Philosopher Roger Scruton reflects on Art, Beauty,and Judgment:
Art is being privatized, with each of us striving to remain faithful to visions of beauty that we are no longer confident of sharing outside the circle of our friends. One cause of this is the democratic culture, which is hostile to judgment in any form, and in particular to the judgment of taste. The prevailing attitude is that you are entitled to your tastes, but not entitled to inflict them on me.
Tom Gilson thinks Scruton is helpful in explaining why bad art gets good treatment.
Andy at Think Christian points to a Touchstone Magazine article about why evangelical authors aren't writing books of lasting literary value and what they can learn from Flannery O'Connor.
Joseph Torres at Kingdomview highlights the intro to an article by Dawn Xiana Moon:
We have become irrelevant. Many contemporary Christians tend to make one of three errors when dealing with art: One, we declare anything that doesn’t explicitly proselytize, anything that depicts brokenness without redemption to be depraved or unworthy of Christian notice. Or two, we decide that the secular world really does have better art, so we copy it, boldly and without apology or thought into our own creativity. Or three, we try so hard to be relevant that we adopt the attitude and worldview of the culture that surrounds us—instead of being the proverbial salt and light, we end up as dust with nothing to offer in the way of hope, because there is only a perfunctory difference between those of us who claim to follow Christ and those who don’t.
Technorati Tags: Christianity art beauty aesthetics writing literature Roger Scruton Flannery O'Connor
CT's LaTonya Taylor reviews The Gospel According to the Beatles (an excerpt from which can be read here) and Infuze Magazine's Matt Conner talks with its author, Steve Turner, about the book and Christian artists (HT: Rick Pearcey at his and wife Nancy's new blog).
Some noteworthy quotes from the interview:
Too often Christians know the Christian view on the Bible and prayer - in other words, on the overtly religious - but not on the things that take up our everyday lives. I think that has happened because Christians haven't been encouraged to think Christianly. They think Christianly about worship on Sundays but switch to a normal, secular frequency during the rest of the week.
American "Christian" TV is a huge enemy of this worldview thinking, and possibly a huge enemy of Christianity. The CCM industry also stifles it by creating a genre of music where it's possible for Christians to sing to Christians about Christian things in a Christian language. We have just developed a very narrow idea of what "Christian" is. I saw an entry in a directory for Christian artists where someone had advertised themselves as writing "poetry both Christian and non Christian." I think he meant poetry that was specifically religious and poetry that was about everday life but he had unconsciously betrayed the fact that, when he wrote asbout ordinary events in his life, he thought of these things as somehow outside his experience as a Christian. As though God is not interested in us walking, eating, fishing, playing ball, shopping, etc.
Hank Rookmaaker the Dutch art historian used to say, "Christ didn't die in order that we could go to more prayer meetings." People would gasp at this. Then he would add, "Christ died to make us fully human." That's right. He didn't die to make us religious, but to make us human. In our fallen state, we lack the completeness of our humanity. The monastic tradition makes the mistake of thinking that God is best pleased with us when we cut ourselves off from the world, deny ourselves pleasure, refrain from marriage and devote ourselves totally to religious activities. This almost assumes that God made a mistake in putting us in a world of pleasure, culture, art, nature, work, companionship, etc. Fundamentalists would hate to be compared with medieval monks but, in many ways, they suffer from the same split.
Turner is also the author of Imagine: A Vision for Christians in the Arts, which I've read and highly recommend ton anyone interested in exploring the relationship between Christianity and creativity.
For a satirical look at items like this divine door knocker (I wonder, can I get that in a Revelation 3:20, instead?), check out kinda kitschy,
a blog whose tagline reads: "The world is laughing at us. So am I."
Speaking of kitsch, Quentin Schultze made the following observation about its use in worship in By Faith magazine (HT: Phil Ryken):
Young people witness some of the cheesy video and computer 'art' in worship and see it for what it is: kitsch. Stock clip art. Old-fashioned, 19th-century background images under song text: the sun shining on the cross, running streams, baby faces--all of the stereotypical images that say, 'Christians are crummy artists and naive sentimentalists.' To them, such kitsch is like handing out illustrated kids' Bibles to high school students and telling them that these images represent the depth of insight and excellence of the Christian faith.
