The Na'Vi and the Celts

You can’t turn on the TV or go online today and not see the computer generated faces of the Na’Vi. Avatar is everywhere – it is a cultural phenomenon. Everyone is talking about it- good, bad, or indifferent, people who had never previously heard the computer game term “avatar” one month ago are now well versed with the story of Marine Jake Sully and his adventures on the intentionally symbolic land of Pandora.

For starters, let me say that I loved the film. It has its flaws as a movie, and is merely a 3-D retelling of the Disney film Pocahantas, but it is a beautiful movie with a clear message.

But what should we do about that message?

If you do an Internet search on “Avatar and Christianity” (later, not while you’re reading this blog), you’ll notice uproar in the Christian community of the idea of pantheism (the worship of nature) present in this film. There appears to be such disgust at the ideas promoted in the movie that even the Vatican has spoken out in condemnation of the film.

Make no mistake about it; Avatar is promoting a religion - a false religion. So what?

Are we really afraid that after watching this film, that thousands of Christians are going to jump ship with Jesus and begin worshiping Ewya, the “all-mother” god of the fictional Na’Vi people? Likewise are we surprised that an ungodly world (I am speaking about our world now) would promote such an idea?

False religion should be discussed in our churches, and all believers should know the truth. But why are we so quick to seclude ourselves in an “us versus the world” camp in regards to theology?

My problem isn’t with Christians choosing to boycott the film, although I do think it a bit foolish. My problem is with Christians ignoring the unique opportunity to share their faith that this movie presents.

Here’s what I mean to say- why is that we condemn practitioners of nature worship, the basic tenant of the New Age mysticism so common in our world, rather than acknowledge their need and show them the real God of creation?

Here’s what I saw when I watched Avatar: a disheartened American soldier who gets fed up with the dream of “more” and turns to a god he meets in nature.

I can work with that.

But how? Is there a way to meet the pagans, like the Na’vi and James Cameron (the film’s director), and show them our God using their tools and their beliefs?

Perhaps the answer can be found in a three-leaf clover.

Like the Na’Vi, the ancient Celts were Mother Earth worshippers. They believed in a pagan god and worshipped their god through various rituals and practices. By all accounts, they were the sorts of people that Hollywood would love to make a movie about.

But unlike the church today, the Ancient Church (coincidentally the same Catholic church that is speaking out against Avatar) responded differently. They did not condemn or ignore, they responded with Saint Patrick.

Patrick’s story is particularly insightful in how we (as Christians) should approach the views presented in Avatar. His story is helpful if we are to understand how best to relate and minister to a world that believes in a false religion.

So what did Patrick do? He organized the biggest and most successful missionary campaign outside of the New Testament. He so effectively planted Christ in a pagan culture that he is now celebrated in an international holiday. Not even the Apostle Paul has a holiday.

But the key to understanding Patrick is not in the results of his missionary journey, but in his techniques. Unlike modern evangelicals, that lambast and criticize the popular religion of our time, Patrick used the native religion to point to Christ. He chose religious symbols of the Celts and adapted them to Christianity. The shamrock became a symbol, not of the earth god, but of the Trinity. Unlike other ancient missionaries, Patrick did not ride into a colony with a legion of soldiers and build a church on native soil. He met in tents, travelled with tribes, and found a connection between what they believed and the God he served.

And Patrick was not the first to do this. In Acts 17, upon his visit to Athens, Paul used Athenian pagan statues to advocate Christ. He studied the native religion, and when pressed, responded to their questions about his faith by using what he had learned about their beliefs. "Men of Athens! I see that in every way you are very religious. For as I walked around and looked carefully at your objects of worship, I even found an altar with this inscription: TO AN UNKNOWN GOD. Now what you worship as something unknown I am going to proclaim to you.” (Acts 17:22-23)

Paul and Patrick provide a model for us on how we should deal with the religion and philosophy in Avatar. They recognized that in most every false god exists the ability, either through comparison or contrast, to show the true God.

If we (Christians) are to make any difference in our world, we must stop condemning non-believers for their earth worship or New Age philosophy and start recognizing that what they see in nature is our God. Yes, they worship the creation and not the Creator, but how can we criticize them if we refuse to show them the Artist behind the art?

The Na’Vi aliens in Avatar are on the right path. Yes their worship is misguided, but they see what we see- the thumbprint of a beautiful and loving God on all of his creation. Is Avatar just a movie? Yes, but it reflects the longings and feelings of so many in our world. It reflects a longing for beauty and truth, a beauty and truth they see in the creation around them.

The church needs to find new three-leaf clover. Perhaps Avatar is a start.

