# A Question of Faith - Scripture in Stories



## Micah Coon (Aug 9, 2008)

I'm curious...especially since this one is coming up in a project I want to work on.

I've written quite a bit, I've read quite a bit. While I've done nothing but use the occasional church as a back drop, when it comes to religion, I'm a bit scared to actually use it in the context of my stories.

I have actually poked around and read a few books with obvious religious overtones (I refuse to call them undertones because there's no way you can have the ideas of "covert" and "religion" in the same concept without the term "underground cult" coming to mind - or that's how I, personally, feel). The ones that I've gotten my hands on fell into one of two categories:
1) Praising the LAWD Jeeeeeeeesus Christ without regard for actual subject matter or entertainment value. (yes, I have deeply entrenched issues with JC and his fan club - no offense to anybody, mind you)
2) The exact opposite, where the author takes to the subject matter like a 80's slasher movie villain takes to the local co-ed population with a chainsaw.

My concept - setting, characters, potential plot lines, what have you - involves a trio (possibly a quartet, if I'm feeling frisky) of Church sanctioned demon hunters in a modern day setting. I want to be able to mix in the fantasy, the characters personalities, and the heavily-researched scripture without falling into either of the two above traps.

My question to the rest of the writing conclave is this: anyone else tried doing such a thing? Anyone willing to offer advice on how to go about this? 

I mean, sure I would like to be able to NOT offend anyone in writing this, but let's face it...it's religion. There's going to be someone that WILL be offended by it. I'm just worried about having to sacrifice character personality and evolution over the scripture, as well as the obvious pitfalls.


----------



## kitreshawn (Aug 10, 2008)

The thing to keep in mind with religion is that religion isn't a bad thing.  It also isn't a good thing.

Like pretty much everything else it is just a thing.  It only becomes good or bad depending on who comes along and starts to do stuff with it, and what their goals are.

A good thing to keep in mind is that almost every religion says that you should be good to other people and all that nice stuff.  Yes your life can suck but that is no reason to be a bastard to others.  It also functions as something that gives people hope which is another facet I think is overlooked.  But that doesn't stop it from being twisted to suit other people's needs.

For a good example of this I like to look at what happened with Jesus.  He basically said that it would be really cool if we could stop killing each other for long enough to realize that there aren't any really important differences between us and anyone else.  But if you look at what has been done with that message it morphs into "Kill them all, let god sort them out" during the crusades.

If you are going to write about religion my suggestion would be that you should try to take on everything about it.  It can motivate people to be much better than they might otherwise be and give their life meaning in a cruel world that does not care about their fate.  The other side of the coin is that it can be used to bring out the worse in people and as a path to power and control.


----------



## AriusEx (Aug 10, 2008)

Someone will ALWAYS be offended, whether you use religion or not.  I've had people email me saying they hated one of my short stories because one of the characters was smoking.

There will be, without exception, at LEAST one Puritan in your audience.


----------



## Stratelier (Aug 10, 2008)

You might want to try reading a few modern Christian novels (adult or young-adult levels) for comparison.  I remember liking several characters from Bryan Davis's novel Raising Dragons.

The main issue is that you don't want to randomly insert verses or settings where they don't "belong".  If one character has an affinity for quoting Bible verses at nearly every opportunity than yes you can use this as a means to randomly quote Scriptures, but still in moderation and more importantly, this should be something that you introduce right along with the character themself, so that the reader knows what to expect from them.


----------



## ciaron (Aug 10, 2008)

When it comes to religion and my stories, i tend to like keeping it subtle enough (almost subliminal,) that the reader doesn't realize religion has a hold in the story until the very end. But then again this is just me. The story behind Ergo Proxy is a great example of how religion and stories should be mixed.
But then again, this all comes down to taste.


----------



## Micah Coon (Aug 10, 2008)

Hmm...this isn't the most promising, but I'll have to keep everything in mind.


----------



## Poetigress (Aug 11, 2008)

You're right that you're bound to offend someone, so that shouldn't be the first concern.  Based on your post, though, it's not really clear to me what you're worried about.  I'm not sure what you mean by "having to sacrifice character personality and evolution over the scripture, as well as the obvious pitfalls."  Maybe it's because I'm not really sure how the scripture is playing into the story, other than the fact that the characters are sanctioned by the Church.

