Yesterday I indulged in a little one-sided provocation to get some conversation going. Taking Justin Taylor’s callout to two blogs that commented on The Dark Knight as a starting point, I basically asked for commentary on the commentary. I don’t think I ever explicitly agreed with the commentary (I didn’t intend to), though it certainly provides some food for thought about the way we consume entertainment.

But I confess that I had an agenda:

1. I wanted show the value of asking questions to make people think and start (and sustain) a conversation.

2. I wanted to stimulate Gospel-centered thinking about something that will come up in conversation (the latest Hollywood blockbuster) so that we can steer it toward something that won’t (the Gospel).

Note that “steering conversation toward the Gospel” doesn’t have to be artificial. For example, here’s what I’m not proposing:

Evangelist: Hey, did you see The Dark Knight?

Quarry: Yeah, that was awesome!

Evangelist: Yeah, it was! In fact, it got me thinking about this great tract I just read that talks about the darkness in our hearts.

Quarry: Excuse me, I need to be anyplace else.

Instead, do you think it would be hard to throw these out for discussion? With a little patience and careful thinking, they all land within striking distance of the Gospel…

• In the movie, Batman is optimistic about human nature, but the Joker is pessimistic. In the real world, which of the two do you think has a more accurate picture of the way we really are?
• Batman’s optimistic view about human nature is certainly what we hope for in the real world, and sometimes we get it. The Joker’s pessimistic view is definitely what we fight off, but usually that’s what we get in the real world. How do you make sense of the fact that real people can really be so noble and so awful?
• Is there anyone in the movie who is completely pure and completely good? In the real world, do you think that it’s possible for anyone to be completely pure and good? Assuming it’s possible, do you think that people should be completely pure and good?
• Wasn’t the scene with the two boats just complete fiction? Do you think people would act that way in the real world? What could possibly motivate people to be altruistic like that? Why is it easy to believe that people wouldn’t be altruistic in that situation?
• (Minor spoiler warning) The movie ends with Batman taking blame that he didn’t deserve, and Harvey Dent getting credit that he didn’t deserve. Is that just? What possible greater good could justify calling an innocent man “guilty” so that a guilty man gets rewards he doesn’t deserve?
• (Minor spoiler warning) The movie ends with the people completely misled about both Harvey Dent and Batman; they believe one thing, but the truth is completely different, and it’s all done in the name of giving the people hope. What’s preferable: an easy hope that everybody can understand (but is false), or a difficult hope that’s hard to swallow (but is built on the way things really are)?
• Was the Joker’s “no rules” way of looking at the world wrong? In the real world, do you think there are real rules about what we should and shouldn’t do? If so, where do you think they come from?
• Was Harvey Dent’s attitude about chance mostly right or mostly wrong? In the real world, do you think life is all about luck and chance, or is there a real purpose behind it all? If it’s all about chance, is there even such a thing as right or wrong or purpose?

(Note the frequent references to “in the real world” and “real life”. One obstacle to reception of the Gospel is that people think it’s just a fairy tale; we need to help them bolt it to reality.)

We would do well to take a cue from Paul:

So Paul, standing in the midst of the Areopagus, said: “Men of Athens, I perceive that in every way you are very religious. For as I passed along and observed the objects of your worship, I found also an altar with this inscription, ‘To the unknown god.’ What therefore you worship as unknown, this I proclaim to you. The God who made the world and everything in it, being Lord of heaven and earth, does not live in temples made by man, nor is he served by human hands, as though he needed anything, since he himself gives to all mankind life and breath and everything. And he made from one man every nation of mankind to live on all the face of the earth, having determined allotted periods and the boundaries of their dwelling place, that they should seek God, in the hope that they might feel their way toward him and find him. Yet he is actually not far from each one of us, for

“‘In him we live and move and have our being’;

as even some of your own poets have said,

“‘For we are indeed his offspring.’

Being then God’s offspring, we ought not to think that the divine being is like gold or silver or stone, an image formed by the art and imagination of man. The times of ignorance God overlooked, but now he commands all people everywhere to repent, because he has fixed a day on which he will judge the world in righteousness by a man whom he has appointed; and of this he has given assurance to all by raising him from the dead.”

Paul jumps right into their myths, and rather than indict them for believing lies and wasting their lives, he engages their ideas with his Gospel-saturated mind and calls attention to the echoes of the Gospel that were there to be found.

But bear in mind that they are only echoes: the Gospel itself turns on the real life and real death and real resurrection of a real man who is really God and really will return to the real world with a real judgment on real people.

Well-done films (like The Dark Knight) that offer sharp contrasts about transcendent themes are great conversation starters, but they’re just fiction. We do well as followers of Christ to see people’s strong attachments to fiction (especially when it seems more real than the real world) and help break those deceptions in favor of strong attachments to the real world (even though it seems more fantastic than a comic book).