OK, I’m glad the filmmakers are focusing on better quality. I salute you. But take some lessons from the past. I am currently teaching a course entitled “Major Christian Authors,” covering such authors as Dante, Spenser, Herbert, Bunyan, Hopkins, Chesterton, T. S. Eliot, C. S. Lewis, Charles Williams, Graham Greene, Flannery O’Connor. NONE of them wrote about people’s personal problems. There is not one terminally ill orphan in the whole lot. No scenes about broken marriages or friends dying or sports teams winning the big game. These classic Christian authors–who actually did influence their cultures–saw Christianity as being rather more than a means of solving life’s problems, and none of them lapsed into the deadly aesthetic sin of SENTIMENTALITY.
Do yourself a favor and read the rest.
3 comments:
Your right, I never realized why I don't like or watch Christian Movies. I thought I was wrong for it. Thanks.
It appears Dr. Veith has seen neither Left Behind nor The Omega Code. I mean . . . Casper Van Dien, Michael Ironside, and Michael York together in one movie? Unstoppable.
Not entirely in disagreement, but (for example) there is a tangent plot in a C.S. Lewis novel, "The Magician's Nephew" (please don't stumble on the title, as I did for a bit). Albeit, Veith might have been excluding Lewis's works of children's fiction.
In the book a main character, Digory, struggles over the great illness of his mother while he is called away to serve in the salvation of another world. When Digory spends most of the novel to complete what he was called to do, Aslan (a savior-character) graciously gives Digory an apple to restore his mother's health. Digory returns home to give his mother the apple, distracted by the ordinary things of his world but faithful in the promise of life that Aslan gave him.
Orphans, broken relationships, death and victory (as Veith listed) are less effective for sympathy as they are for indications of our own need for adoption, stability, life and leadership. Not just for today, but for the eternity ahead.
This is where the films lose focus, but we would also be remiss to expect Christian literature to avoid the tangible mess of our lives.
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