New Anne Rice novel from the point of view of 7-year old Jesus

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I am not an Anne Rice fan . . . several of my friends read her books in high school and very confused about life after trying to adopt her philosophies.
 
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Jayson:
She used some non-canonical texts as sources of research and as a result you have Jesus killing a bully and bringing him back to life and you have him making birds out of clay and things like that.

I don’t think Jesus would kill someone just because he could. That would be a sin, and therefore couldn’t have happened.
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I also don’t agree with this portrayal of Christ, or with the idea of the young Jesus discovering that He has “supernatural abilities.” To me, it seems that God does not have “supernatural abilities,” like the fictional Harry Potter. God has God-ness, so He can do things we find supernatural. The idea of a child Jesus performing miracles that didn’t flow from His unity with the Father and with the Father’s purpose, but rather from the selfish use of some kind of supernatural ability, is one that doesn’t sit well with me. For some reason, I feel that it implies two separate gods and denies the reality of the Trinity. The Gospels portray Jesus as always emphasizing that His authority and power came from the Father and that He was “about [His] Father’s business.”
 
I, too, object to her use of non-canonical texts. Those texts were rejected for a reason, and can be very misleading.

I hope Ann Rice is spiritually open and will allow herself to grow and improve in her writing.
 
I think that the belief that Christ “discovered” who He actually was has been officially condemned by the Church as a heresy. The book sounds very New Agee to me.
 
First off, Jesus was the one who told Mary and Joseph about who he was (remember the lost and found/in the temple passage?) This would not have been a “secret” kept from Jesus by the extended family, but by Jesus, Mary, and Joseph from the extended family. Every appearance we have from the Bible is that it was assumed by on-lookers that Jesus was Joseph’s son.

Further, I have a problem with any writer making up stories about Jesus. It just seems fundamentally wrong to me. We know what we need to know about him! If we want to see our own lives in the lives of the holy, read the stories of the saints! Plenty there to keep us going, and it is non-fiction.

Lastly, Anne Rice wrote erotica books under a pen name. She has now supposedly converted to Catholicism, but per her own words is a thorn in the church’s side in that she has an explicit agenda concerning female ordination and gay marriage (her son is gay). Hardly one I would look to to present an Orthodox view of Christ. The few comments I’ve seen here (such as that none of her source texts are Catholic, that she refers to Jesus’ siblings, that she implies that Jesus did not know of his own divinity, etc) make me even more secure in my knowledge that this is not a book for me.
 
I’m going to read it. It looks interesting, and from the interview that I read with her (it’s on AveMariaRadio) she’s trying to be a good Catholic.

She made a (two hour) confession about her erotica and other books and about all that she’s done and she said that she will not go back to vampires and darker writings.

I have also read Interview with the Vampire and I liked it. Reading The Vampire Lestat and it’s a bit iffy, but I skip the scenes that aren’t that good.

I think we should give her a chance.

For all we know, if we boycott her and dislike her, we may drive her back to being athiest.
 
It’s wonderful that Ann Rice has converted. Whether she’s totally orthodox or not, God will guide her, I’m sure.
It’s not easy and must have required courage for her to do this. I converted after publishing my first book, which was about a witch, and never was able to sell another book after that. (The one below is self-published) I was really good at writing dark, semi-erotic stuff but couldn’t do it as a Christian. So I admire her for continuing on her journey to the church.

But I too find it problematic to write a fictional book using Jesus as a character. After all, He’s alive and around nowadays, it’s like writing a book about George Bush’s childhood. It’s too weird, but if it brings people closer to Him, it will turn out to be good.
 
I read the book and I didn’t find anything bad about it. I didn’t like her using the Jesus killing the little boy thing…but that was about it. And the ‘secret’ being kept from Jesus isn’t really what you think. Jesus doesn’t know who he is in it, true, but I don’t have a problem with that theory. I’m really very doubtful that it’s a heresy! He didn’t know who He was when he was a 2 month old. Makes sense he’d have to gradually learn about it. Anyways…the book is fine as far as I’m concerned about being in line with Catholic doctrine, except for that thing where he kills the kid. My problem with the book was that it was just boring. I guess a lot of people wouldn’t have that opinion of it…but I did think it was boring, with only a few interesting parts. Her portrayal of The Blessed Virgin was pretty sweet though, which I liked. She is described many times as very innocent and child like in the book. So if you wanna read it and are worried about heretical stuff in it, I wouldn’t worry. But personally, I like her earlier works a WHOLE lot more.
 
Oren,

<<But personally, I like her earlier works a WHOLE lot more.>>

Someone I know who read her earlier works said they should be rated triple-x. Are these the earlier works you mean?
 
You know,

There’s something very odd about someone who has a sudden “conversion” and then proceeds to challenge many of the central tenets of what she converted to. It’s also strange that the first creative thing she does is to write a book using gnostic and heretical sources against which the Church she just joined has been fighting a running battle for 2000 years. They’re not trivial matters! They go to the core of the faith both morally and theologically. It might be a good idea to keep in mind that someone attacking the Church from “within” gets much more press than someone who attacks it from without.

A quote from Hans Urs von Balthasar who was hugely influential on both JP2 and B-16 (some say the greatest theologian since Aquinas)–“The man Jesus Christ is not subsequently raised to being this image of God; from the very beginning he was aware of being such.” This shouldn’t be dismissed as poetic license on her part. It’s a heresy that goes to the very heart of who Christ is…but Ann Rice, former homoerotic vampire writer and brand new convert knows better.

Pray but verify!
 
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MarkR:
You know,

There’s something very odd about someone who has a sudden “conversion” and then proceeds to challenge many of the central tenets of what she converted to. It’s also strange that the first creative thing she does is to write a book using gnostic and heretical sources against which the Church she just joined has been fighting a running battle for 2000 years. They’re not trivial matters! They go to the core of the faith both morally and theologically. It might be a good idea to keep in mind that someone attacking the Church from “within” gets much more press than someone who attacks it from without.

A quote from Hans Urs von Balthasar who was hugely influential on both JP2 and B-16 (some say the greatest theologian since Aquinas)–“The man Jesus Christ is not subsequently raised to being this image of God; from the very beginning he was aware of being such.” This shouldn’t be dismissed as poetic license on her part. It’s a heresy that goes to the very heart of who Christ is…but Ann Rice, former homoerotic vampire writer and brand new convert knows better.

Pray but verify!
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:amen:
(Well said!)
 
I just checked this book out of the library–I couldn’t resist it. The reviews have been mixed, so I’m interested.
 
Dorothy I’m referring to my faves of her old works, like The Vampire Lestat, Tale of the Body Thief, Blackwood Farm, The Witching Hour, The Mummy, Lasher. They’re alot better than this new one of hers. About the whole triple X rating…I dunno…I read from when I was 13 years old and they never bothered me or anyone else I knew who read em. I guess it just depends on what you like or whatever.
 
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Oren:
Dorothy I’m referring to my faves of her old works, like The Vampire Lestat, Tale of the Body Thief, Blackwood Farm, The Witching Hour, The Mummy, Lasher. They’re alot better than this new one of hers. About the whole triple X rating…I dunno…I read from when I was 13 years old and they never bothered me or anyone else I knew who read em. I guess it just depends on what you like or whatever.
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She wrote erotica under another name.

And her books aren’t that bad. I read The Interview with the Vampire and I didn’t even catch the homosexual themes that are supposedly there. Louis and Lestat just seemed like friends.
 
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