MUST I Care About The Da Vinci Code? Part I

Because the Da Vinci Code has dominated the precincts of evangelicalism, I felt DVC fatigue…a year ago. This past month I’ve felt accosted on all sides by DVC frenzy.  This May, one of my favorite blogs, The A-Team, became All Da Vinci, All The Time. I affirm what the A-Team, Darrell Bock and others have done to respond to DVC; I’m glad they do what they do. However, I don’t personally care about this fad.

Part of my sense of being hemmed in by evangelicals regarding DVC is the repeated assertion [by some] that those who care about non-believers won't miss this incredible opportunity (!) provided by popular culture to connect with non-believers. Ah, guilt…it does a body good.  This past week I’ve noticed material from Christianity Today and Books and Culture saying or insinuating that if you miss this incredible opportunity you suckle at the breast of loser Christianity.

But I really just don’t care. I tried to make myself care for a while, but it didn’t work. I couldn’t muster up the...interest? time?....to make myself read the book or now watch the movie.

You might think, “Ah, he’s got a remnant of fundamentalist separatist boycotter in him.” Hardly. I’ve got strong eye muscles from rolling my eyes at the evangelical boycotts that have come down the pike the last ten years.  In 1996, when the Southern Baptist Convention declared their boycott, I joined Michael Jordan, Tom Brady and my other peers in athletic stardom in saying, “I’m going to Disney World!”

Regarding DVC, I’m an apathist. I feel no outrage at the novelist for writing fiction about Mary Magdalene and the Church. I feel no urgency that Brown’s fiction might prevail against the Church. Call me crazy, call me complacent, but I tend to think the Church is slightly more durable than the Da Vinci Code.

Mostly it’s because I have a full life. I have a calling to be faithful to, plus a stack of great, unread books by my desk, plus wonderful friends and neighbors to do life together. Some of my Christian friends in the past year have brought up DVC, and I think one of my non-Christian friends has read the book (I prescribe Bock and Bill Wilder). The rest seem to have full lives and just haven’t been interested in the DVC phenomenon either. 

All of this relates to an insoluble question that haunts me: To what degree does the world set the agenda for the Church? Assuming this blog lasts for a while, you’ll probably read this many times in the future. I frequently ponder the 1968 World Council of Churches (WCC) declaration, “The World Sets The Agenda for the Church.”

Christians a lot smarter, more thoughtful and more erudite than I am have insisted in writings and in personal conversation that I must bend to the world.  They see something I just don’t see.  I hear the “must” and I think, “Really? Must I?”  Derek Webb echoes in my head, “Don’t you ever let anyone tell you that there’s anything that you need…but Me.”

I don’t have “missional” figured out but I do (really) buy what I know of it. However, I dispute that being “on mission” requires that the world set the agenda for me personally or for the Church corporately. Does the world affect things? Absolutely. Because we are social creatures and because collectively the Church is (in part) a social group as well as being a spiritual entity, we relate socially to people and collectives of people around us. Does this affect us? Yes.

See Part II on Friday.

© 2006, Glenn Lucke.

Comments

[Vicky]

Great post, Glenn. I especially relish the phrase "if you miss this incredible opportunity you suckle at the breast of loser Christianity." Why? because the ironic tone reminds that Christianity isn't about winners and losers, but about nothing being essential but Him (as you mention later in the post).

Memories from when I was a non-Christian remind me forcefully that what attracts people to Christianity is the difference, not the likeness, to "the world" (whatever that turns out to mean at the moment--). It's an arresting difference. I keep trying to figure out best ways to be in the world and not of it; that's a constant question for us all, I suppose.

Vicky

[Glenn]

Thanks, Vicky. I agree that the question of "in the world but not of it" is an eternal tension with which we will always wrestle. At least I don't have it figured out, and none of my friends do. But it's usually stimulating to talk the question/tension out, week after week, in community.

As for the "loser Christianity" phrase, years ago the guy the Lord used to bring me to faith in college, Ross, played a song by an old duo that had the line, "...all of the losers win." Ross, the alpha males of all alpha males that I know, wanted to talk this concept out with me-- that we're ALL losers, we ALL need Jesus. This was a LONG time ago but it made an indelible impression on this new Christian.

And because of Jesus, all of us losers are no longer losers at the foot of the Cross. There is only one Gospel- for losers- and in the Kingdom that that Good News heralds, there is no loser Christianity.

[Vynette]

The Qur'an and The Code

Dan Brown, quite unwittingly I'm sure, has done us a great service - he has made known to the general population the existence of certain 'stories' about Jesus.

The Qur'an's portrayal of the 'Virgin Mary' and Brown's Da Vinci Code share a common genesis and will eventually meet up at the same destination.

How can this be? Well...a couple of millenia or so, ago, a thirst to know more about Jesus than the gospels revealed gave rise to the concoction of various 'fables'.

These 'fables' were tailored specifically to resonate with certain audiences and to meet perceived needs and prevailing 'expectations'.
Naturally therefore, they were riddled with historical and other errors.

The Da Vinci Code and part of the Qur'an's 'Virgin Mary' story borrowed material from this 'fabled' library and, living up to time-honoured tradition,
tailored their own 'fables' to resonate with certain audiences and to meet perceived needs and prevailing 'expectations'.
Naturally therefore, they also are riddled with historical and other errors.

Being only a 'lending' library, however, these 'fables' based on 'fables' will eventually be called in by their rightful owner - the great 'fable' library of history.