Should a Christian do a nude scene?

One by one, the summer flicks have faded from theater screens, entering the brief purgatory that precedes rebirth on video and cable television.

Most are forgotten sooner rather than later.

"The Thomas Crown Affair" was one typical piece of Hollywood eye candy, focusing on a filthy-rich hunk who commits crimes as a hobby and the femme fatale that stalks him. This was not the kind of movie that normally inspires discussions in a seminary or in churches.

Then again, this steamy thriller featured a star-turn performance by 40-something actress Rene Russo, a born-again Christian who bared both her emotions and her body. It raised serious issues for believers who frequent pews and Bible studies in Hollywood.

"I see no sign that the questions she raised are going to go away anytime soon," said evangelical theologian Robert Johnston, who teaches the "Theology and Film" course at Fuller Theological Seminary in Pasadena, Calif. "Movie people always have a lot to talk about, when they get together to discuss the issues that affect Christians who work in this town. But it seems like somebody always asks: 'Would you ever do a nude scene?' It's such a symbolic question."

Russo faced this agonizing issue during promotional interviews, explaining that she spent hours in prayer and turned to a therapist. She discussed her role as wife and mother. She described her charismatic, slain-in-the-Holy Spirit conversion as a teen and her return to faith as an adult in Bible classes at the famous Church on the Way in Van Nuys.

The ultimate issue, she said, was not nudity. "I don't know where in the Bible it says, 'Don't be nude in a motion picture,' " she told Los Angeles magazine. The question was whether she should, as a Christian, accept the challenge of playing a fictional character that is amoral, manipulative and, at times, plain old nasty.

"It was like, whoa, this is a woman who totally leads with her sex," said Russo. "Here is a character who is European. She doesn't know if she has her top on or not. She doesn't care. She is a different kind of woman and it's not who I am. And it was really scary for me."

This line of defense only raises more questions. Would her critics have approved if she played the same amoral, sexy character, yet managed to keep more of her clothes on? Why?

What if she played the same role, but allowed the use of an anonymous "body double" to take her place in nude scenes?

Or how about this somewhat theoretical question: What if a Hollywood director asked Russo to play a loving wife, shown in a romantic nude scene with an actor playing the role of her husband, in a film that defended faith and virtue? Was nudity acceptable in the wedding-night scene in "Braveheart"?

Meanwhile, asked Johnston, why aren't moral conservatives asking as many tough questions about roles that involve other deadly sins? Can Christian artists depict war criminals, tyrants, bigots and crooks? Should a Christian actress think twice about playing Lady Macbeth?

This behavior issue leads to another question: If it is wrong for religious believers to play these kinds of characters, especially in nude scenes, is it just as wrong for other religious believers to watch these entertaining images in theaters or at home?

"We get so upset about issues of nudity and sex in art and entertainment, while issues of violence and killing don't seem to bother us as much," he said. "We Protestants, in particular, have a special problem with body and with images of the body. This affects painting and dance and theater, as well. ... Meanwhile, Rene Russo is right on target when she said that the real question was the behavior of her character."

The actress admitted that her choice raised disturbing questions. She told USA Today that she soon developed a spiritual answer for this essentially spiritual question.

"Did I do the right thing?", asked Russo. "I always say to Christians who say I'm wrong, 'Well, you know what? Pray for me. Just pray for me.' "

A Catholic zeal for souls?

It wouldn't be a proper baptism rite without someone taking a photograph of the priest and the new members lined up for the service.

Anyone who studies these images from Catholic life during the 1940s and '50s will be struck by an obvious fact, said Bishop John H. Ricard of Pensacola, Fla. The center aisles in those urban churches were awfully full during baptisms, including rows of adult converts.

Somebody was doing something right.

"It was just expected of a priest in those days that he would bring into the church at least 40 or 50 people a year. It was also the expectation of the parish that this would happen," said Ricard, during this week's conference of the U.S. Catholic bishops. "I know that times have changed, our culture has changed and attitudes have changed, which makes this a great deal more challenging. But, somehow, we need to recapture that spirit that we had in the past. We need to regain that sense of expectation."

There are a lot of Roman Catholics in America already - 61,207,914, according to the 1998 statistics. Last year, 69,894 adults were baptized and 92,155 converted from other churches. But while those numbers are rising, church leaders are wrestling with basic questions of Catholic identity, such as the spiritual health of the faith's schools and why so many Catholics live on the fringes of church life or have joined other flocks.

