Earlier in the year, the Pittsburgh Theological Seminary’s Rev. Derek R. Davenport proposed a rather intriguing hypothesis: that graphic novels were ideal for theology. He admits that it’s not the most intuitive or necessarily comfortable fit — but it’s a text-and-medium marriage that was meant to be.
As people of faith, we don’t know what to do with art. We surround ourselves with it, invest huge sums of time and money creating it, and then we ignore it.
[…] So let’s do a thought experiment.
Imagine that there was an art form specifically created to address the issue of our relationship with God. Imagine that it was created apart from official church ties, allowing it to maintain freedom from iconoclastic tendencies. Imagine that it could integrate multiple genres like drawing, painting, poetry and literature. Imagine that it had the breadth to explore even questions that some might consider inappropriate or offensive.
This is the graphic novel.
The Reverend is quick to point out that it’s not a direct correlation: not all graphic novels are engaged in theology nor are all graphic novels that could be engaged in theology of high quality. But, nevertheless, the relationship is there (and he nicely tips his hat to S&S at the same time).
Read more of Reverend Davenport’s work on religious symbols and symbology here.
