Christian Author Accountability

[The Jesus Geeks]

Hey guyz! I heard this interview a few weeks ago on Dragonpage Cover to Cover and found it interesting.

http://www.dragonpage.com/2008/12/15/co ... ent-607124

I have to admit I was a bit outraged with what the author went thru. Cliff and I even recorded an episode about it a few weeks ago. But the night after the recording I really felt compelled to read the book. I felt that throwing my support behind something without reading it was as bad as condemning something without ever reading it. So I am in the middle of reading the book. I won't go into it here, saving it for a future episode of my podcast.

So what I am looking for is if any other Christian authors/creative Christians ever experienced anything like this in their own church? How have you dealt with it?

Let me know what you think of the interview. And just to warn you, the second half of the podcast after the interview is not "friendly" towards religion.

[Kij421]

I read their blurb on the page, and that sounds rough. I mean, yeah, the cover looks more secular than I would expect from a Christian author, but to be kicked out of his church for it?

You always pull up the extreme cases, don't you Chris?

[jorowi]

Hmm...not having read the book, I cannot judge. However, I will say that many Christians stray over the line, in my opinion, when it comes to entertainment (including myself). You are what you eat (spiritually) and if you continue to consume sin & sinful behavior it will bear itself out in your life.

I will listen to the interview and comment further.

[aetherswift]

I've seen a lot of Christians (including some of my own family members) who have a very hard time separating reality from fiction.

[The Jesus Geeks]

You always pull up the extreme cases, don't you Chris?

Yep! Makes things more interesting. But to be honest, I haven't gone extreme yet.

[jorowi]

I listened to the interview. I have a few comments & observations:

1.) Although Mr. Lewis seems sincere, we're only hearing one side of the story. I wowonder if C2C would be willing to interview someone from the church. I think the church would decline.
2.) Not having read the book, I don't know what the content may be like. I don't have a problem with profanity as long as it isn't excessive. Some of the men use the s-word when we get together for breakfast and/or pray. Nobody holds it against them. Personally I don't think the f-word is appropriate in any context.
3.) Mike & Mike seemed to use this interview as a means to spread the "religion is a virus" mantra, therefore associating it with something harmful. It's typical of what you hear from the flagship Farpoint podcasts which is why I stopped listening to Slice of Sci-Fi.

Now, the book and it's content. This is from Jeremy's website:

Eric is a vampire with issues. His short-term and long-term memory problems are just the beginning. He not only can't remember what he did yesterday, he doesn't even remember how he became a vampire in the first place. His one true love refuses to become a vampire, so she's in her eighties, now, but still hanging around, helping him run his strip club, the Demon Heart, in downtown Void City. His current girlfriend, Tabitha, won't stop bugging him to turn her into a vampire, but when he finally gives in and does, he's suddenly not interested in her anymore. And now, it's starting to look like someone's setting him up to take the rap for a recent werewolf murder. It would help if Eric could actually remember if he did the deed… but he's pretty sure he didn't. And now the entire pack of fundamentalist werewolves wants to kill him as revenge. His newly-vamped girlfriend Tabitha might be the best person to come to his rescue...if he'll let her.

So the main character is a vampire that owns a strip club. By his own admission, there are sex scenes in the book (not sure of the details) and it's clear that the main character is involved in fornication and other sexually unacceptable behavior. Listen, Jesus said if you commit adultery in your heart it's the same as doing the deed (Matthew 5:28). Now, I don't know what he was thinking when he wrote the book but out of the abundance of the heart the mouth speaks (Matthew 12:34). These are the words of Jesus, not some historical Christian.

Scripturally, I think the church had reasons to be concerned. They may not have gone about it the right way but that's human nature. Adding "evangelical werewolves" to a sordid story doesn't make it good. Would you like your soda mixed with turpentine? I don't think so. Read James 3 and you'll see where I'm coming from. The premise of the book seems to be un-Biblical.

Now, I'm not saying you can't have a main character with some hang-ups, we all have them, but this seems excessive to me. Some things are to be avoided and those things are clear in scripture. Writing about such things in detail indicates to me that you've been thinking about it at length. The scripture is very clear on what we should think about (Phillipians 4:8).

I haven't read the book. I'll see if I can find the book and give you a more educated opinion.