Thus, Pope John Paul II has called for increased efforts to reach lapsed Catholics and the unchurched. Almost every gathering of the hierarchy will include one report or workshop focusing on what Catholics call "The New Evangelization."

This week's Washington, D.C., conference was no exception. The bishops' evangelization committee said parishes must find creative ways to be more welcoming, to add new outreach ministries and to offer beautiful liturgies with better preaching and "appropriate music."

"There's so much more to do," said Archbishop Michael Sheehan of Santa Fe, N.M. There are "so many people who are spiritually hungry. We must have a kind of renewed enthusiasm for sharing the faith. We need a kind of a good old-fashioned zeal for souls."

Part of the problem is that "evangelization" sounds like "evangelism" and, in this day and age, that word is almost exclusively associated with evangelical Protestants. Plus, if clergy and laity develop a "zeal for souls," this will almost certainly lead to divisive discussions of heaven, hell and saving souls.

This is controversial territory for modern Catholics. During his recent trip to India, the pope upset many religious leaders - including some bishops - by insisting that Jesus is the savior of the whole world and that it isn't enough for Catholics to do good works and dialogue with those in other faiths. John Paul II stressed that "there can be no true evangelization without the explicit proclamation of Jesus as Lord."

But the pope also said, in a proclamation about mission work in Asia, that non-Christians don't necessarily have to become Christians in order to save their souls.

Echoing the Second Vatican Council's efforts to modernize Catholicism's views of other faiths, he wrote: "From the first minute of time to its end, Jesus is the one universal Mediator. Even for those who do not explicitly profess faith in him as the Savior, salvation comes as a grace from Jesus Christ through the communication of the Holy Spirit."

Thus, Ricard said Catholics no longer believe that the main motivation for evangelization is to save lost souls. But this doesn't mean that priests are supposed to stop reaching out to lapsed Catholics and to non-believers. It is still good to make converts. It is still good to see people lining up in the church during baptism services.

Priests must be taught that this remains part of their vocation, he said.

"I guess that, in your typical suburban parish, we are consuming so much of priest's time in all these ministries with the people we already have," said the bishop. "There's so much for our priests to do already and, most of the time, they are simply not finding the time to lead others into faith in Jesus Christ."

Take the 'family' – please.

The following quotations come from modern leaders in the Jewish, Christian, Muslim and Confucian traditions. Here's the big question: Who said what?

* "The family is the basic social unit in society, and marriage is the fundamental institution."

* "The family is the original cell of social life. It is the natural society in which husband and wife are called to give themselves in love and in the gift of life."

* It is "the family, more than any other unit in society, which constitutes a solid base for national life."

* "Throughout the centuries, the family has always occupied the central place as the primary social-religious institution."

For the curious, the answers are Muslim author Abdel Rahib Omran, the authors of the 1994 Catechism of the Catholic Church, Chinese scholar Chang Chi'i-Yun and Jewish sociologist Benjamin Schlesinger. The point of this exercise is to note that the world's major religions have for centuries maintained a remarkably degree of harmony when it comes to the role of the family.

Like it or not, religion remains a powerful force in world affairs. So it wasn't a surprise when traditional definitions of controversial terms such as "marriage" and "family" drew a hearty "Amen!" in a survey done in preparation for the second World Congress of Families, which meets Nov. 14-17 in Geneva. The Wirthlin Worldwide survey recorded the opinions of 2,900 adults in 19 countries in five regions - the United States, Europe, Asia, Latin American and the Middle East and Africa.

"Religion and family are the opposite sides of the same coin," said Allan Carlson, president of the Howard Center for Family, Religion and Society in Rockford, Ill. "Religion and family life feed off each other everywhere. When the level of religious faith declines in a culture, then that culture's views of marriage and family life begin to change, as well. The obvious example is Europe."

Researchers found that 84 percent of those polled worldwide agreed that, "marriage is one man and one woman." Meanwhile, nearly eight in 10 respondents worldwide (78 percent) agreed that, "A family created through lawful marriage is the fundamental unit of society." However, only 54 percent of Europeans agreed with that statement. On a related issue, 86 percent of those polled agreed that, "All things being equal, it is better for children to be raised in a household that has a married mother and father." Only 66 percent of Europeans agreed.

Meanwhile, 39 percent of those polled worldwide gave the strongest possible affirmation when asked to rank the importance of religious faith in their lives. It was 16 percent in Europe.

When asked how often they attend worship services and other religious events, 36 percent of global respondents said, "Once a week or more." In Europe it was 13 percent. And what about those who never darken the door of a church, synagogue, mosque, temple or shrine? Ten percent of those polled worldwide said they never attend religious meetings of any kind. In Europe, that number was 26 percent.

