With numerous Christian films like God's Not Dead, Heaven Is For Real and Saving Christmas, it seems that Christians are getting a larger say in hollywood, largely because of all the money these films are making. And yet, strangely, secular and Christian reviewers are staunchly critical of these movies. The most recent of these; Saving Christmas, actually has been recognized by IMDB as the worst movie ever in terms of user reviews on their site. Likewise, in the case of God's Not Dead, Christian reviewers tended to see the movie as shallow and uncharitable. Having watched at least some of these movies myself, I can't help but feel the same way. There seems to be a huge disconnect between what these movies are arguing for and reality, let alone the truth of the Christian viewpoint historically. This has had the ironic result of discrediting Christianity even more by demonstrating Christians who don't seem to understand atheists, homosexuals or the nonreligious in general. But why is this the case?
Centrally, I believe this is because the Evangelical Church as a whole has committed a fundamental miscalculation as to how best to relate to its surrounding culture. Evangelical leaders see pop-culture as the language through which ideas are now communicated. So they reason, it seems logical that we have to explain the gospel through the language or medium of pop-culture in order for it to make sense to the unbeliever. Hence, churches began selling t-shirts, having bands play on stages in their newly built auditoriums and producing all sorts of other merchandise. The problem is pop-culture doesn't operate this way at all. Pop-culture does not allow ideas in general to be communicated but specifically, ideas that are entertaining. Pop-culture acts as the hub for all things fun, entertaining, pleasurable and delicious. Thus it is impossible to communicate the gospel through this hub without making it into something fun and entertaining.
Well of course this doesn't work out very well, especially when churches are also committed to taking the gospel seriously and devoting their lives to Christ. And so this creates an equally awkward and confused tone in everything Evangelicals try to say to, in and through pop-culture. The message of the gospel sounds at one minute to be something beneficial and attractive and a matter of life or death at another. Christianity is simultaneously displayed as a "relationship" that is hip and a serious commitment filled with obligations and huge intellectual and ethical questions. Likewise non-believers are seen as fun loving one moment and heartless, sadistic, Godless heathens the next.
Evangelicals themselves then have their language confused. We just haven't nailed down how we relate to our culture.
To offer a different approach I think on the nature of language our culture uses different mediums to communicate different kinds of ideas. For ideas in entertainment we use pop-culture, music and commercials, for intellectual ideas, news outlets, journals, magazines and documentaries are used. Here, Christians have engaged in these kinds of mediums, but often with little theological education or understanding (i.e. the 700 club or Glen Beck on Fox News). Here the failure is just on understanding and utilizing the enormous intellectual resources at our disposal. The Church has existed for 2 millennia, and over this time numerous thinkers have defended and explained brilliantly the Christian faith. Even today thinkers like N.T. Wright, James K.A. Smith, Alvin Plantinga and James Sire among numerous others are presenting the case for Christianity and the cogency of Christian beliefs and yet few Christians seem to be listening, despite their interest in communicating the truth of Christianity to our society.
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