EDIT: P.S. Mr. Lewis has this to say about my arguments: http://www.leagueofreluctantadults.com/ ... -line.html I agree with what he has to say. I haven't read the book, I'm looking in from the outside. These are my initial gut reactions.

[jorowi]

BTW, I left a comment on Jeremy's blog inviting him to come here and discuss his book with us.

http://www.leagueofreluctantadults.com/ ... -line.html

[Kij421]

Good call, John. And thanks for providing such an in depth description of what's at hand.

The premise of this book does not seem appealing to me. In any respect, really. I agree that the church had the right idea about coming to the author about it, but went about it the wrong way. I'll be interested to see how this progresses....

[The Jesus Geeks]

I am reading the book and I am almost done. I have concerns and I will be bringing them up in a future podcast. But even with these concerns I still have issues with some of how his elders handeled things.

[jorowi]

I've got the book on request from my library. When it comes in I'll read it and comment further.

[The Jesus Geeks]

I just finished it last night. We will be talking about it on my next show.

[jorowi]

I just finished it last night. We will be talking about it on my next show.

If I get it in the next day or two, I'd like to try and join you for that discussion.

[JFLewis]

BTW, I left a comment on Jeremy's blog inviting him to come here and discuss his book with us.

Thanks for the invite. I'm sorry it took me a few days to reply, but The League of Reluctant Adults is a group blog and I don't have it set up to email me whenever there is a comment. Perhaps I shoud should change that... I *did* listen to episode 58 of the Jesus Geek podcast and have responded via voicemail which I understand Chris will be playing in a follow-up show a few weeks from now. Chris was even nice enough to check in with me via email this evening.

Something I told him via email that I'd like to make sure everyone knows. While I vehemently disagree with the use of the term "pornographic", I truly appreciate both Chris and John taking the time to actually read the book before commenting on it. It's a welcome change. Kudos to both of you.

[Kij421]

Well, there isn't any point in criticizing a book if you haven't read it... I'm pretty much just an outsider looking in on this discussion and waving at everyone.

By the way, welcome to the Geek Works section of the MyLifeMinistries forum, Mr. Lewis.

[JFLewis]

Well, there isn't any point in criticizing a book if you haven't read it... I'm pretty much just an outsider looking in on this discussion and waving at everyone.

By the way, welcome to the Geek Works section of the MyLifeMinistries forum, Mr. Lewis.

Thanks! Feel free to call me Jeremy, BTW.

[The Jesus Geeks]

What's funny, I wanted to read this book so much after hearing the interview on Dragon Page I ended up with two copies. I went to 3 bookstores and 1 used book store looking for a copy and I couldn't find it. So I went to Amazon. Latere that day Cliff said he needed to go to the stores and we ended up at a bookstore I didnt go to earlier and guess what, it was there. So I tried to cancel my Amazon order but it already shipped. So here I am having bought 2 copies... maybe I'll have some contest or something!

[jorowi]

Jeremy,

Thanks for popping in and joining the discussion. I stand by my use of the term. As I said, I've read books from non-Christian authors that were not as explicit. I was reluctant to use the word because it didn't want to seem sensational but I couldn't think of any other word to use. Pornography is a strong term but I didn't want to use explicit because I didn't feel that would convey my feeling s about the material. I hope we can have an open discussion about this. Perhaps we will both come away with a better understanding of each other.

[JFLewis]

Jeremy,

Thanks for popping in and joining the discussion. I stand by my use of the term. As I said, I've read books from non-Christian authors that were not as explicit. I was reluctant to use the word because it didn't want to seem sensational but I couldn't think of any other word to use. Pornography is a strong term but I didn't want to use explicit because I didn't feel that would convey my feeling s about the material. I hope we can have an open discussion about this. Perhaps we will both come away with a better understanding of each other.

John,

The term pornographic implies that the piece's sole intent is to arouse the reader or viewer sexually. Even if we talk strictly about the scenes containing sexual content, arousing lust or sexual excitement was not the focus of those scenes. As I explained to Chris, I write a scene like that for one of two (really three) reasons:

1. It is important to the plot
2. I am using the scene to reveal somehting about the characters engaged in the act that is hard to reveal in a different way.
3. My editor insists that I add one (In which case, see rules one and two).