Prompted by an inquiry from a friend, Jeff at The Dawn Treader has posted a helpful list of recommendations and resources for parents wishing to instill the ability to think "worldviewishly" about films in their children and teens. In addition to the fine books he mentions, I'd add another title - Hollywood Worldviews: Watching Films with Wisdom & Discernment by Brian Godawa.
Though it doesn't target parents specifically, this book would certainly benefit any adult wanting to engage young people in intelligent, faith-informed conversation about movies and their meanings. Godawa is an experienced screenwriter who combines his inside knowledge of the industry with his knowledge of Christian theology, philosophy, and apologetics resulting in an informative guide that not only helps readers learn how to think Christianly about films but also to understand a film's underlying structure (e.g., theme, hero, hero's goal, the adversary, character flaw, final confrontation, resolution). Godawa posits that the essence of storytelling in movies is about redemption.
A movie takes a hero with an inner flaw, who desires something and has a plan to get it. But he is blocked by an adversary until he almost fails but finally finds a solution. This process of goal, flaw, failure, and self-revelation is the process of paradigm change or conversion in an individual.
Movies, therefore, offer diagnoses about what ails us as well as prescriptions for setting it right. They are, in that respect, "incarnate sermons." Cinematic storytellers are, says Godawa,
...engaging in their craft with an intent to communicate their view of the world and we ought to live in it. They have discovered the power of a well-told story combined with a well-thought-out philosophy that is creatively embodied in the story through character, plot and image. In the same way that worldviews involve a network of individual ideas that are interconnected to serve a greater philosophical interpretation of our experience, so movies are a network of events, images and themes that serve a unified way of interpreting our experience through the effective means of drama.
In an early chapter on the nature of stories and mythology, Godawa claims that Christianity alone provides justification for as well as makes sense of storytelling. "...the biblical notion of linear history, with an author, characters and a purposeful goal, was the philosophical foundation for the search for meaning in a narrative of life. Storytelling is meaningless gibberish unless reality itself is narratable."
The book is divided into three parts. The first, consisting of two chapters, "Stories & Mythology" and "Redemption," is called Storytelling in the Movies. Part Two is called Worldviews in the Movies and includes chapters on existentialism, postmodernism, and other worldviews. In each case, Godawa offers ample illustrations from well-known films. Part Three is called "Spirituality in the Movies" with chapters on "Christianity," "Angels & Demons, Heaven & Hell," and "Faith." Each chapter concludes with discussion questions and sidebars refer readers to related web resources (most often Godawa's site) and books (including James Sire's The Universe Next Door, which Jeff highly recommends in his post). An appendix deals with the issues of sex, violence, and profanity in the Bible and asks whether there is ever any Christian justification for the dramatic portrayal of evil.
I seriously doubt this one will be turned into a movie so don't wait for it. Read the book!
Related posts:
A Call for Artist-Apostles: More on Faith and Film
Using Films to Rattle Cages: Movies and Apologetics
A few weeks ago Dick Staub hit some nerves when he predicted that "Facing the Giants," the Christian film that gained notoriety for its PG rating, would be "another artistic embarrassment in the name of Jesus." Today he gives further explanation for his criticism and asks a series of thought-provoking questions in response to a reader who took offense at his previous post:
I have no doubt that "Facing the Giants" will make a ton of money, but since when is that American materialistic standard our standard? As for emotional reactions? I'’ve been "moved to tears" by art my kids brought home as children, but I did not expect it should be mounted at the local art museum. If we want to glorify God, why should we champion movies with good storylines that make people cry, but are created with inadequate, uncompetitive budgets and substandard acting? If this film DOES make tons of money, Hollywood may distribute more of them. Do we really want to send the message to Hollywood that the kind of films Christians want will be characterized by poor acting, low production values that are inoffensive, make us cry and also make tons of money? Is this truly how we want to influence Hollywood for God?
When asked in an interview with Relevant Magazine what area of Christian media most concerns him, radio personality and author Dick Staub replied:
C.S. Lewis said, we don't need more Christian writers; we need more Christians who can write. Lewis and Tolkien wrote 50 years ago and are still influential today because their work had spiritual, intellectual and creative ballast. They would not have imagined operating in the kind of parallel universe that Christian media has become. They were mainstreamed. Last year alone their works sold in the millions.
