[The Invisible Man]

lDonnie Darko is already in the database; it ranked #181 last year (and WHY can't SciFi be spiritual?!?):
http://artsandfaith....ry.php?film=114

It's a purely personal thing: I have come to regard all forms of non-Christian spirituality as invalid, and because most science fiction (or, at least, most science fiction that I have seen) contradicts a Christian world view, I regard it as essentially unspiritual.

[Doug C]

IM, the first SF novel ever written, Frankenstein, threw down the gauntlet for SF's moral/ethical/spiritual imagination ("I am thy creature; I ought to be thy Adam, but I am rather the fallen angel, whom thou drivest from joy for no misdeed"), which the genre has perpetuated with high honors; of all genres it seems to be the most reflective and critical about the implications of life, technology, and society--the way we live today. In addition to all the rich spiritual questions about what it means to be human and finding our place in the cosmos that the genre offers, would you also discount these works?

• G.K. Chesteron's The Man Who Was Thursday: A Nightmare
• Madeleine L'Engle's A Wrinkle in Time series
• C.S. Lewis' space trilogy
• Tim Powers' Declare and others
• Mary Doria Russell's series
• Tarkovsky's Solaris and Stalker

...not to mention all the hybrid SF-fantasy allegories like Wangerin's Book of the Dun Cow?

If "most of the SF" you have read happens to "contradict a Christian worldview," I'd definitely recommend branching out a bit.

And of course, these are only obvious examples--I don't think one could ever rule out the spiritual worth of any whole genre or art form, because extracting meaning is such a subjective experience.

[The Invisible Man]

Note that I said science fiction that I had "seen" - not read. I meant movies and TV shows, and most of these seem to posit a godless universe, so I have no interest. I haven't read any science fiction since my teens, and I am unlikely to ever again.

My point about Donnie Darko is that in the director's cut, Richard Kelly pretty much removes God from the equation and everything is explained away (well, kind of) with talk of tangent universes and wormholes zzzzzzzzzz. But in the original version, God is very much the mover and shaker (at least, from how I read the film), and Donnie is something of a Christ figure.

Am I the only person who is annoyed by this modern trend for director's cuts? Films get turned on their heads so the DVD companies can milk us for a few extra bucks, and I am never sure whether to regard all of the various DVD versions as a whole, or to simply concentrate on the original. Take Apocalypse Now, for example. For twenty years, Willard was as dark as death, but then along comes the Redux version, and suddenly he's a changed man, laughing, making mischief, and taking risks to get laid, etc. How are we to assess these things?

[Doug C]

Well just to name a few titles, I'd say The Day the Earth Stood Still, Alphaville, 2001, Tarkovsky, Blade Runner, Gattaca, and Dark City--even AI: Artificial Intelligence or Eternal Sunshine..., both of which people here have written passionately about--all ask very basic questions about existence, ethics and meaning, which fits the "spiritual" bill for me. (Not to mention, The Invisible Man. ) Of course, there is a lot of dross out there too, but I wouldn't feel bad about nominating a film simply because it happens to be SF. Science fiction movies do tend to emphasize special effects, gadgets, and geeky concepts like wormholes over penetrating human insights, but the possibility is still there, which makes the ones that do it that much more "significant."

I haven't seen Donnie Darko, but I'd like to. I've heard many complaints about the director's cut. And I'm with you about the director's cut fad/marketing scheme in general. A studio cuts a film to be more "commercial" or to be shorter so they can screen it more times a day and generate more money, but then releases the "director's cut" version on DVD and expects everyone to double dip. Or they randomly add extra footage that was creatively cut to begin with. It's maddening. Of course, there are instances where director's cuts are legit and not part of an overall sales scheme, but examples seem to be dwindling.

This post has been edited by Doug C: 11 April 2006 - 06:57 PM

[Denny Wayman]

As a life long Trekkie and lover of Science Fiction I have to join this discussion.