In the voice mail I left on The Jesus Geeks Podcast voice mail line, I used the scene which runs from page 165 to 169 as an example. I think that if you look back at the scene, you'll find there are some things that I do not do. I tend not to name body parts or explicitly describe actions. My purpose in the scene (the longest in the book, IIRC) is not to arouse, but to do the following things:

Eric is an unreliable narrator when it comes to his own emotions and motivations. His actions in the scene show a little about Eric as a caring person. Women, their feelings, etc are imortant to him. Despite his gruff exterior, he cares. The ungainly bits in the scene: Eric nearly losing his balance, the accidental tickling, the comment about socks staying on or off are meant to humanize two characters that are both supernatural. The scene is also meant to give the reader and big hint that Rachel is not all that she appears to be. I believe that the scene does those things without becoming pornographic, though I understand that we may have to agree to disagree on that.

Another thing that bothers me about the term you used is that pornography is a legal term. To use it implies that sales of Staked should be restricted in the same way that sales of magazines like Playboy or Adult movies are restricted. Given that I tend to refer to anatomy to horrorify rather than arouse and try to avoid mentioning it during sex scenes, alluding to actions rather than describing them, I could agree to the term R-rated, but pornographic...? No.

[jorowi]

I wanted to step away for a few days before I replied to make sure that I really thought about your points. I'm known to pop-off and regret it later. While I believe that you could have developed the character of Eric without the use of sexual material, I will concede that calling it pornography is too strong. Many people have commented that this book would get a "hard-R" rating for a movie. I don't like making comparisons to movie ratings because they can be somewhat arbitrary depending upon the mood of the ratings board that day. Rather, I will amend my statement and say that I'd rate it as explicit for language, violence, sex and alcohol consumption (if drinking fermented blood counts as alcohol).

[JFLewis]

I wanted to step away for a few days before I replied to make sure that I really thought about your points. I'm known to pop-off and regret it later. While I believe that you could have developed the character of Eric without the use of sexual material, I will concede that calling it pornography is too strong. Many people have commented that this book would get a "hard-R" rating for a movie. I don't like making comparisons to movie ratings because they can be somewhat arbitrary depending upon the mood of the ratings board that day. Rather, I will amend my statement and say that I'd rate it as explicit for language, violence, sex and alcohol consumption (if drinking fermented blood counts as alcohol).

Your amended rating is one with which I cannot argue, sir. Thank you.

As for whether Eric's story could have been told differently... almost any story can be told in a different way. I told it the way that felt right to me. I wanted it to be honest and unflinching, to show that Eric, even if he is nicer than the other monsters - even if he might one day stop being a monster, has become a monster and knows it.

[jorowi]

I am curious: what drove you to choose sexual encounters to develop Eric rather than, say, external observations by other characters or actions towards others (you did use Eric's actions towards others but I felt like this was under used).

[JFLewis]

I think one of the big reasons I used two points of view (Tabitha's and Eric's) was to give that external observation. Most of the Tabitha chapters are used (whether it's very obvious or not) to make various points about Eric and his behavior either through direct comparison between how Tabitha wants Eric to be and how he actually is or indirect comparison between the way Tabitha and/or other vampires act and the way Eric behaves.

The sexual content was also chosen because I wanted to depict Eric as having fallen just about as low as he possibly could. GIven his beginnings (which Marilyn alludes to in her confrontation with Tabitha near the end of the book): Eric has gone from leading a realitvely heroic, if somewhat broken, life to owning a strip club in a seedy side of town, living on his dancers when he can, and killing when the urge to feed is too strong to safely feed in other ways.

Since I knew I was going to depict the violent side of his nature without turning away, I wanted to show all aspects of his nature without turning away. That included the sexual portion, which certainly exists in the novel, but in a proportion that is not out of kilter with everything else. And quite frankly, it was also included because vampires have always been highly sexualized creatures. From the beginning of vampire literature, Varney (the first tragic semi-hero vampire), Lord Ruthven, Carmilla (the first female vampire with obvious same sex interests), and, a few decades later - when Stoker wrote of him - Dracula, were all sexual creatures to one degree or another.

Slight Spoiler:

For that reason, I picked Rachel as the representation of everything Eric must learn to resist in order to regain the part of himself that he has lost.