Christianizing Creativity (A ‘Reluctant Brilliance’ Response)

Brian asked for my thoughts on affixing the title “Christian” to a product, service, artist or work of art. As in, being a “Christian band” or a “Christian company.” I’ve certainly got my opinions, but I’ll let smarter people discuss the theological implications of the whole idea – what I’m most afraid of are the motives behind the labeling and the potential for greatness we’re squandering as a result.

1)      Profit – . The American Christian church is a strange, beautiful, messy, rich and sometimes terrifying group of people who are incredibly good at homogeny and continuing their (our) way of life (be it financially, spiritually or socially.) And, I understand how tempting it is to jump in and swim with its strong, profitable currents. The truth is – you can make a lot of money in the Christian industry. There is a real, predictable market available and ready to embrace almost anything with marginal substance so long as it’s identified as “Christian.” But, this is why lots of Christian music is passionless and redundant. This is why most Christian movies are awful. This is why a Christian company struggles with greed. In any other realm, your genre is not your credential. The product being sold must also have merit, be valuable. You don’t buy an iPod because it’s an “MP3 Player” – you buy it because it’s the best. It’s a risky thing to trade identity for income.

2)      Protection – My parents were good parents and they were deeply (to my adolescent frustration) involved in the music I was listening to. If you were to scour the 10 freeway roadside, you’d probably find small bits of my Gin n’ Juice cassette tape which was thrown from my mom’s speeding Honda when she realized just how articulate Snoop Dogg could be. They’d read the lyrics inside every CD I brought home, scanning for expletives or lewd references, my Mom’s eagle eyes could find a spelling mistake in the New Yorker. To avoid these inspections, I learned to just buy CD’s from the local Christian bookstore.  Sure, it cost roughly twice as much (see point #1) but my parents trusted the endorsement of “Christian” bookstore and they didn’t need to harass me about my purchase.

So, some protection is good. But the cost of protection is a diminishment of progress; you can’t wear armor and run quickly. When the Christian market is so consumed by protecting its fundamentalism, creativity is stalled. I think there’s unlimited potential for greatness in being strong, talented, creative, fearless, loving, agents of creation. And I believe we do more to usher in the Kingdom of God by participating in that creation than we do in burying our talents in the sand, making sure it stays put and stays the same.

So, do I think there’s a problem with the “Christian” genre?  I’m not sure. While I don’t think it’s a leading cause of atheism – it might be a leading cause of atheists making fun of us.