May 26, 2009

The Nature of Christian Art (so I think)

I have written on worship lately on one of my other blogs (here and here), and those musings have got me thinking on the subject of Christianity and art. I made a point in both of those entries of noting that much modern worship is idolatrous because of its incorrect utilization of and focus on stage performance and its overt focus on individual subjectivity. I counter this mode of worship with the claim that, though our subjectivity is important, it must be bound to (and thus subservient to) the objectivity of God (i.e., who He is and what He has done and will do; His character and His actions). I do not doubt the sincerity of modern worshippers or worship leaders, but much of the stage performances that pass as "worship" serve only to distract us from the God who is to be the center of our worship. We often walk away saying, "That was a great show/performance," or "That made me feel refreshed/revitalized/empowered/etc.," rather than saying "God is so good/great/holy/loving/righteous/etc." (or if we do say that, what we mean is that Him being good/holy/etc. is contingent upon us enjoying the show and/or feeling refreshed/etc.). Older (more medieval) Christianity understood that all things are to point us towards God, and the less distractions, the better.
That has lead me to think about this: Plato (in Republic) trashed on poets and performers because (1) they are liars, or (2) if they speak any truth, they are too many steps removed from the Truth, and thus will distract their listeners from the Truth. It works like this: there is the Truth (the Form of the Good/God/Reality/etc.), then there are imitations/copies of the Truth (books/speeches about the Truth), then there are imitators of the imitations (poets and performers), and then imitators of the imitators of the imitations, etc. The farther along you go, the farther from the Truth you get as each layer of imitations/imitators could serve to distract from the Truth itself. However, that raises an important question: is Plato right that this possibility of distraction necessarily means that all imitations/imitators are bad?
The answer, of course, is no. We cannot conceive of the Truth as we are (viz., fallen and finite), and thus we need "imitations/imitators" that are of the Truth to point us in the right direction. It is true that each imitation can serve as a distraction, but that does not change the fact that the Truth is a part of them in some way, shape, or form. The issue is whether or not it points its audience back to itself (and thus becomes a distraction) or points outside of itself to something else (i.e., the Truth). Therefore, it is not the thing itself that is wrong, but rather the thing that it drives our focus towards. The same can be said of worship, which is supposed to drive our focus away from ourselves and towards God. That much worship today looks like a performances piece does not make it bad per se. That much worship today, in being a performance piece, distracts our focus away from God and to itself (or what it worse, to ourselves), is bad.
The same can be said of art, and my fellow Christian artists must be in constant prayer over this. At all cost, our works must never distract our audience with itself (or ourselves, or themselves). It must be a sign post that points to God. It is His quality and character that must ultimately be felt in the end, not the skill of the artist or the feelings of the audience. This, of course, is a matter of prayer and submission, not nit-pickyness and paranoia (remember how to write). However, we must be reminding ourselves always that our purpose is to make others aware of Truth; to guide them (whether they be believers or not) away from us and themselves to the God who is there.
(Addendum: Note amendment to these thoughts in a later post)

-Jon Vowell

5 comments:

Cristiano Silva said...

Hello Jon,

Great post! Specially your thoughts of worship pointing to us x to God. That's an important issue that we must always have in our minds.

Question: have you already written any fiction?

God bless.

Halcyon said...

Once again, I am glad to be an encouragement to you.

Yes, I have written some fiction. A lot of it is a paradox in that it is simulatenously impressive and laughable: impressive in scope, laughable in substance.

I had typed up an approx. 300-page novel on my computer when I was a teenager. I was highly impressed with it...until I went to college and studied real literture. Then I wasn't too impressed. My college studies only served to spur me on, however. My latest writings are mostly short stories, with the better ones being the shortest of the bunch (less than two pages!). I am, indeed, still learning how to REALLY write.

Lately, however, I have stumbled upon something that was highly interesting. I may have found my "voice," i.e., my indivdiual mode of expression as an author. Finding it was a real struggle; I was unsure whether or not my writing was to be serious or silly, realistic or fantastic, imageic or plain-jane. However, I just recently began working on a (much longer) story with a voice that I truly enjoy to write in. It seems to be a combination of all of the above-mentioned qualities (minus the "plain-Jane" one).

If you like, I may post some of my fiction (my newer, BETTER ficiton) including sections of the story that I am currently writing.

Cristiano Silva said...

Sure, I'd be glad with that. Someday, maybe, God will allow me to find my "voice".

Do you know this book The Christian Imagination?

Halcyon said...

I think that I have a different version of that book. Some of the essays are different than the ones I have.

Great...now there's ANOTHER book that I want to get. 8^)

Cristiano Silva said...

:)

This one I already bought, but I didn't read yet. Another interesting one, maybe not excelent but a good work nonetheless, that I've just finished reading, is this one: Scientific Mythologies.

I'm a sci-fi, so it was a good reading.

God bless.