Something I wondered yesterday is: why is The Exorcist, a film about heroic Catholic priests fighting a demon, based on a book by a devout Catholic inspired by historic Catholic exorcisms, and with multiple Catholic priests advising on the film, not considered "Christian media"?
I think the reason is that the Christian media landscape of today - CCM, Pure Flix, Angel Studios, Christian romance novels, The Shack, Veggietales, etc. - is the product of American Evangelicalism developing into a subculture in the 1980s, and that subculture's (A) willingness to spend money on things promoting their views and (B) increasing dissonance between their values and mainstream American culture. Consequently, an industry sprang up to ensure that they wouldn't have to interact with secular media.
That historical development has led to two things:
People have a very specific image of "Christian media", rooted in Evangelical theology and culture, particularly its emphasis on positive feelings as a gauge of spirituality and (to quote "Screwtape Proposes a Toast") "petty traditional abstinences from wine or cards or the theatre". Which a dark, violent, sexually explicit and extremely Catholic horror film does not match.
Because of that history, "Christian media" is a similar category to "exploitation film"; most of it is low-quality and makes money by pandering to a specific audience, and hence any example of it that achieves critical respect and mass appeal is assumed to have transcended the genre.
Tagging @wariteres (Catholic who grew up Evangelical) for her opinion.
I swear I eventually get to the point.
Raised in the church and left long ago because even as a sixth grader I had way too many questions for them to answer no offense. Like the good old āwho made god?ā ooh boy they get mad when you ask that one. Why do women give birth and create life but men give all the credit to a singular male god? A bunch of dudes obsessed with dudes, hating women and dudes who love dudes make it make sense. All babies start female, because we donāt have x and y automatically so because the male hormone gets added last I find it crazy to say women are made out of some spare parts. so disrespectful anyway. I do not exist as an object made of menās spare parts. Men are the ones with vestigial nipples clear proof that women do not come as afterthoughts. you can tell it was written by sexist creeps. obsessed with women/girls being untouched and still somehow pregnant. Pure objects for men while doing all the work. Just a vessel not a human. God even gives us periods and apparently even though god gave them to us we are unclean and must leave the village and be blessed upon return, totally intelligent.
If religion is made to answer where we come from it just asks another question. Another non answer. How can you just believe god popped out of nowhere? What about the countless people who lived and died before the bible was made up? guess god just didnāt care about all those people? If god was real why isnāt the bible as old as humanity?
cus it was clearly made up by people of a certain time, and didnāt exist before that just like the torah and quran. if God was real people wouldāve known and been writing about him since the beginning of time but they havenāt because it took a while for men to make him up.
I think itās pretty transparent how many Commandments are about not being jealous of rich people or stealing their possessions and thereās hardly anything about treating human beings properly beyond donāt kill because then you are killing their property as in workers. You canāt sit on your duff and drink wine if you donāt have slaves to make it for you.ļæ¼
I think itās pretty transparent how much the church is obsessed with tithing and getting money from people that itās obviously not from a god that wouldnāt need material wealth. itās from people who want to control you. Man I think it went better than they ever imagined it could. Tell em a pretty lie and assuage their fears and youāve got a lifelong sheep worker.
The bible is from people who wanted you to believe that you being the best little worker for them making them the most money not questioning ļæ¼and not complaining, just reproducing more workers for them is the way to live. under the thumb of the Rich and royal. itās not a coincidence that they promote living ascetically, they donāt want you using their resources and they want you to be as quiet compliant and low needs as possible.
The whole community is unwilling to live fully in reality, and how can you when you are expected to operate upon the idea of yeah you donāt see it but itās there. Even psychosis becomes part of your unquestionable reality. Anything that can be connected will be. correlation is causation.
How can you operate in reality when you are doing things like drinking blood and eating body but clutching pearls at anything that doesnāt fit your played out done a million time stereotypes youāre supposed to follow?
So many religious people hating brown people when jesus was brown, not to the state obvious but according to yāall they are gods creations too just like atheists so idk if you have a problem with that you should take it up with your god who keeps creating them. Or not being into crying on feet like jesus was, crying about any media that includes people other than straight white heteros all while crying all lives matter haha but if you donāt fit the stereotype they donāt care that youāre gods children too!
thereās an Iām superior especially morally air to all of it. Going around the world forcing beliefs on others and calling them savages, changing their names, implying superiority at every step, creating shame.I know weāre fighting to take away the ability to choose what religion you want to belong to but we are sooo sweet though! but fall in line or suffer burning torture for eternity. Iām such a great person for making people feel ashamed and changing who they are lying that itās for their good intentions when in reality you know itās just because you canāt stand that youāre afraid that you might be wrong and the more people believe what you believe the more secure you feel in your belief. You would cling to pretty much anything fed to you out of fear of the unknown. A community constantly name dropping compassion like their concern of it doesnāt leave as soon as you donāt fall in line or fit the stereotype.
the dissonance is great. A bunch of people using words and ideas they parrot back without even reading the book or fully understanding what they regurgitate. The longest game of telephone.
as a religious person you pick and choose what you want to actually believe and follow every day because there are so many contradictions in holy books. That doesnāt even begin to touch on how many things have been lost in translation or changed by kings and other godheads.
Learning and questioning is a sin, especially if you are a woman because obviously when something is the supreme truth you care so much about people learning and questioning. That makes total sense itās not like it would only get clearer everyday that it was the truth if it was. Itās like oh yes if something is true the more you ask questions about it or learn about it it will seem less true and thatās a bad thing.
