The need for more good literature.
My eyes glazed over a photo of four people in suits looking important. Even though I usually know better, my eyes turned to see how many “likes” the photo got – a lot. The quartet were representatives from a faith community. They conveyed a sense of importance, effectiveness and rationality – like they could solve all the problems in the world – or at least they were trying to. No doubt they would spend the next few days locked up in a room coming up with strategies for fixing our messed up world.
I had a cheeky thought.
What would happen if we replaced that photo with four people dressed as clowns, artists, a rag-tag bunch of musicians and writers and poets? Could they too solve our problems today? Would they get as many “likes”? What sort of solutions and offerings would they come up with?
Dallas Willard suggested in The Divine Conspiracy that “sometimes important things can be presented in literature or art that cannot be effectively conveyed in any other way.” Art and literature speak softly yet powerfully especially in dark times to convey truth, meaning and hope. I often wonder that Jesus used parables – a literary technique- to covey messages more than he used sermons. Parables are evocative, they elicit questions rather than answers and have multiple meanings- they are highly contextual. It can’t be by accident that Jesus employed this literary technique. He must have wanted to evoke feelings, thoughts and action in his hearers rather than tell them what to do. People would need to think for themselves and create new ideas and ways of being.
In my upcoming book I’m looking at an “everyday spirituality” that we can experience through the creative process. This is a spirituality that not only gives us solace in a disturbed world but also compels us to act and contribute creatively for the good of our world.
Maybe rag-tag prophets, artists, writers, poets and creatives can in an alternate way evoke things not yet envisioned in the dark times we are living in today. They may not come up with “solutions” but they can make us think, wonder and live into a new imagination for the future.
(For a fairly good take on transcendent themes in current movies take a look at this link https://artsandfaith.com/the-arts-faith-ecumenical-jury-2025)
Rev. Dr Karina Kreminski, Mission Catalyst – Formation and Fresh Expressions, Uniting Mission and Education. Karina also blogs at An Ordinary Mystic.