It sounds like you're hoping to find a middle ground between the two categories, and I like that part of the concept.  I am a little concerned, though, that since you say you have "deeply entrenched issues" with Christianity (combined with the tone you're using to talk about them) it's going to be easier for you to work with the negative aspects of religion than with the positive.  In other words, if your feelings about religion/Christianity are negative, that's probably going to come out in the story (intentionally or not).  Or worse, your arguments for the positive aspects might come out feeling forced or shallow.  I guess I'm just echoing Kitreshawn -- show both sides, or all sides -- but also make sure that you're doing it sincerely and with honest curiosity and openness, not just fitting people into boxes on either side.  To me that applies, of course, to any writing topic, not just religion, but since religion is such a personal and potentially inflammatory issue, I think the writer's purpose and mindset have more influence than in other areas.

Sorry if this is off.  You might have to get more specific about the concept to get more relevant responses.


----------



## Micah Coon (Aug 11, 2008)

Like I stated before, I've seen religious stories go in two directions: exaltation without an argument beyond "I'm right, you're wrong" and condemnation without an ounce of thought beyond "Religion is bad like Jack Thompson knows about video games". As such, as I've seen with a lot of the work I've read, the main characters tend to fall directly into those stereotypes - the super devout zealot-preacher and the disillusion...

...well, me, for example.

Perhaps you're right, Poe. Describing what I have planned would help.
I have three characters - a gun toting preacher with that schizo "good priest/bad priest" thing going on, the large lug of a bruiser, and the literal knight templar. Each of 'em has read said holy text and interprets them all in their own way of viewing the messages kept within the words. 'course, I'm going with MY various interpretations of the text, all of which have pissed off people...

Which I'm not afraid of. Part of me wants to go out of my way to piss off the Fred Phelpses of the world and make sure they get a copy of it.

That was my original plan - this is how I interpret the Christian/Catholic bible and I choose to show it through these three characters.

...that help any?


----------



## M. LeRenard (Aug 12, 2008)

From the sound of it, I think the best way to go about this is to make it less a study on 'you Christian morons out there are always fighting' (which sounds like what you're edging on doing), and more a study on how there can be religious difference within a single religion.  An impersonal study; do a good job explaining each character's point of view, in a way that the reader can sympathize with each one of them.  As long as you make us like all three characters, I think, you should do minimal damage.
Also, it helps to do a little more research.  You can let your own interpretation show through, certainly, but I would suggest not making it the focal point.  Rather, talk with people who think mostly like the characters in your novel, and see exactly what it is they think, and why.  Once you get the why down pat, you can reason like them, and your characters will come across a lot better.  You can't be anti-religious when writing this kind of book and expect it to come across as mostly neutral, and the best way to start hating religion less is to figure out why it is people follow it, I think.
As for examples... since most books centered around religion are trying to make a point, I can't really think of anything like this that I've read.  About the closest I can come is Stephen King's _The Stand_, I guess.
Does this help any?  It feels like it's more about diplomacy than anything else.


----------



## twilightiger (Aug 12, 2008)

A few things. First, you say you've done your research. Which is good. Second, you want your characters to explore the moral values inherent in the things they personally choose to believe in. Also good. Third, you're worried about what your target audience will think. Unfortunately, that's the ultimate gray area. If you're worried about coming under fire for creating something that may or may not offend people, then you need to determine exactly how much criticism you're willing to take and weigh it objectively against your own desire to express your personal beliefs and opinions. After all, art is an essential realization of the soul made manifest. Regardless of what the subject matter may be our own personal views, ethics and beliefs can either be drawn consciously to the surface to be written about and explored, or unconsciously dragged to the surface for all to see and condemn. It's our job as authors to recognize which is which and to act accordingly. It's just like the saying. A good novel tells us truth about its hero. A bad novel tells us truth about its author. Simply write the story that you want to tell and forget about what anyone else says. Besides, if someone complains after reading it, then hey, at least they read it.

Okay now that the stupidly obvious and often over repeated cliches about how you should always be true to yourself and not care about what anyone else thinks are out of the way some of the best advice I can actually offer in regards to using any sort of scripture in stories is this.

Uphold the spirit, not the letter. Literalism often serves to breed only contempt, and shows a failing to understand the changing nature of time. Thank you existentialism for revealing an unfortunate truth about religion. That more often than not its twisted to fit the needs of the moment. Great for villains to abuse but make a hero devoutly religious to the point of fanaticism and you risk not only alienating them from your readers but plot wise you'll also make them more transparent than saran wrap.

Everyone has their own interpretation of what something means to them. Exploit that. If the scriptures can be likened to anything they can be likened to a set of morality tales. Stories we tell ourselves to caution or warn. Not to control. Again we're dealing with the changing nature of human perspective. Lucifer Morningstar was cast from heaven for saying "I will not serve" not for commiting any great sin. That came afterwards.