The analogical nature of Science Fiction allows us to see ourselves in ways that open our eyes. This is not intended to be a replacement of Scripture or give a Biblical worldview, but rather as a window to see life/people/society/governments/businesses/ourselves/etc. in a new or different way.

For example in In M. Night Shyamalan's "Signs," the science fiction gives us an interesting understanding of what could possibly be the weaving of unfortunate events in our lives with God's providential care. Granted this one is a little obvious because the main character is a minister, but there are other examples.


Matrix - the first - is one of my favorite films in the category of giving us language for talking about living in a world that has no real existence and being invited to wake up. Obviously the film is not a Scriptural worldview - yet it is a fascinating analogy as "The One" dies and is "resurrected" by Trinity


Denny

[goneganesh]

Well just to name a few titles, I'd say The Day the Earth Stood Still, Alphaville, 2001, Tarkovsky, Blade Runner, Gattaca, and Dark City--even AI: Artificial Intelligence or Eternal Sunshine..., both of which people here have written passionately about--all ask very basic questions about existence, ethics and meaning, which fits the "spiritual" bill for me. (Not to mention, The Invisible Man. ) Of course, there is a lot of dross out there too, but I wouldn't feel bad about nominating a film simply because it happens to be SF. Science fiction movies do tend to emphasize special effects, gadgets, and geeky concepts like wormholes over penetrating human insights, but the possibility is still there, which makes the ones that do it that much more "significant."

I agree. But for me it goes beyond humanist approaches and into myth. I think that Jung would probably say that the genre, from Poe and Lovecraft on, is essentially religious in the sense that it's about humans encountering some kind of wondrous, perhaps frightening "other" in what is a "religious" or humbling experience. And how often is human "scientific" arrogance punished or satirized in the genre?

This post has been edited by goneganesh: 11 April 2006 - 08:33 PM

[opus]

I would very much echo the films that Doug C mentioned, with the possible exception of Alphaville (which I just could not get into at all ). I'm not as huge a sci-fi geek as I used to be, but it's still one of the genres that I return to more often than not. In large part, I think, due to (good) sci-fi's constant questioning of what happens when humanity suddenly finds themselves in a bigger, larger, more mysterious universe. Sci-fi, along with horror, and perhaps to a lesser extent, fantasy, do all too often sink into dross and even exploitation, but yeah, that just means the good stuff really, really shines.

I will agree, wholeheartedly, that the director's cut of Donnie Darko really weakens the movie by removing a lot of the mystery and ambiguity behind what's happening to Donnie. It makes his deeds and sacrifices much more underwhelming and much less miraculous than they are in the original cut.

[Overstreet]

A story can be about spiritual matters from the worldview of someone who isn't a Christian, and yet it can still communicate the truht. Many stumble onto spiritual insight and communicate it without realizing or crediting its source.

Much of the science fiction I'm familiar with is about technology and how the things that man has created in his ambition end up betraying him or revealing the limits of his wisdom.

A great deal of it also has to do with exploration, and WHY we explore. Do we go "where no man has gone before" to "subdue and replenish" creation? To serve? To discover and appreciation? Or to conquer and subjugate? For pride and ambition?

These are Christian themes, if we must use the word as an adjective.

Blade Runner is full of meaningful themes -- the emptiness of revenge, the essence of humanity being something higher than mere power, realized only through selflessness and mercy.

Star Wars is full of echoes of "Christian" truth. It distorts these truths in places, but there are still vast rewards there... enough that a whole book has been recently published by an insightful Christian writer on the subject (with the title Christian Wisdom of the Jedi Masters. It's not as cheezy as it sounds.)

Science fiction is as capable of reflecting truth as any other genre, and all truth belongs to God. I prefer not to talk about "Christian" truth because there is no such thing as something that is true that is separate from God. Thus, I'd be surprised to find any science fiction that is completely devoid of anything meaningful for a Christian.

Yes, there is a lot of sci-fi that incorporates lies and distortions, and that is why we must proceed with discernment. But this is not distinct to sci-fi... it's true in all realms of art.

