Christian media. Those words have such a bad stigma attached to them. I have nothing against Christians, nor media, but those words together just strike me the wrong way. And I mean all of Christian media. The movies, the music, and the television. I think the problem is that Christian media these days just isn’t subtle anymore. Everything is in your face Christianity, and the message is shoved down your throat. Plus then everything at the end is tied up nice and neat in a bow. It’s not realistic and I can’t really stand it sometimes.

So many Christians movies came out this past year too. Noah, Son of God, God’s Not Dead, and a couple others. And I didn’t want to see any of them. First of all, Noah wasn’t really a Christian movie. It used a lot of Jewish mythology instead of stuff from the Bible. My wife saw it and really didn’t like it because of that.

And then, honestly, I thought that God’s Not Dead looked stupid. It has a great message and everything, but those kinds of movies are just way too cheesy for me. And I think that’s the problem that I have with Christian movies at least.

Movies can be Christian in nature without shoving a message down the viewers’ throats. There really doesn’t even need to be an explicit message. So many movies have a subtle Christian message without being a Christian movie. Any time a movie has a hero die and come back to life can be related back to Jesus. The martyr who gives themselves up for others and then is rewarded for it. It’s a really simple idea and it still points back to Christianity without being explicitly Christian. The first movie that comes to mind would be the Matrix. Neo can easily be portrayed as the messiah figure in the movie. So we have a Christian message in a non-Christian movie. It’s an easy formula, but it just seems that the Christian movie business sadly hasn’t figured it out.

Christian media would also include music too, and it seems that there is a style of Christian music. Which is really weird, because Christian music should really be a song subject, not a genre, and yet there is a style of music associated with Christian music. It’s a very upbeat and praisy music. I wish that it wasn’t, because I can’t really stand that kind of music. I like punk-rock and hard-rock, and that kind of good Christian music is quite rare. The first Christian rock band that comes to mind is Skillet. And I’m pretty sure that goes for everyone because they’re mainstream and openly a Christian band. And I think their success is in part because their songs are not specifically Christian songs. Many of their big songs could be about God’s love or a girl’s love. Which makes them very relatable and accessible.

But bands don’t have to be labeled as Christian to be a Christian band. A lot of bands have members who are Christian, but don’t want their band to be labeled as Christian. One very famous band is U2. Their members are proclaimed Christians, but their band is not. Although they do have some Christian songs.

I wish that more bands would take that route. It seems to be working for the bands that do.

So I think that Christian media in general should just tone it down a bit. Spreading Christianity is great, but not when you’re shoving it down people’s throats. That is no way to spread the Good News. It’s very off putting to non-Christians. So I think that Christian media should just take a more subtle approach and it would be ten times better than what it is.