Drawing on myth is often more effective than fact. Check out Paradise Lost, Dante's Inferno, even Neil Gaiman's The Sandman and you'll see religion used to incredible effect. Whether you consider what they wrote to be respectful to the original subject matter or not they still remain powerful and sweeping works.

Draw on outside sources. Your story need not be based entirely around the scriptures. Aristotle himself wrote a treatise on demons. He said that demons can be seperated into three classes. Those born of the self, that plague our world with all its ills. Those born of faith, that plague our souls. And those born of power, that those who grasp a sufficient amount of can become.

Sublimation, sublimation, sublimation. Why the moral doesn't have to be overtly obvious. Go watch Constantine. The one with Keanu Reeves. Yeah . . . that one. Watching it? Okay. You know how Constantine can see everything. Well, the moral of the whole movie is about how faith isn't actually dependent on proof but choice. Not that people might notice that what with all the ass-kicking going on. For proof just listen to the whole spiel Gabriel goes on about how human's can be so noble and how all god does is ask us to believe in him. There you go. From the lips of an asshole, er, angel, religion taking the center stage to create a context in which we are asked to question what faith means to us as individuals and what it means to uphold that choice. And that part where Constantine flips off the devil. Classic.

And finally. Go for broke. If you want to use religion in a story than go the whole nine yards. If you want to give your demon hunters divine powers than turn them into nephilim. "And lo, the children of the angels were born unto the daughters of man, and they were as nephilim." If you can get your readers so wrapped up in the story, so absorbed by what their reading, then they're not going to have time to complain.

I am now officially standing in the eye of the storm. And loving it.


----------



## Stratelier (Aug 12, 2008)

M. Le Renard said:


> As for examples... since most books centered around religion are trying to make a point, I can't really think of anything like this that I've read.


That is unfortunately true, most books centered about religion are philosophy books, not novels.



> Drawing on myth is often more effective than fact . . . Draw on outside sources.


The novel by Bryan Davis that I read involved some Arthurian lore (Merlin and Excalibur, with faith-based, God-fearing representations), and (not evil!)-dragons.  Main character was a pencil artist with a love of history subjects, the usual sort who doesn'thave a church to attend to or wouldn't be considered a Christian himself but still has great respect for the Bible, one of his teachers was a Christian but so too was the book's antagonist, and the author introduced early on that the latter two characters had diametrically opposite interpretations of dragons.  Which, of course, left the main character's family right between the two.


----------



## Lobar (Aug 12, 2008)

Hellsing


----------



## Shouden (Aug 13, 2008)

Yeah, the hole religion thing can be a very slippery slope. I try to keep religion out of my stories even though most of my characters believe in God. (you can be a Christian without a religion.) My older stories used to deal with the Christianity issue a lot more than my newer stories. I have come to realize that most people are not looking for stories that deal with the pleasant valley Christianity, but more what life is really like that crap rolls you up whether you are Christian or not.

I have actually started a Demon Hunter series of my own and if you want to check it out, you can hop on over to my site: http://www.spiritwellbooks.com . (for a quicker link: http://www.spiritwellbooks.com/JustHeroes )

Anyways, I would say, just run with it. You never know if you have a good idea until you have explored it.


----------



## Stratelier (Aug 13, 2008)

Shouden said:


> (you can be a Christian without a religion.)


(Unfortunately the reverse is also true.)


----------



## dietrc70 (Aug 15, 2008)

For starters, forget about who you might offend.  Think about what the religion means to your individual characters.  If THEY take religion seriously, then their beliefs will naturally become part of the story.

I use religion a lot in my own stories.  God is very real in my universe, but there is also a Fox God who snuck into the world after the world was made and has his own agenda.  There is also a Wolf God who for a time was God's hitman (i.e. the Old Testament Satan), but has his own agenda as well.


----------



## Shouden (Aug 15, 2008)

sorry to detract from the subject, but wasn't Lucifer the Angel of Light and Music?

But, I agree with dietrc, if God and faith and Christianity and religion is important to your characters, then that is what matters. Most likely, if it is a work of fiction, not many people will be offended as it is something your characters deal with. And the people that do get offended by it, you can simply just ignore, because they are taking something that is made up and taking it seriously.

I am considering playing around with adding more than one religion to my characters soon.

Two things I have learned in writing: 1) Get to know your characters and 2) you will always have your greatest fans and your worst enemies. Some people will love your work, others won't. Focus on the ones that do, and press forward.


----------



## Telnac (Aug 23, 2008)

My advice on this topic: make the religion of the characters match the characters themselves.  Just because someone is deeply religious doesn't mean they quote the Bible every other sentence.  In fact, a vast majority of Christians only know what is preached every Sunday from the pulpit.  If all they hear is John 3:16 or Romans 10:9 (both very frequently quoted verses) then that's all they're likely to quote.