My main complaint with the genre is how copiously derivative and disposable work is made, and how rarely something reflecting profound vision is produced. But that also is a charge that applies to other genres.

[Doug C]

I think that Jung would probably say that the genre, from Poe and Lovecraft on, is essentially religious in the sense that it's about humans encountering some kind of wondrous, perhaps frightening "other" in what is a "religious" or humbling experience. And how often is human "scientific" arrogance punished or satirized in the genre?

Oh, totally. It's kind of ironic that the first science fiction novel--Frankenstein--was anti-science. I like your idea of an encounter with the Other. Vivian Sobchack has a pretty good book on SF movies, and she writes:

"These kinds of [alien] images--introduced to amaze us--seem to stand alone in the films, deriving their poetic power from their very separation from a familiar context. . . . There is indeed an urge toward abstraction contained in these alien images--and it is very much connected to a basic thematic concern common to all SF film: man and his relationship to the physical environment which surrounds him. Abstraction, itself, says Lotte Eisner, 'stems from the great anxiety which man experiences when terrorized by the phenomena he perceives around him, the relationships and mysterious polarities of which he is unable to decipher.' The SF film is concerned with this anxiety and reflects it, but not to a point of withdrawal from narrative into total abstract art; rather, it deals with this anxiety on a human as well as transcendental or formal level. The SF film is ever aware--thematically and visually--that we have to live in our own future, and that future, unknowable as it may finally be, is very real."

Aw, opus--you should give Alphaville another chance some day. (But you remind me that I should include Nausicaa in my short list, although that may be more fantasy than SF. Maybe Ghost in the Shell or Metropolis, both Lang and Tezuka's versions.)

My main complaint with the genre is how copiously derivative and disposable work is made, and how rarely something reflecting profound vision is produced.

Another quote:

"I shall not be supposed as according the remotest degree of serious faith to such an imagination; yet, assuming it as a work of basic fancy, I have not considered myself as merely weaving a series of supernatural terrors. The event on which the interest of the story depends is exempt from the disadvantages of a mere tale of spectres or enchantment. It was recommended by the novelty of the situations which it develops; and, however possible as a physical fact, affords a point of view to the imagination for the delineating of human passions more comprehensive and commanding than any which the ordinary relations of existing events can yield." --Mary Shelley, Preface to Frankenstein

Future SF writers take note... (Have I mentioned how much I love the book?)

[The Invisible Man]

Perhaps science fiction does deal with essential questions of existence, but if all the essential answers lie with God, then aren't the Trekkies and their ilk looking in all the wrong places?

I don't agree about Lovecraft being religious (or, at least, religious in any Christian sense). The Cthulhu Mythos has been embraced by certain factions within the occult community for a reason.

And doesn't Poe's raven squawk "nevermore" when questioned about a sweet hereafter?

Maybe I look at films too literally (this is possible). If God can be fitted into a particular science fiction universe with no contradictions (say, the universes of Frankenstein, Eternal Sunshine of the Spotless Mind, or Videodrome) then I don't have any problem watching the movie (God doesn't have to be actually discussed or mentioned in the plot; his presence just has to be implied); but once a filmic universe denies God I start to feel very uncomfortable (some problematic universes for me would be those of 2001, Star Wars and Star Trek).

I agree that 2001 has the texture of spirituality, and I have tried to read the film in terms of theistic evolution and with the monolith as a metaphor for God, but this ultimately doesn't work, and I do not believe that the film allows for any form of Christian reading. If Kubrick and Clarke deny God, why would any Christian want to sit in the dark and do the same, even if for only two and a half hours?

Likewise George Lucas with Star Wars; To me, these films effectively begin with the legend "a long time ago in a galaxy far, far away, there was no God...". Allegorical readings might be possible, and some in this forum, whose opinions I respect, have tried to convince me of this before, but, frankly, I don't see it, and I can't help but picture Tertullian, wagging his finger and asking "What has Tatooine to do with Jerusalem?"