Like Nope we are so insecure about the truth donāt you dare ask questions or learn outside of pouring over the same old book ad nauseum while real problems stare you in the face unsolved. Praying instead of taking action, wishing instead of simply living and doing. Looking through and looking for instead of looking at and thinking critically. Going to the same place every weekend to listen to the same story beats they curated over and over and over.
It leads to a bunch of people who pick and choose everything and just ignore anything that doesnāt already fall within their preconceived ideas. There isnāt any critical thinking involved when youāre told your whole life that itās evil to do so. Omit whatever you please, after all you could commit atrocity after atrocity and god will still welcome you into eternal paradise and people will say the victims suffering and misfortune was Godās sick will. Everyone thanking god for good things and even though god created everything and that means God created all evil God is somehow just above being held accountable for atrocities that he does not do anything about. but I think itās pretty obvious that religion is the killer of accountability. Once you can do anything bad and say itās between me and God who can argue with you? Once you can instantly clear your conscience by saying a couple words what is there to stop you from doing the worst things imaginable and feeling fine about it afterwards? I mean look at so many serial killers and abusers and youāll see a bunch of religious people or people who find religion because they want to feel good about what theyāve done later.
Itās not like good people seek religion to assuage their fears and the way they feel about the things that theyāve done. Itās a running joke in my community when we talk and somebody starts getting sucked into religion again, we are like so what did they do that they need to shirk accountability for.ļæ¼
Tons of religious people act like natural disasters are something outside of God and itās just ridiculous. I mean God is in charge of everything ever and knew everything that would happen and said it all in motion but heās not responsible for anything but good stuff? He creates Lucifer knowing what will happen and knowing how Lucifer is misunderstood and still continues on doing what heās doing like a misguided toddler? Iām sorry but how can that be an all knowing or all smart creature if it is so unintelligent that it canāt get over its own ego about the truth it already knows? I know more mature 12-year-olds. I mean if God is real why do churches not get protection? It doesnāt matter how perfect of a believer you are Godās not going to protect you. If that was the case People would do the right thing and stay with the diseases God gave them instead of going to the hospital. Clearly God wanted you to have disease so why are you going against Godās will? Why donāt religious people just pray if God is always going to work and protect you then why donāt you rely on him? why is a rape Godās will but you getting cancer isnāt? Thatās what God wants and you should just sit there with your cancer and pray because I mean God helps you so why donāt you have faith and trust that he will if he really will like you say he will? Or is it maybe that it doesnāt matter how faithful or how many times you pray you could still have a horrible life and suffer endlessly?ļæ¼
Ah no matter we are thinking too hard. We should just work and reproduce it doesnāt matter how or when you pass you are just fodder for the rich and royal in power. So silly Iāve asked to act like we have any agency or right to freedom, of course we are only slaves to Godās will because anyone who loves you will force you to do things and control you. Such a great lesson to teach kids.
Donāt be fooled thereās a reason religious media often doesnāt connect and is because itās largely performative and not genuine. Music made toļæ¼ purely fit within religious standards is hardly ever a raw genuine feeling. Itās like hyper produced pop fodder and pandering country music. It isnāt something that was spilling out of someone that you couldnāt contain, it was someone trying to create music that appeals to performative people pretending to love everyone and judge no one.
The Sunday school of music but less whimsical. You arenāt allowed to say so much, you canāt question anything or talk about doubts unless you immediately say that God solved every one of them.
So many of these people donāt have much experience to pull from to write anyway If you live a life lacking many experiences, marrying the first and only person you get with, hearing the same stories over and over, often not leaving your community and being homeschooled or schooled in a religious setting, being told anyone outside of your group is dangerous, excommunicating people who donāt fall in line, ideas outside of your group are dangerous, learning and questioning are wrong etc it all just leads to less variety and nuance of experience. all the ticky tacky house look the same. It just means these people have less interaction with ideas outside of the ones forced upon them and curated so therefore less to pull from. variety being the spice of life they go the bland Kelloggās enema way. I miss shakers at least they got up and did cool dances.
Beyond evangelicals religious media in general tries to smooth over the atrocities and absolutely mature rated parts of religion. They want to pretend it doesnāt exist. They want everyone besides religious scholars to think that Catholicism is a fairytale sunday school sweet little story when itās brutal and not like that. No cute way to talk about how the bible is cool with people as property. No happy fake way to talk about beating your child with an iron rod while they should be silentļæ¼. No cutie way to talk about how the Bible thinks itās OK to rape a concubine to death and leave her dying on a doorstep. No cutie way to paint the abusive relationship between God and creation as wholly pure to anyone with critical thinking skills who knows what a healthy relationship is. No cute way to kill first borns and rub blood on doors or incest.
At the base of it you have to ignore so many things to be a part of this belief system so itās no wonder they reject anything that doesnāt fit what they want to see. Sorry but the exorcist doesnāt fit in a happy pure lie that they want society to think of them as. They always try to distance themselves from anything involving it. something like Godās not dead is more their speed championing victimhood just because everything isnāt about you is more their speed of course they donāt want to admit that thereās plenty to be afraid of even if your God is real. That there are plenty of things that they donāt have explanations for. Or letās say even if you were an innocent child or the best follower there could be that doesnāt mean god will or can (apparently) protect you from demons and people donāt like that. The church wants you to think that God is a cure all snake oil and you can find everything within his limited scope. The church looks for broken people like abusers look for broken people because theyāre easy to manipulate control and imprint upon. So to make a movie where the possession is almost analog for an abuse you canāt just immediately escape with god, well yeah thatās not exactly the triumphant story they want you to perceive their religion as.