At the risk of sounding uncharitable—50 years from now, how many copies of Left Behind and the Purpose Driven Life will be sold? Our popular culture is impoverished and the "Christian media culture" is satisfied to make money by serving crumbs off the table of that fallen culture, often dumbing down our faith in the process. Until we experience a spiritual, intellectual and creative renaissance, both culture and the parallel universe of Christian media will serve thin gruel, entertaining ourselves to death. I'm concerned about the whole Christian media enterprise.
Another of my favorite quotes from the interview: "Hans Rookmaaker said Jesus didn't come to make us Christian, Jesus came to make us 'fully human.' Those who are fully human have no appetite for the crap pumped out in culture and the Christian subculture."
The entire exchange is relatively brief and well worth reading.
Believers interested in pursuing careers in film production would do well to heed Barbara Nicolosi's counsel in a commentary recently published in Christianity Today called "Escaping the Creative Ghetto" (HT: Think Christian). Here are some points that stood out to me:
It's not that Christians aren't making stabs at moviemaking and television production. It's that most of these efforts come to naught because our fears and misconceptions have us standing on the sidelines, cursing and boycotting and begging for favors from the pagans who have paid their dues and have the power to green-light stories for the screen.
The whole church needs to brood over what it means to be the Patron of the Arts in a post-Christian setting. We need to wrangle over how best to nurture our young artists and media professionals, and how to maximize the influence of those Christians with talent and charisma. But first of all, we need to figure out what success in Hollywood will look like for the Christian community. What does a Christian worldview mean in entertainment, and will our own brothers and sisters in the church recognize it when our artists start producing it?
....our efforts in entertainment cannot be limited to making movies about saints and the Bible, as though we have nothing to say to the modern world about anything that is not part of our subculture. Borrowing from St. Paul, Christians in entertainment don't have to be always talking about God. They should be talking about everything in a godly way.
Nicolosi goes on to make a point similar to one made by Andrew Fellows (whom I mentioned in the previous post). Fellows warns against evaluating films solely through what he calls the grids of truth and morality. He's not denying that these are important. He's just concerned (rightly, I think) that in doing so, we obscure a film's narrative power by dealing only with abstractions. Rationality and conscience are important but shouldn't be emphasized to the neglect of other areas of our inner lives such as the imagination. Nicolosi writes:
Many godly people think that the goal is for movies to be "non-offensive" in terms of sex, language, and violence. But the problem with that standard is it only describes a void. It doesn't give any creative guidance. A lot of Christians lauded the 2002 release A Walk to Remember mainly on this basis: "It didn't have any bad language, and the two teenagers didn't sleep together." Yes, but it was a banal, predictable story with underdeveloped characters, pedestrian acting, and saccharine dialogue.
I think that what Nicolosi is getting at is that like a lot of Christian music, many Christian attempts at filmmaking lack an honest depiction of depravity, the very thing that we claim makes the gospel so necessary and such marvelous news. There is often a lack of reality about life's fallenness, pain, and confusion on account of the desire to quickly resolve the messiness of life with the gospel. The answer is not to gratuitously depict immorality but to portray it within the context of a truly biblical worldview.
Nicolosi suggests some themes that define a Christian movie and offers the following explanation and remedy for the current state of the film industry:
The principal reason for the moral confusion that ends up on the screen is the paucity of happy, well-catechized believers in the entertainment industry. We do not have enough witnesses to Christ living and loving and working alongside the witnesses to Mammon or secular humanism that have overrun the creative community. We do not have enough thoughtful, godly filmmakers who can draw compelling stories from a mature faith experience.
The world does not need a "Christian cinema" so much as it needs Christians in cinema.
We do not need our churches to set up production companies and make movies. We need the church to approach Hollywood as a missionary territory, to preach and teach and minister.
We need a new generation of artist-apostles to come to the industry with humility and pastoral love.
Speaking of films, bethinking.org has posted an excellent audio by Andrew Fellows on the use of film in apologetics. Fellows, a staff member of L'Abri in England, gave this presentation to a group of campus ministry workers.