This post has been edited by The Invisible Man: 12 April 2006 - 04:45 AM

[M. Leary]

I agree. But for me it goes beyond humanist approaches and into myth. I think that Jung would probably say that the genre, from Poe and Lovecraft on, is essentially religious in the sense that it's about humans encountering some kind of wondrous, perhaps frightening "other" in what is a "religious" or humbling experience. And how often is human "scientific" arrogance punished or satirized in the genre?

Great, great topic. And this is well said G. I would even want to talk about more recent things like William Gibson's Pattern Recognition as indicative of some of his over-riding spiritual concerns. The fact is that advertising, media, and consumerism are all at base very "spiritual" issues. From a Christian perspective they strike at questions regarding personhood, desire, and the search for substantive things. Guys like Gibson just come along and extrapolate current trends in these cultural issues to their logical extremes, in his novels we come into contact with people having to come to grips with what it is like to attempt to "be a person" when contemporary culture plays out. Gibson's novels are a way of speaking about the present in terms of an imagined future.

And this gets far more serious when Sci-Fi deals with cloning and bio-ethical issues that N. Katherine Hayles talks about under the umbrella term as "posthumanity" (in How We Became Post-Human, also in Fukuyama's Our Posthuman Future...). How can we talk about Christian theology when our very conception of what it means to be human has changed? There are a few Evangelical and more-broadly Christian think-tanks trying to deal with this problem, but the bald fact is that sci-fi literature has dealt with this issue since the 50's at the very least. They have asked the questions, and demonstrated their significance in literature in ways that Christian theology has yet to catch up with. Sterling's Schizmatrix really keyed me into the fact that in our lifetimes we may face vastly alternative conceptions to humanity than the one offered by the Judeo-Christian mythos.

David Dark once told me that he always gives Le Guin's The Dispossessed as a wedding gift to people, as it speaks so clearly about gender distinctions. I soon read it afterward and found it to be a beautiful, hauntingly spiritual revelation of personhood and gender. These sorts of gender issues are also taken up in a lot of Jeff Noon's novels, which at the very least demonstrate that all the gender and sexuality questions of our day have a vast spiritual significance for the future. And by "spiritual," I mean that in a Christian context, as we need to start thinking more clearly about how Christian spirituality relates to gender and sexuality.

I agree that 2001 has the texture of spirituality, and I have tried to read the film in terms of theistic evolution and with the monolith as a metaphor for God, but this ultimately doesn't work, and I do not believe that the film allows for any form of Christian reading. If Kubrick and Clarke deny God, why would any Christian want to sit in the dark and do the same, even if for only two and a half hours?

I think you are mostly right in this, in that even Kubrick's reliance on various images in Greek mythology show that 2001 is a major artifact of Western rational spirituality. It is our major lasting icon of the Enlightenment in this respect. But as it is so clearly spiritual, it is a film that demands a response in the vocabulary of Christian spirituality. 2001 brings us quickly into the orbit of spiritual filmmaking, and serves as a good point of departure for talking about what "spiritual" filmmaking is all about. I will go quickly out on a limb and say that 2001 and The Passion of the Christ have a great deal in common, both films take us to the extreme visual limit of their respective spiritual traditions. They ultimately function the same way.

[opus]

Good call on the anime, Doug. Some of the more, um, "mature" titles, such as Ghost In The Shell and Akira are certainly full of themes about existence, man's responsibility to his creation, man's attempts to seek and control power that is not his (i.e. "play God"). Of course, with anime, there's plenty of dross and stuff that is downright vile, but again, that just makes the good stuff shine all the more.

I agree that 2001 has the texture of spirituality, and I have tried to read the film in terms of theistic evolution and with the monolith as a metaphor for God, but this ultimately doesn't work, and I do not believe that the film allows for any form of Christian reading. If Kubrick and Clarke deny God, why would any Christian want to sit in the dark and do the same, even if for only two and a half hours?

Not to sound flippant, but even if a filmmaker/author/artist denies God in their doesn't mean God won't go ahead and use their work without their permission. All truth is God's truth, as Jeffrey said.