Faith in Film

I love Jesus. I love movies. Unfortunately, there have been many times in my life when these two things have come in conflict- albeit mostly in my teenage years when a combination of fundamentalism and hormones had me flip-flopping on whether or not it was appropriate to watch certain films.

The discussion of what is acceptable or not for Christians to watch is not however, what this blog is about. With few exceptions, I view personal movie tastes much as Paul views eating meat sacrificed to pagan gods. It’s a personal choice, based on prayer, specific personal temptations, and your personal spiritual maturity. The problem of deciding a viewing policy for all Christians is for people much smarter and wiser than me.

Nevertheless, I cannot escape my love of a cinema. I am a movie junkie. And since I have no desire to ever escape my presence in the love of Christ, I am forced to either compartmentalize my life (that is to box off certain areas and not allow my entire life to be ruled by God) or reconcile all of the aspects of my life together. And since it is my desire for every corner of my life to be transparent and hopefully help me understand God more, the question I must ask myself is can my love for films help me love Christ more?

This seems like an odd correlation – using earthly loves to strengthen a supernatural one – but allow me make a parallel. On a much deeper level than my love for movies, I love my wife. In my attempt to become a better husband, I work hard to love her more. I study her likes and dislikes, learn more about her past, talk with her, etc. And in doing so, I am growing in my love of Christ as well - knowing that my marriage is a biblical symbol of Christ’s relationship with me. And the inverse is true as well - the more I learn to love Christ, the more I love her.

Is this same correlation (the idea that an earthly love can strengthen a supernatural one) true in regards to movies? Is it possible in my spiritual growth that I have somehow found a deeper way to connect with film? Is it possible that in learning about movies, that I can learn about my savior, the designer and creator of the world?

Yes, I think it is.

On a superficial level, movies are entertainment. They are a way to pass a boring Saturday night, a way to pass an awkward first date, a way for parents to get two hours of relative silence. But they are also stories- true or false, real or fiction, they are stories- of love, adventure, despair, joy, action, horror, or any other label Amazon wants to create to categorize them. Regardless of their subject matter, they are attempts to tell stories. And storytelling is as old as civilization itself.

In fact, if C.S. Lewis is to be believed (and I think he should) then this storytelling is actually valuable proof of the existence of God. Lewis argues in The Abolition of Man that in every culture’s storytelling, there exists proof of an invisible moral hand. That is, every culture, from the dawn of time to Hollywood, all show in their stories a sort of natural, ingrained proof of a human desire for right.

But is there any biblical support to validate Lewis’ claim? It makes sense logically, but one thing we must be sure of in the faith is to always temper logic with the Bible. Without that measuring stick, we would be (and some would say are) lost.

Romans Chapter 1:20 offers an interesting insight into this philosophy. For since the creation of the world God's invisible qualities—his eternal power and divine nature—have been clearly seen, being understood from what has been made, so that men are without excuse. Paul argues in the context of chapter 1 that since the dawn of time, all of creation has clearly shown God. We see this elsewhere, when Jesus declares that if men refuse to praise God, even the “stones will cry out” (Luke 19:40).

So it stands to reason, that if all of creation shows God, either visibly or invisibly, that we (humans) as the crown prince of creation would show God as well. Since our actions cannot always (or perhaps rarely) be construed as godly, how then do we show the “eternal power and divine nature” of our Creator?

Through our stories.

Listen to a fisherman weave a tale about his adventures on the lake, and you will hear a story of the one that got away. What does this story say about the fisherman? That he’s quite possibly a liar, but most definitely longing for a world where the good guy always wins, the nice guy always gets the girl, and the award winning catfish stays on the line.

So what does this have to do with film? Simple. To me, movies show, sometimes in beautiful 3-D, our human desire for a world that is not ours. We long to see the world that is buried deep within our hearts- a world we often choose to cover by layers of reality and science. Our logical minds tell us no such world exists; yet our fantastical minds, our storytelling minds, speak of Narnia, of Gotham, of Hogwarts, of Pandora.

If I can train my eyes to analyze the stories of our culture, which are most often told through the medium of film and TV, then I could potentially see the thumbprint of God in the stories we tell. And like any good investigator, perhaps in studying the thumbprint, I can learn more about the Hand to which it belonged.

And I’m confident that if I could even only see the Hand of my maker, it would change me forever.

My intention in this blog is simple. I am going to regularly upload my thoughts on a movie that I’ve seen. It may be a current movie, or a classic, or just a movie I love (caution, I do have weird tastes sometimes). Please note: I am not endorsing watching any of these movies – nor am I reviewing them. I only wish to show my thoughts on how they perhaps point to something greater- something so eternally great that our minds can only hope to catch a glimpse.

I hope to show how our stories point to the Greatest Story of all.