He begins by dividing the apologetic process into three stages:
1. Subversion
2. Persuasion
3. Proclamation
Proclamation is the telling of the core gospel. Fellows says this is the most precious stage in the process yet complains that for many Christians, this is the only stage. Consequently, we miss many opportunities. Persuasion targets those who, though skeptical, are open to dialogue about the possibility of Christianity being true. Here, believers give reasons for their faith. Finally, subversion, the most challenging stage, is needed when dealing with those who are completely closed to considering the gospel. This involves getting inside the other person's worldview and "rattling their cage." (Though he doesn't mention it, this is equivalent to what Francis Schaeffer meant by "taking the roof off.") Fellows thinks that popular films can be effective tools in this phase of apologetics and estimates that about 80% of his own conversations with those who are closed to Christianity revolve around movies.
Fellows' talk has four main points:
1. Don't underestimate the power of film
2. Allow film to function as narrative
3. Be attentive to the worldview that lies beneath every film
4. Checkpoints for our use of films
In the course of the talk, Fellows explains the power of narrative and how we must learn to make connections between a film's narrative and the Christian story which is the one, true, epic story. Every other story that has ever been told connects to this story in some way. Subversive apologetics through film seizes or exploits the similarities between the film's story and the Christian story while recognizing the essential differences in worldview. (Fellows offers nine worldview questions to ask when viewing a film.) However, the focus of this kind of engagement is not primarily about arguing worldview but about the story and its appeal to the imagination.
Fellows says that the more his own Christian worldview has developed, the more his enjoyment of film has increased. He also says that if unbelievers see that we love and understand films, real discussions will emerge.
During the Q & A, he urges the campus ministry leaders to teach their students how to watch movies, something most of them don't know how to do. Teaching them how to do this will equip them to discuss films with their peers. This caused me to think about the need for churches to educate believers in a similar manner. For those interested, Brian Godawa's book, Hollywood Worldviews: Watching Films with Wisdom & Discernment, is a good resource for that.
12/7/05 - updated with related posts below
I confess. I've been counting down the days until the release of The Lion, the Witch, and the Wardrobe. Friday evening I'll be joining a large group from my church to view the film. While at the theater I'll try to put all the marketing hype surrounding the production out of my mind so as not to ruin my enjoyment. As David Wayne notes in his musing about the promotional fervor, "Just as Aslan is on the move in Narnia, so the servants of Mammon are on the move in our world seeking to make us evangelicals their servants." Like David, I too thought back to Tim Challies' question of just how crassly the church is being used to market the new Narnia film as I've witnessed all the hype.
When I read at Reformation 21 that according to the Philadelphia Inquirer Walt Disney Pictures is sponsoring a promotional sermon contest whose winner will be given $1,000, I was shocked. I couldn't believe that Disney would go so far as to sponsor a contest designed to get pastors to give verbal trailers from the pulpit. It just didn't seem like good business sense. Such an offensive move could alienate members of the very audience Disney is banking on to make the film a success.
After a little searching I found what at first appeared to clear Disney of such crass publicity seeking. The "Narnia Sermon Sweepstakes" is sponsored by SermonCentral.com which claims to be the world's largest sermon research site. In addition to $1,000, the grand prize winner will receive a trip for two to London and Oxford, England to walk where Lewis walked and worshiped. All a pastor has to do to enter the competition is submit a qualifying Narnia-related sermon transcript or outline. Apparently it's not necessary that the sermon actually have been preached but the odds are good that if a pastor has expended the time and effort to compose such a message, it will get preached. And those entries that are eventually posted on SermonCentral's site will probably be preached in some form or another from numerous pulpits. The Inquirer claims that Disney is using hired agencies to promote The Lion, the Witch, and the Wardrobe in churches. Among them is Outreach Media Inc. which, according to the article, hosts the sermon contest. At first, I thought this was an error having read at SermonCentral.com that it was sponsoring the contest. However, when I visited SermonCentral's page for potential advertisers, I learned that it is an arm of Outreach Media and thus it appears that the sermon contest is indeed another Disney marketing strategy.
Outreach Media Inc. affirms Christian orthodoxy and states its vision as follows: "To create a network of churches and ministries working together to love and serve people with the goal of inviting every person in America to a local Bible believing church and, ultimately, into a personal relationship with Jesus Christ." I'm sure there are sincere believers at Outreach who are eager to promote the Narnia film because they are persuaded that it has the potential to turn minds toward contemplation of the gospel. However, given their being in Disney's employ, the decision to run a sermon sweepstakes is a matter of very poor judgment. It may lead some to conclude that the folks at Outreach have succumbed to the craving for Turkish Delight.