I'm sure all of us can think of works of art that move and inspire us, and communicate Truth to us, but were created by artists who actively deny God. I'm not necessarily saying this is the case with 2001 (it's been years since I've seen the movie), and this is obviously where discernment and conviction have to play a role, but if we ignore art just because the artist has denied the existence of God (either implicitly or explicitly), than we might as well become blind and deaf.

Moreover, just because we sit in the dark for two and a half hours, and watch a movie made by such a person doesn't mean that we're agreeing with them, that we're denying God ourselves. Even if I know that a movie actively promotes the absence of God, there could still be value in watching it, even if the worldview presented by the movie is completely opposed to mine. Of course, it could prove much more problematic for me, so I need to exercise wisdom, do research on the film, etc. But again, if we write off art just because the artist writes off God, well, then these forums would be a much emptier place.

[M. Leary]

I also want to add this link for Susan Sontag's famous essay on The Imagination of Disaster.

In it she says:
“...science fiction films may also be described as a popular mythology for the contemporary negative imagination about the impersonal.”

and:

"What I am suggesting is that the imagery of disaster in science fiction is above all the emblem of an inadequate response.”

and:

“...we live under continual threat of two equally fearful, but seemingly opposed, destinies: unremitting banality and inconceivable terror. It is fantasy, served out in large ration by the popular arts, which allows most people to cope with these twin specters. For one job that fantasy can do is to lift us out of the unbearably humdrum and to distract us from terrors—real or anticipated—by an escape into exotic, dangerous situations which have last minute happy endings.”

Her take is then that sc-fi films do try to deal with the sense of trauma that looms over contemporary society, but while such films are indicative of our need to deal with this spiritual catastrophe at the center of culture and politics they always end up being inadequate. Her view of sci-fi disaster films is ultimately negative, but mainly because they are incapable of keeping up with the spiritual realities they tap into.

[The Invisible Man]

I'm sure all of us can think of works of art that move and inspire us, and communicate Truth to us, but were created by artists who actively deny God. I'm not necessarily saying this is the case with 2001 (it's been years since I've seen the movie), and this is obviously where discernment and conviction have to play a role, but if we ignore art just because the artist has denied the existence of God (either implicitly or explicitly), than we might as well become blind and deaf.

If we write off art just because the artist writes off God, well, then these forums would be a much emptier place.

I don't agree. Christians should be selective.

If it turns out that an atheist creates a work of art that contains Christian truth (and, as I indicated at the outset, I personally regard any form of "spirituality" that isn't Christian in flavour as pseudo-spirituality), then that work has relevance to me (the original version of Donnie Darko being a case in point); but if a film denies God and its Christian elements are so slight as to be barely noticeable, then I see no point in watching it or wasting time thinking about it. Why would a Christian want to partake of a work of art that denies God in the first place?

So personally I do write off art that writes off God.

This post has been edited by The Invisible Man: 12 April 2006 - 09:04 AM

[M. Leary]

So what do we do with some of the language in the Hebrew Scriptures that expresses indignation at some of God's choices, or laments the meaninglessness of life, or even praises acts of violence and war?

Some would probably respond by saying that in these situations you have someone with the covenant community just expressing their confusion, or being mistaken, or thinking in a period before the progressive revelation of Jesus Christ in the New Testament (thus making their thoughts "Old Testament" thoughts). But that isn't quite true, as something like Ecclesiastes is often as dark as any of the "spiritualities" you think "write off God." And what do we do about something like Esther, which is part of our Bible even though it doesn't mention God at all.

I am simply suggesting that your definition of Christian spirituality isn't exactly too narrow, but simply may not have taken into account the incredible range of spiritual expression embodied by the Bible itself. I am with you on not calling elements of truth in things like 2001 "Christian" truths, because they aren't until they have been transposed back over into Christian language. But there has to be room in Christian spirituality for doubt and the occasional "writing off of God."

