How to Talk to Shadows - front cover


 

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The Great Dragon Audition

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For several years now, I have wondered about getting a Nativity scene.  There are all sorts of versions around, from a range of sizes and styles available in cathedral gift shops to a tiny Mexican folk art version that I once saw in a gift shop.  Books on handicrafts offer patterns to make your very own woollen ‘Knitivity’. When I’ve raised the subject with PDB11 , his answer has always been: ‘What I’d really like to have is a dragon Nativity.’   It’s not that he thinks that Jesus was a dragon, even in a fantasy universe , but just that, as a Christian who likes fantasy fiction involving dragons, he would like to combine the two ideas. A web search for ‘dragon Nativity’ brought up three main results.   Firstly, there are a number   of essays  arguing that you should include a dragon in Nativity scenes, in reference to the allegorical poem in Revelation 15 picturing Satan as a dragon attempting to eat Jesus. I did once have a go at making a Christmas ...
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When I first encountered Shane Claiborne and Tony Campolo’s book Red Letter Christianity , I seized it in the hope that it might answer my questions.  Over the previous few years, I had been finding it impossible to reconcile being a Christian (i.e. someone who believes Jesus is our saviour) with focusing on the ‘red letters’ (i.e. what the Bible records of the teachings of Jesus himself, which are printed in red letters in some editions of the Bible). Campolo and Claiborne had adopted the term ‘Red Letter Christianity’ to describe those who take the teachings of Jesus seriously and try to live up to them (for example, in loving their enemies, freeing the oppressed, sharing all their possessions, etc).  They explained that they had done this because the term ‘Evangelical Christian’ had come, particularly in America, to imply Far Right, pro-gun-ownership, anti-environment, etc, none of which they were. To me, ‘evangelical’ had the much simpler meaning of ‘someone...
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