The rising secular tide in Europe is more than a statistic. European educators, artists and politicians have historically played pivotal roles in shaping world opinion, especially at the United Nations and in elite U.S. cultural institutions such as Hollywood and the Ivy League. In response, conservative religious leaders in Africa, Asia, Latin America and the Middle East have begun forming interfaith coalitions focusing on social issues – including breakthrough efforts between Muslims and Christians.

Conservative activists who gather next week in Switzerland will disagree on many political, cultural and religious issues, said Carlson. But they will have at least one uniting goal: to find definitions of politically charged words such as "marriage" and "family" that transcend the particulars of their cultures and these changing times.

"To be human is to be familial. That is the critical point we want to make," he said. "You can believe that we were created that way or you can refuse to believe that we were created that way. But anyone who studies marriage and family has to face this question and it is an essentially religious question."

Harry Potter and free will, Part II

Harry Potter had just triumphed in another face-to-face showdown with the forces of evil – represented, logically enough, by a gigantic serpent.

But the young wizard also discovered darkness, as well as light, in his own soul. His ordeal in the Chamber of Secrets revealed that he truly was free to have embraced evil and the house of Salazar Slytherin, rather than the noble house of Godric Gryffindor.

"It is our choices, Harry, that show what we truly are, far more than our abilities," says Albus Dumbledore, headmaster of the Hogwarts School of Witchcraft and Wizardry.

This kind of scene is typical of the vaguely moral, "good versus evil" plots in many fantasy novels, said literary critic Kathryn Lindskoog, who is best known for her books about the Christian apologist C.S. Lewis. Yet the Harry Potter books also specifically address the complex and confusing world of modern childhood. The characters are tempted to do what is wrong, as well as challenged to do what they know is right. They face real choices.

"The Harry Potter books are cute and naughty in that us-versus-them sort of way that kids like so much and I guess it is true that they contain some moral ambiguities," said Lindskoog. "Welcome to the real world. The question is whether these books tell children that they are supposed to choose good over evil. It seems to me that, so far, they are doing just that."

One thing is certain: millions of people are choosing to invite Harry Potter and his friends into their homes. "Harry Potter and the Sorcerer's Stone," "Harry Potter and the Secret Chamber" and "Harry Potter and the Prisoner of Azkaban" recently grabbed the top three slots on the U.S. hardback fiction bestseller lists at the same time. British author Joanne Kathleen Rowling has promised four more books in the series.

The books have their critics. Some worry that they are too violent and, since Rowling has said future volumes will be darker and more complex, they are likely to become bloodier and more distressing. Others believe that the books may popularize witchcraft, in an era in which the principalities and powers of public education and popular culture would certainly reject, let's say, "Harry Potter and the Rock of Ages."

Nevertheless, evangelical activist Charles Colson and his radio-commentary researchers have concluded, "the magic in these books is purely mechanical, as opposed to occultic. That is, Harry and his friends cast spells, read crystal balls and turn themselves into animals – but they don't make contact with a supernatural world." Meanwhile, the characters learn "courage, loyalty and a willingness to sacrifice for one another – even at the risk of their lives. Not bad lessons, in a self-centered world."

Fantasy fiction often causes controversy, stressed Lindskoog, because it blends powerful emotions and messages with symbols and stories that are wide open to different interpretations. But there are common themes that grace the classic fantasy novels. In an updated edition of her book "How to Grow a Young Reader" - which surveys 1,800 works of children's literature – Lindskoog and co-author Ranelda Mack Hunsicker note that these works consistently:

* Emphasize the importance of personal choices.

* Focus on the "heroic thoughts and deeds of seemingly ordinary characters."

* Recognize the "presence of evil in the world and the need for vigilance on the part of those who love truth."

* Help the reader achieve a "clearer understanding of oneself and society without resorting to preaching."

* Provide a sense of hope.

The jury remains out on Harry Potter, said Lindskoog. But this frenzy is typical of the media fads that sweep through youth culture, including children's literature. Meanwhile, researchers continue to find increasing numbers of adolescents with cable-era television and VCRs in their rooms and, in 1998, 66 percent of American movies were rated R or worse.

"There is real evil out there and parents need to stay on guard," said Lindskoog. "So I hope parents are out there reading the Harry Potter books for themselves and discussing them with their kids. Anything that pushes parents to get more involved in the lives of their children can't be all bad."