My Take: Why I support Anne Rice but am still a Christian

[MormonHero]

From Brian McLaren, an “Emergent Christian/small-c catholic” response to Anne Rice

So I do not condemn or criticize Anne in any way. I’m glad she has followed her conscience and articulated the reasons for doing so. That’s good for her, and it may be good for the church, too. Sometimes, powerful people only listen when they see enough people voting with their feet.

I haven’t taken that step myself, though I think about it quite often. (As recently as last week when I heard about the pastor planning to burn Qurans on September 11. Sheesh.)

I hang in there for several reasons. First, if I want to be affiliated with any group of human beings, sooner or later I will be associated with bigotry, intolerance, violence, stupidity, and pride. In fact, even if I stand alone, distancing myself from every other group, I know that within me there are the seeds of all these things. So there’s no escaping the human condition.

Second, if I were to leave to join some new religion that claims to have – at last! – perfected the way of being pristine and genuine through and through, we all know where that’s going to lead. There’s one thing worse than a failed old religion: a naïve and arrogant new one. In that light, maybe only religions that have acknowledged and learned from their failures have much to offer.

Third, I’ve decided that if I’m going to have solidarity with one failed religion, I might as well have solidarity with them all. So rather than surrendering my identity as a Christian, I’ve redefined it so it doesn’t mean that I feel superior to anybody. Instead, it means that as a failed member of a failed religion, and I’m in solidarity with all other failed members of failed religions … and with people who have dropped out of failed religions as well.

Perhaps it’s this truly catholic (small-c) solidarity in failure that really counts most, for Catholics, Protestants, and everybody else. Those who leave religion and those who stay can work to expand that gracious space of solidarity, which, I think, is what Jesus called “the kingdom of God.”

 

[Watchman]

So the idea of “Truth” doesn’t enter into his equation?

 

[FickleFreckled]

Anne Rice has left Christianity? Interesting. It hasn’t been that long since her book about returning to Catholicism came out, with all her glowing memories of a Catholic childhood and waxing poetic about Christ and the Church. I imagine she’s still making big bucks from it. She ended it with a tirade against the Church for its view of homosexuality and same-sex marriage, which was disappointing. So I’m not really surprised. Maybe we shouldn’t be looking to celebrities for spiritual leadership, huh? They have a nasty habit of hopping from one thing to another with equal enthusiasm.

 

[IHeartAquinas]

No, she didn’t leave Christianity. She just bottled up her ideas concerning Christ, refused to let anyone else look at them, labeled them as true, and walked away from the Church. Now she’s a non-denominational who knows more about how Christ thinks than anyone else.

Good author, though.

 

[FickleFreckled]

I haven’t read her vampire books; was just interested in her books about the life of Christ and her return to Catholicism. She’s very good about returning emails; she must be getting some interesting ones lately.

 

[MormonHero]

She’s very good about returning emails; she must be getting some interesting ones lately.

Knock yourself out.

 

[bluerose]

I was in Phoenix for Sunday Mass yesterday when the priest mentioned Anne Rice in his homily… that when she admitted to having problems accepting the Church’s position on homosexuality, contraception and abortion, he wrote her and invited her to visit with him and offered to help her study and understand the Church’s position on these issues, but she “was not interested”. A few letters were exchanged, but in the end, she went ahead and left the Church. He asked for us all to pray for her.

 

[Izdaari]

No, she didn’t leave Christianity. She just bottled up her ideas concerning Christ, refused to let anyone else look at them, labeled them as true, and walked away from the Church. Now she’s a non-denominational who knows more about how Christ thinks than anyone else.

Good author, though.

I think that’s essentially it. She says she still loves Christ, but doesn’t agree with the Church. And being a cradle Catholic who strayed into agnosticism, then returned, she tends to think of the Catholic Church as being Christianity. She says she’s left Christianity, but what she means is she’s left Catholicism, while remaining a Christ-follower. My guess is that she’s an emergent/liberal Christian, very like McLaren. And like me, though I’m less liberal than McLaren.