This post has been edited by MLeary: 12 April 2006 - 09:10 AM

[Overstreet]

Jesus asked questions of those to whom he ministered. He heard them out. And he responded.

Art is human expression... the most profound form of human expression, because it attempts to communicate things that cannot be reduced to paraphrase.

If I refuse to examine art by those who do not believe, I am not listening to them or attending to their perspectives.

The more I attend to the art of the godless, the more I come to understand their perspective, what they are saying they need, what they do not understand, where their arguments fail. Further, I see my own rationalizations and sins and arrogance and blindness mirrored. In short, just as Saint Paul was able to employ his knowledge of pagan mythology at Mars Hill and use it to reveal its uninentional--and yet profound--appeal for God, so can we.

Many of the most profound works of art that have moved me to worship, to repentance, to prayer, to contepmlation, and to an appreciation of beauty have been made by people who do not yet know or acknowledge God.

Philippians 4:8 lists all of the things we are to dwell on: "Whatever is right, whatever is pure, whatever is lovely, whatever is of good repute, if there is anything excellent, or anything worthy of praise, let your mind dwell on these things."

I have found just as much or more that is excellent and worthy of praise in the art of unbelievers than in the art of believers. And I have found a dismaying amount of mediocrity, arrogance, sloppiness, and plagiarism in the art of people who name Christ as their savior.

When God delivered his instructions for the tabernacle, he didn't call for the best believers to come and build it. He called for the best craftsmen.

[Anders]

I will go quickly out on a limb and say that 2001 and The Passion of the Christ have a great deal in common, both films take us to the extreme visual limit of their respective spiritual traditions. They ultimately function the same way.

Thank you M! My brother and I said the same thing to people soon after the film was released.

And I just want to thank everyone participating for making this one of the best threads we've had in a long time. Hopefully I'll have some time to chime in with something more meaningful in a bit, but I'm just working on an MA paper on Milton's Samson Agonistes (which I just mention because I think the biblical story of Samson is one that fits in with some of the more problematic OT stories that M alluded to).

[Doug C]

I agree that 2001 has the texture of spirituality, and I have tried to read the film in terms of theistic evolution and with the monolith as a metaphor for God, but this ultimately doesn't work, and I do not believe that the film allows for any form of Christian reading. If Kubrick and Clarke deny God, why would any Christian want to sit in the dark and do the same, even if for only two and a half hours?

Well, first of all, because Christians are not omniscient and though we may believe we're connected to One who is, there is still quite a bit of mystery in the world and in God and in ourselves, and we are created relational beings. We have been placed in a world teeming with diversity. We are still fallible and limited and we need to listen and learn and comment, particularly to any genuine questions and expressions of what it means to be human. And as Tony Campolo has modelled (in evangelical terms), "We Have Met the Enemy and They Are Partly Right: Learning from the Critics of Christianity."

The National Catholic Office for Motion Pictures gave 2001 its 1968 award for Best Film of Educational Value, saying that the film, "by the scope of its imaginative vision of man--his origins, his creative encounter with the universe, and his unfathomed potential for the future--immerses the eye, the ear, and the intuitive responses of the viewer in a uniquely stimulating human experience." That may not be the Roman Road, but to me, it certainly is spiritual and provokes many Christian questions, and it doesn't require turning the monolith into a Christ figure to do so. The film can be taken on its own terms. Actually, I think oddball Christian makeovers are often the worst of so-called "Christian Criticism" given that their interpretations are only meaningful to other Christians and ultimately reveal little about the specific film in question.

[goneganesh]

Invisible Man wrote: "I don't agree about Lovecraft being religious (or, at least, religious in any Christian sense). The Cthulhu Mythos has been embraced by certain factions within the occult community for a reason.

And doesn't Poe's raven squawk "nevermore" when questioned about a sweet hereafter?"