But more likely, rather than actually quoting the Bible, they'd say something like this: "Well, the Bible says that the spirits of deceased wise men rise up every night at midnight."  The statement can be blatantly false (as it is in my silly example) or it can be true: "Yeah, but the Bible also says we shouldn't be consulting the dead!"  What's important is that the devout character believes it vehemently, even if they don't know enough about the Bible to give you a verse reference.  If they really think that the Bible tells them to douse vampires in holy water, they'll do it and they'll tells others that's what the Bible says to do (despite the fact that the Bible clearly says no such thing...)

Where you get into danger is when your character is a scholar.  Scholars are the ones who are likely to always have a verse ready to quote for nearly any situation.  That's double so when they meet another scholar.  I'm a devout Christian, but I don't exactly fit in at church because I often know more about the Bible's contents than the pastor does.  That's because I've studied it & read it cover to cover several times.  So when I start throwing around verses, it's to counter man-made notions (such as masturbation being a sin) that have no Biblical basis.  So if you get me & the wrong type of pastor in a room, you'll start to see debates filled with verse references... and I'm not talking common ones like John 3:16.  You'll get obscure stuff pulled from every part of the Bible.  Unless you know the Bible really well, I'd suggest avoiding having two scholar characters in your story unless they pretty much agree on matters of faith.

If you're trying to have a character who is a pastor, my suggestion would be to decide what the pastor believes... even if it isn't something that's in mainline Christianity!  Then go online and do searches for sermons from pastors who actually hold that view... or who are trying to refute it!  Many churches place the texts of old sermons online.  Chances are, you'll get a bunch of good Biblical references that your character would likely use when dealing with a situation where their belief is confronted.

I hope that helps!


----------



## Telnac (Aug 23, 2008)

Actually, some additional thoughts:

If you're concerned that a character misquoting the Bible can be mistaken for some lack of Biblical knowledge on your part, you can insert a humorous moment where the devout character tries to misquote the Bible and gets caught.  This will illustrate to the reader that the devout character's knowledge of the Bible may not be all that good.  Then later misquotes would be attributed to a flaw in the character's knowledge, not yours.

An example in the form a silly tiny play:

John, a devout Christian whose knowledge of the Bible isn't what he thinks it is.
Mike, an ordinary dude.
A mutilated corpse.

[John & Mike are trying to sneak away from something spooky when they discover the corpse.]
Mike: Holy shit!  It got him, too.
John: Lord Jesus, protect us all.
Mike: We can't just leave him like this.  We have to bury him.
John: Wait!  The Bible says that we have to put garlic in his mouth or he could rise from the dead.
Mike: Where the Hell does it say that?
John: (flustered) It just does, OK?


John's attempted Biblical reference was so outlandish that even Mike (who has no Biblical knowledge at all) knew he was misquoting the Bible and called him on it.  From now on, the reader's going to assume John's Biblical references are far from perfect.

Also, an online resource that you may find useful:
http://www.biblegateway.com
It has a bunch of different Bible translations, and more importantly for you, you can do keyword searches that you can use to pull up verses a character might quote when facing various situations.


[Edit]
Sorry... both writing & my faith are dear to me, so I can't leave well enough alone. 

I thought of another scenario where you can explain why a devout character would be quoting stuff that may not line up with the Bible.  You could have a character that claims some sort of hidden knowledge, or access to extra books in the Bible that don't really exist.  This works particularly well if the character is a rather eccentric Christian who believes or practices some things that may not line up with mainstream Christianity.

Example: same play as above only this time John is an ass-kicking vampire hunting pastor.

[They find the corpse.]
Mike: Holy shit!  It got him, too.
John: Lord, have mercy on his soul.
Mike: We can't just leave him like this.  We have to bury him.
John: Wait.  We're on unholy ground.  The Bible says that we have to put garlic in his mouth or he could rise from the dead.
Mike: Where the Hell does it say that?
John: Not all of the Bible is in the book that people take to church, son.

In this case, John is quoting from an unnamed source that's still "The Bible" but is outside the canon that ordinary Christians would be quoting from.  The advantage to this approach is that John can now quote from "The Bible" stuff that is not only a departure from mainstream Christianity but may even be downright blasphemous!  The other advantage is that it reminds any Puritan-types who may be reading your story that this is a work of fiction.  John may say crazy stuff that no normal Christian would say... but John's clearly not a normal Christian.  So just because he believes some really strange stuff doesn't mean that you think the reader believes that too.  In fact, you're clearly setting the user's expectation that John's going to say stuff they won't agree with.  But that's OK... since this clearly isn't reality.


----------

