fiction
If you're reading fiction searching to know the depths of God, you're looking in the wrong place. While books like The Da Vinci Code and The Shack may contain what the writers believe to be theological and empirical truth, they are fiction. Read them as such. I haven't read The Shack yet, but will be doing so in late June, and I couldn't put The Da Vinci Code down (or any of his other books). Do I believe that there was a cult where Jesus had sex with Mary? Not so much, but Dan Brown is an incredibly gifted and entertaining fiction writer.
Common grace, though, can run rampant through them (maybe not Da Vinci...). Instead of just labeling a book as "crap," especially if it's fiction, let's just read it through a Scriptural lens and keep our opinions of the theology of a fiction book to ourselves. It's fiction...if William Young or Dan Brown start writing "theological" books, then we'll critique them as such. I think these attitudes are exemplary of how many conservative Christians act, and thus are part of the reason that Christianity is so divided (e.g. all the denominations).
3 comments:
I think the authors of the fictional works you cite have "owned" the teachings in their works. In other words, they claim to believe what they have written. That it is a fiction is primarily a question of how to format the teachings they want to promulgate.
"Who Moved My Cheese" is written as a fictional account (I think), but it is widely taken as a statement on how businesspeople should operate. Brian McLaren's "A New Kind of Christian" is written using fictional characters, but he certainly had "truths" he wanted people to "get." And "Uncle Tom's Cabin" was a novel, but it helped speed the inception of the Civil War.
Sometimes a story is "just" a story, but I don't think The Shack or The DaVinci Code fall into that category. A book doesn't get a free pass just by being fiction.
My point is to read it as just a story. I'm not in disagreement that they are attempting to put forth their beliefs, but you don't have to believe it to be entertained or enjoy the books. And, believe it or not, you might be able to glean something from it (not the reference to common grace above).
Like I hinted to, being so dogmatically and obnoxiously theological is part of the reason for the great division in the Christian church.
Yo Matteo!!
I hear you are looking for a JOB!! I ran into your mom and steven the other day and she filled me in .... let's get together sometime when ya are in town;) I am praying for the job search!
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