c. 2008 Religion News Service

(UNDATED) Where did this idea originate _ that Christianity is about being “nice”?

It is an odd outcome and irrational progression from Jesus, whose very arrival on earth threatened to overturn everything: the Roman Empire, the Jewish religious powers and most significantly, the lives of every human on earth.

Essayist Annie Dillard noted the dissonance between “American Christianity” and that of its founder, describing contemporary Christians as “cheerful, brainless tourists on a packaged tour of the Absolute.”

There’s more.

“On the whole I do not find Christians, outside the catacombs, sufficiently sensible of the conditions,” she said. “Does anybody have the foggiest idea what sort of power we so blithely invoke? Or, as I suspect, does no one believe a word of it?”

Three recent strands intertwine to bring the problem of “Christian niceness” to mind.

First, there is sociologist Christian Smith’s study in which he finds today’s young people practicing an aberrant form of Christianity that he calls “moralistic, therapeutic deism” _ nice people having their personal needs met by a God who is there in case of emergency, like a parachute on an airplane. This is not Jesus’ version of the faith.

Second, there is a conversation I had with a young “Christian film school” professor at the International Arts Movement in New York. He commented that if he had to make a choice, he would rather his students be the best people than the best filmmakers. This kind of muddled thinking may explain why these filmmakers are making such bad films and asking Christians to support them. After all, shouldn’t we support films made by such nice Christians?

It was odd having this conversation at IAM, a gathering that exists specifically to elevate the craftsmanship in art, standing on the shoulders of the Apostle Paul who said, “Whatever you do, do it to the glory of God.” The passion for artistic excellence and personal integrity are not mutually exclusive pursuits. Just look at C.S. Lewis and J.R.R. Tolkien.

Which leads me to a third problem.

In today’s commercially driven pop culture, where Christians have become defined as nice people who are not really concerned about intellectual or aesthetic excellence, the result is the sudden proliferation of insipid faith-fueled, family-friendly films produced by and for people who like such stuff.

Most of Hollywood, having witnessed “The Passion of the Christ,” did not see the story of Jesus, who died for humanity to transform it; they saw an opportunity to make money. As Andy Warhol said, “Money is more American than thinking.”

Having heard Christians complain for years about sexual content and nudity in their films, and having observed that G-rated family films actually can deliver audience and profits, they embarked on a path to produce films made by and aimed at “nice Christians.”

I was recently on the PBS show “Religion & Ethics NewsWeekly” talking about “God and Hollywood” and the low-budget productions made by Fox Faith for the Christian audience. Most of these films never made it to the big screen, and so far, the financial results have been disappointing.

Here’s what I told PBS: Generally, to make a good film, you’ve got to spend money, and Fox Faith has not spent good money. Therefore, they’re not making good films. Therefore, they’re not successful.

But the problem with “marketing niceness” has more severe consequences than economic ones. When Pollyannaish storylines like “Facing the Giants” become the definition of the good news offered by Christians, we have lost the essence of the gospel.

We’re coming up on the Easter season, and Jesus died on a cross. The Christian story has a resurrection, but it also has a lot of messiness in it. If you want to tell the Christian story, it’s not just a feel-good story. It’s a story that has substantial pain and suffering and sorrow in it, just like our lives do.

The gospel of Jesus Christ is not just about comforting the afflicted; it is also about afflicting the comfortable. Being Christian is not just about being nice.

(Dick Staub is the author of “The Culturally Savvy Christian” and the host of The Kindlings Muse (http://www.thekindlings.com). His blog can be read at http://www.dickstaub.com)

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