Photograph: Hobbit home from the Hobbiton set in New Zealand, used for the cinematic versions of J.R.R. Tolkien’s The Lord of the Rings and The Hobbit. Photo credit: Yoshimi Nagasawa.

Introduction to Arts and Theology

In this section of our website, we engage with artists of all types, especially storytellers. You can also enjoy these videos on our YouTube channel’s Arts and Theology playlist!

The Theology of J.R.R. Tolkien’s The Lord of the Rings

This is our 11 part video series exploring Tolkien’s The Lord of the Rings, with references to The Hobbit, The Silmarillion, and other books in the Legendarium. The story is a beautiful exploration of the character of God, the purposes of God described as a musical symphony where God wants apprentice musicians to learn and play their parts well, evil as dissonant music and redemption as musical reintegration, human being and human becoming, the addictive power of evil, the hero’s journey and the defeat of evil as atonement and salvation, the possibility of created beings to become divine light-bearers, ethics and epistemology, lessons on power and politics, and how pagan virtue points to Christian faith, hope, and love.

Tolkien wrote to create a story that contained the languages he studied and invented or reconstructed, to create a pre-Christian myth for England, and to suggest an explanation for why the historic Angles converted to Christian faith so quickly. So his story foreshadows Jesus. Click here or on the graphic to the right.

The Theology of Marvel’s Black Panther

This 5 part video series looks at Christian faith and leadership in the golden thread of non-violent resistance movements during the 20th century, including the Civil Rights Movement in the U.S. led by the Black Church. This context is vital for understanding the real choices faced by the Black Panthers in Oakland, California in the 1970s. In Part 2, we also consider look at real-world Ethiopia as the only non-colonized people in Africa, and the mystique and Christian history that it has — and the Ethiopian cross was worn by a tribal elder in the movie, shown just as T’Challa falls over the waterfall at Warrior Falls.

The whole series on Black Panther engages the ethical vision and choices of a chosen but suffering people responding to Empire and imperialism: isolation, imperialism, or involvement. We show how Jesus’ vision of involvement is the only real choice for biblical Israel to share with the world the gift from above, and the only way a good Creator God could bring about a triumph of good over evil.

The Theology of J.K. Rowling’s Harry Potter

Stay tuned!

The Theology of C.S. Lewis’ Chronicles of Narnia

Stay tuned! A preliminary:

David Bates, Half Pint with Mako Nagasawa: Atonement and the Stone Table. Pints with Jack, May 13, 2023. A 35 minute video where Mako was a guest with David Bates. David and Mako focused especially on the death of Aslan the Lion in The Lion, the Witch, and the Wardrobe. But we also engaged with The Magician’s Nephew and The Great Divorce. Mako suggested that Aslan’s death represented a medical substitutionary atonement. It was a short summary of his longer paper, C.S. Lewis’ Theology of Atonement.

Bible Studies and Messages from The Anástasis Center:

We hope to transform Christian education and ministry through the rich resources of the early Christian movement. So we create and curate materials for Christian leaders, storytellers and artists, activists, and scholars. Check out videos, tools, small group leader notes, sermons, and exegetical papers on Scripture. Also, check out our YouTube Channel or read our blog. Read Atonement 101 and Theology 101 for short introductions to two of the topics we care about most.