RELATED:
Christianity Today asks, "Did Disney Pay for Your Sermon?" and likewise questions "the propriety of offering financial incentives for pastors to preach on a commercial product, even if it is Narnia."
Paul C. at Theospeak.net has a few questions of his own: "What's next, pastors wearing suits emblazoned with sponsor's logos like a NASCAR driver? Maybe cash strapped churches could sell commercial breaks during services to help raise funds?"
In light of the buzz that has been going on about what it means to have a personal relationship with God and my recent post about theological understanding being displayed in life, this quote I came across in Christianity Today is timely:
To speak of friendship with God can sound so cozy and consoling, as if we are all snuggling up to God; however, there is no riskier vulnerability than to live in friendship with God, because every friendship changes us, because friends have expectations of each other, and because friends are said to be committed to the same things. … Any friend of God is called to faithfully embody the ways of God in the world, even to the point of suffering on account of them. There may be grace and glory in being a friend of God, but there is also clearly a cost. Paul J. Wadell, Becoming Friends
This World Magazine cover story about Christians seeking to be faithful while working in Hollywood, illustrates such costly friendship:
"I will never be home for dinner at 5:30 p.m.," says one of the most successful Christians in Hollywood, Ralph Winter. "In Hollywood, 5:30 is when things are just getting started."
Mr. Winter produced X-Men, Planet of the Apes, Star Trek IV, and this summer's hit, Fantastic Four. But behind the blockbusters are family separation and heartaches. A shoot in Puerto Rico meant being away from his teenage sons for six months. A filming in London coincided with news that his wife's father had died, tragically. He did not go home. "I cannot believe how selfish I was," he said, "how unfeeling I was about her ongoing grief and depression. I was caught up in the excitement of Hollywood and the possibilities of my own career."
Soon after, Mr. Winter was offered a career plum: the chance to direct a new James Bond movie. But production was going to be in England. He realized what his career was doing to his family. He turned down what seemed like the career opportunity of a lifetime—the chance to play with Mr. Bond's weaponized sportscar, exotic locales, and special-effects-driven chase scenes—to devote his time to his wife and kids.
That decision meant he was out of work for six months. Mr. Winter learned that doing the right thing doesn't mean you won't suffer for it. But he was angry at God. Today he sees that God was at work all along. He finally got a chance to work close to home—and with Steven Spielberg, an opportunity he never would have had if he had been filming James Bond in London.
Today, Mr. Winter zealously sets aside time for his family. He also stresses the importance of his church, Bible study, and accountability partners. Without them, he could not remain spiritually and mentally grounded.
The article goes on to explain Winter's involvement as a mentor in Act One, a non profit organization that trains Christians for careers in film and television. Here's how they describe their mission: Stressing artistry, excellence, professionalism, and spirituality, Act One prepares students to be "salt and light" in writers rooms, on sets, and in studio and network offices. Our goal is not to produce explicitly "religious" entertainment, but movies and TV programs of unusual quality and depth.
I'm always encouraged to see efforts of vocational discipleship like this; people asking and answering questions like "What does being a faithful follower of Jesus Christ look like in this particular sphere?" and "How do I think Christianly about my line of work?" A certain popular Christian book taught believers to pray "Expand my borders." I think the borders that stand in need of being expanded are those of our narrowly-defined conceptions of discipleship. Groups like Act One can aid us toward that end.
The members of Act One have also written a book - Behind the Screen: Hollywood Insiders on Faith, Film, and Culture.
The relationship between theology and the arts has been a subject of interest to me for some time. The tendency to devalue creativity that does not have an explicit religious function is unfortunate and incompatible with a thoroughgoing doctrine of creation and redemption. This week I had conversations with two young people who have questioned the legitimacy of their being involved in the arts. I mentioned Jeremy Begbie, a systematic theologian and accomplished musician, to both of them. Dr. Begbie is the Associate Director of the Institute for Theology, Imagination and the Arts as well as the founder and director of the international research project, Theology Through the Arts.
Here are some other recommended titles (in no particular order):
