Halloween and the Werewolf Within
I snuggled up close to my daughter as we each cracked open our brand-new books, ready for some quiet reading time. It lasted about 30 seconds.
"Listen," Greta said. "You'll love this." She launched into the description the narrator—a 10-year-old boy named Zach—gave of himself:
And I guess I've always been sort of interested in weird stuff. Stuff like werewolves and vampires and zombies and houses where you go into the bathroom and turn on the faucet and out comes blood. Stuff like that.
"He's just like you, Mama!"
My children know me well. Indeed, I share Zach's interest in weird stuff. Not so much the blood out of the faucet, but the monsters and spooky houses? Yes. Love it. At least in stories. In fact, I've written about my love of the "ooky-spooky" here at Her.meneutics, and have defended my love of Halloween and all the accompanying creepiness as things that actually draw me closer to God.
So you can imagine my delight discovering that not one but two new books—Night of the Living Dead Christians: One Man's Ferociously Funny Quest to Discover What It Means to Be Truly Transformed (Tyndale House) by Matt Mikalatos, and The Zombie Killers Handbook: Slaying the Living Dead Within (Thomas Nelson) by Jeff Kinley—were hitting the shelves this month, and also propose that monsters can play a key role in our spiritual development.
In Night of the Living Dead Christians, Mikalatos—a Portland-based speaker, writer, and Cru staff member—takes readers on a fictitious journey through days in the life of narrator Matt and his troubled friend and neighbor, Luther the Werewolf. In this funny, campy quest to rid Luther of his wolfiness (without out-and-out killing him, the way yet another man wants to do), Matt discovers a neighborhood and church full of other monsters, including out-of-control, life-sucking vampires and believe-whatever, brain-dead zombies.
In The Christian Zombie Killers Handbook, Kinley—pastor and founder of Main Thing Ministries in Little Rock—mixes fiction with nonfiction to point out the "zombies" in our lives. Instead of using zombies as "brain-dead" churchgoers, as they are in Mikalatos's book, Kinley uses zombies to symbolize the sin that eats us alive. Kinley intersperses didactic chapters—explaining the power of sin as well as the need to confront it—with the gory tale of Ben Forman and his family's quest to stop a global zombie epidemic. The book's target audience is teenagers, so it should not surprise that I—someone two decades beyond teenage-dom—related to and enjoyed it less than Mikalatos's book.
The Seminary Gender Gap
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Comments
abey
The word "Beast within" indirectly or more directly relates to "Sexual Pleasure", not to be confused with gentleness & procreation in the sanctity of marriage, an outside & desirable but avoidable evil. The bible states that with GOD we be as angels neither marrying or given in to marriage. In other words no sex, but then it comes back to the question of pleasure. The answer is of this manner, for in Heaven is the love of GOD in its pureness which love gives great joy & that Pleasure arising of that joy far out weighs any type of pleasures that can be obtained on earth. The beauty of GOD & Heaven.
Matt Mikalatos
Thanks for this post, Caryn! And I'm so glad you enjoyed Night of the Living Dead Christian! Matt
KAREN SWALLOW PRIOR
As someone whose love of reading was cultivated by Stephen King, I so appreciate this! I've always thought that the modern "horror" genre is just an updated version of ancient mythology and fairy tales. Great post!
Jenn
http://www.christianitytoday.com/ct/2000/october2/29.79.html Read this article yesterday and was so glad I had when my kids asked (at bedtime, of course) why we celebrate Halloween. My preschool-appropriate summary: We can laugh at the things that scare us because Jesus is stronger than them all.
Allyn
For a more academic take on monsters, religion, etc. (but by no means boring - Tim's an interesting guy), you might be interested in Timothy K. Beal's Religion and Its Monsters.
Halee Scott
Funny, I've been thinking quite a bit lately how much Dr. Jekyll and Mr. Hyde is analogous to the Christian life--though it's been so long since I've read it I can't remember how Stevenson resolves it. I appreciate your call to "tell these stories about ourselves". In our culture, we are so fearful of not measuring up that we can't be honest about our pitfalls, our hang-ups, or about how tough life can be at times.
Tim
The description of Jesus pulling the wolf part off of Luther reminds me of the scene in Voyage of the Dawn Treader where Aslan strips the Dragon off Eustace one layer of skin at a time. It's painful too, but (unlike Luther) Eustace finds the end result wonderful. He may still be a bit confused at times, but he knows what it's like to be known by God and to belong to him. The comparison with the werewolf isn't exact, but it's the same motif. Tim P.S. The Missouri Department of Conservation has some handy tips on eradicating a Zombie infestation: http://mdc.mo.gov/zombies. P.P.S. And of course if you can't beat 'em, dance with 'em: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=hG6oy46qKE4&feature=fvsr
Laura Droege
I've sat here for a while, reading and re-reading this, trying to think how to respond. This is a thought-provoking post. I never thought about how Halloween monsters & company are outward manifestations of my own inner demons. No wonder I've been so creeped out by those little goblins and witches appearing on my doorstep; they're modeling the darkness in my soul. Thank God that he is scandalous and amazing enough to love even a beast like me.
Monica Selby
Ooohhh, Caryn, I love this! I'm not huge on the gore myself, but I do love the idea of any kind of fantasy mirroring our life in Christ. Thanks!
David Neff
Both Herman Hesse's Steppenwolf and Stevenson's Dr. Jekyll and Mr Hyde set out to explore the inner duality of the human self, and succeeded marvelously in uncovering the beast within. Neither of those seemed to have any path to resolving the tensions. I hope these new books can do the job.
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