christianity into the religion we have now," but documentation by eyewitnesses shows that he was aware of his shortcomings in theology, and he used his secular influence to provide a forum for church leaders to discuss the problem of Arianism and the urge to come to a peaceable agreement on the subject. He didn't understand the implications of Arianism and what really made it so dangerously different from Biblical Christian theology, but he knew that the arguments it was sparking were causing riots. As a secular leader, he wanted peace in his Empire; as a Christian, he wanted unity in the Church.
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