You're right, of course, Invisible, about Poe and Lovecraft if we're talking about a factual, biographical level of their creative lives. But they both embody a peculiar contradiction that makes them still speak to people through time: they are absolute rationalists who are obsessed with the fantastic. Now, we're perfectly able to look at this as the ravings of people who are consumed by the occult. With the caveat, of course, that a truly rationalist, atheist person would make no disctinction between Poe and your good self with regards to your sanity. To that person, you are both consumed with a world of fantasy.

What's interesting to me about Poe and Lovecraft as the founders of this SF tradition, is less the intention, but the real artistic problem that they faced, and their response. Which was: how do we get our spiritual needs met in a technological world that doesn't acknowledge officially that there is any such thing as spirit. I tend to see these "fairy tales" as coming from a genuine need in people for belief, but in the context of a schizoid mindset that is both superstitious and rationalist.

Is it possible that SF might be a halfway house for modern people on the path to true religious belief?

Invisible Man wrote: Maybe I look at films too literally (this is possible). If God can be fitted into a particular science fiction universe with no contradictions (say, the universes of Frankenstein, Eternal Sunshine of the Spotless Mind, or Videodrome) then I don't have any problem watching the movie (God doesn't have to be actually discussed or mentioned in the plot; his presence just has to be implied); but once a filmic universe denies God I start to feel very uncomfortable (some problematic universes for me would be those of 2001, Star Wars and Star Trek).

Then there's always the problematic case of Buñuel whose mocking atheism is as pronounced as his gift for expressing the paradoxes of and real tribulations of Christian belief.

Invisible, here you're facing a harsh reality vis a vis most recent art, movies and literature: The vast majority of them "deny God". You are forced either to head for the hermitage, or into charitably inserting religious themes or boxing God into the mix to justify spending $8.50 on Aeon Flux. You may be polemically over-stating your position, here.

MLeary wrote: "And this gets far more serious when Sci-Fi deals with cloning and bio-ethical issues that N. Katherine Hayles talks about under the umbrella term as "posthumanity" (in How We Became Post-Human, also in Fukuyama's Our Posthuman Future...). How can we talk about Christian theology when our very conception of what it means to be human has changed? There are a few Evangelical and more-broadly Christian think-tanks trying to deal with this problem, but the bald fact is that sci-fi literature has dealt with this issue since the 50's at the very least. They have asked the questions, and demonstrated their significance in literature in ways that Christian theology has yet to catch up with. Sterling's Schizmatrix really keyed me into the fact that in our lifetimes we may face vastly alternative conceptions to humanity than the one offered by the Judeo-Christian mythos."

This is the crux of the matter. Christian thinkers really need to grapple with the FORCE of technology and what it means for our Humanity. They can't really afford to keep naively saying that it is a neutral element in the material existence of humanity. Technology seems to be, as Heidegger mysteriously said, a Spirit. And it may be the resistance to dealing with this issue comes from the fact that Christian thinkers are confronted by realities that force them to question the strict and cozy duality of matter and spirit. What happens when as you say, humans become partially and genetically "machined"? And does matter have or generate spirit? I think a Letter on Technology is long overdue from the powers that be. You don't have to go back to the days of Galileo to talk about these things.

This post has been edited by goneganesh: 12 April 2006 - 10:37 AM

[M. Leary]

Good stuff all around, what a great thread. It is interesting how easily this "Science-Fiction Film and Christian Spirituality" discussion turns into a discussion about how Christian spirituality relates more generally to film.

I forgot to toss in Stalker as such an epic example of Christian spirituality intersecting with science fiction. As a "rubble film," a genre that uses wastelands and/or bombed and broken urban centers as backdrops for questioning themes like faith and justice, Stalker is a great example of sci-fi film using an imaginative future environment to let us encounter the sort of doubt and anguish Sontag describes in The Imagination of Distaster.

I am becoming a broken record on this point, but it has been striking to go back through few "rubble films" and realize that we can read Ezra and Nehemiah the same way, as "rubble texts." Perhaps this is science-fiction training us in new Christian reading behaviors.

This post has been edited by MLeary: 12 April 2006 - 10:39 AM