New!
Author resources • Lorehaven Guild
Podcast sponsors • Subscribe for free
Crew manifest Faith statement FAQs
All author resources Lorehaven Guild Subscribe for free

154. What If You Had to Fake Being Genetically Modified? | Enhanced with Candace Kade
Fantastical Truth Podcast, Mar 21, 2023

Exile
Reviews, Mar 17, 2023

153. When Can Deconstructionism Threaten Christian Fiction? | with Michael Young aka ‘Wokal Distance’
Fantastical Truth Podcast, Mar 14, 2023

Library

Find fantastical Christian novels

fantasy · sci-fi · and beyond
middle grade · young adult · grown-ups
All novels Search Add a novel
Enhanced, Candace Kade
Bear Knight, James R. Hannibal
The Wayward, Tabitha Caplinger
Fortified, V. Romas Burton
Canaan Sleeps, Daniel Camomile
Silver Bounty, Victoria McCombs
A Sword for the Immerland King, F. W. Faller
Calor, J. J. Fisher
Once Upon A Ren Faire, A. C. Castillo
The Genesis 6 Project, Michael Ferguson
Exile, Loren G. Warnemuende
Aberration, Cathy McCrumb
The Truth Beyond the Lies, Kathleen Bird
Frost, Winter's Lonely Guardian, E. E. Rawls
Podcast

Get the Fantastical Truth podcast

Podcast sponsors | Subscribe links
Archives Feedback

154. What If You Had to Fake Being Genetically Modified? | Enhanced with Candace Kade
Fantastical Truth, Mar 21, 2023

153. When Can Deconstructionism Threaten Christian Fiction? | with Michael Young aka ‘Wokal Distance’
Fantastical Truth, Mar 14, 2023

152. How Can Christian Fantasy Fans Heal from Church Trauma? | with Marian Jacobs and L. G. McCary
Fantastical Truth, Mar 7, 2023

151. How Can Fantastical Satire Sharpen Our Theology? | The Pilgrim’s Progress Reloaded with David Umstattd
Fantastical Truth, Feb 28, 2023

150. Is the U.S. Government Covering Up Spy Balloons or Alien Spaceships? | with James R. Hannibal
Fantastical Truth, Feb 21, 2023

149. Why Do Christian Fiction Fans Love So Much Romance?
Fantastical Truth, Feb 14, 2023

Quests

Join our monthly digital book quests.

Lorehaven Guild Faith statement FAQs

War in Heaven
Book Quests, March 2023

Rose Petals and Snowflakes
Book Quests, February 2023

Prince Caspian
Book Quests, January 2023

Dream of Kings
Book Quests, December 2022

Reviews

Find fantastical Christian reviews

All reviews Request review

Exile
“This gentle fantasy from Loren G. Warnemuende shows little magic or strange creatures, focusing on complex emotions and relationships.”
—Lorehaven on Mar 17, 2023

Illusion
“Frank Peretti’s last novel creates a romantic world with sci-fi flourishes where likeable heroes, villain twists, and familiar places sell a dramatic performance.”
—Lorehaven on Mar 10, 2023

War in Heaven
“Charles Williams’s classic supernatural thriller pairs a deeply spiritual worldview with perceptive examinations of human nature.”
—Lorehaven on Mar 3, 2023

Bear Knight
“Bear Knight’s quest pacing starts slow but quickens as two plots merge into one, exploring the Christian’s spiritual walk with adventurous aplomb.”
—Lorehaven on Feb 24, 2023

Gifts

Find new gifts for Christian fans

Archives

The original SpecFaith: est. 2006

Speculative Faith | archives

Lorehaven issues (2018–2020)

Order back issues online!
New
Library
Podcast
Quests
Reviews
Gifts
Archives
Lorehaven helps Christian fans explore fantastical stories for Christ’s glory: fantasy, science fiction, and beyond. Articles, the library, reviews, podcasts, gifts, and the Lorehaven Guild community help fans discern and enjoy the best Christian-made fantastical stories, applying their meanings to the real world Jesus Christ calls us to serve. Subscribe free to get any updates you choose and to access the Lorehaven Guild.
Subscribe free to Lorehaven
/ SpecFaith /

Conversion Scenes: Are They Real?

The bigger issue in my mind isn’t whether a story has a conversion scene or not, but how well it is portrayed.
R. L. Copple on Jul 15, 2014
8 comments

256px-Charlotte_catherine_de_la_Trémoille_de_Condé_Guillain_Louvre_LP_400If you’ve hung around Christian writers much, especially those outside the publishers who produce books for the CBA (Christian Booksellers Association), you’ve no doubt ran across the accusation that Christian fiction often contains an “obligatory” conversion scene. As if it is a required event.

Yes, much Christian fiction does show conversions.

I’ve even got a couple in my Christian books, and it isn’t through a CBA publisher.

But author Robin Lee Hatcher disagrees on the “obligatory” idea.

The interesting thing to me is that I’ve written 18 novels for five CBA (Christian Booksellers Association) publishers thus far, and never once has an editor asked me to include a conversion scene.

Adding that the real reason you see so many in Christian fiction is:

Readers of fiction are drawn to stories that entertain them, but they also look for stories that will affirm their beliefs. Readers of romance want their belief in two people finding lasting love to be affirmed. Readers of mysteries want their belief that justice will be done to be affirmed. And readers of Christian fiction want the truths of their faith to be affirmed. Conversion scenes are a natural part of that affirmation.

I’d say yes and no. I get what she is saying: conversion scenes aren’t generally included because a Christian publisher refuses to publish a story without one, but because it is a genre expectation. However, a genre expectation also makes a particular concept or event obligatory.

Like in romance, the happy ending with the protagonists walking away hand in hand and head over heels in love, if not also walking down the wedding aisle, is the expected outcome. In fantasy, the hero is expected to win in the end, even if through great cost. There are exceptions to these, but they are the expected conventions.

But she has a point. Within Christian culture, like much any other culture, we like to have our beliefs and experience affirmed.

That is why Christian novels tend to have conversions, not in the hopes of saving a sinner, but to encourage a saint. This is exactly what so much of worship is about. We sing that song we’ve sung all our life not because we expect it to reveal an unrealized truth, but to affirm our faith in Christ. Much like people sing the national anthem or go to clubs with like-minded individuals.

The bigger issue in my mind isn’t whether a story has a conversion scene or not, but how well it is portrayed.

On one end of the Bell curve, conversion scenes low on motivation and high on author arbitrariness give them a tacked on feel. It happens not because the character is sufficiently motivated to change, but because the author wants it to happen at that point. In essence, the conversion scene isn’t connected as part of the fuller character arc.

On the other end are conversion scenes so organic to the story and character that the reader hardly notices them. Indeed, for the conversion to not happen would make the story unrealistic.

Between those two ends lands the bulk of conversion scenes. I know, I know. I can hear the protest. “No, no. Most conversion scenes fall into the first category!” Or “You’ve got it all wrong. Most conversion scenes I’ve read fit in the second category.”

You know what? You are both right. How?

A reader’s experience will dictate whether most conversion scenes come across as realistic or not.

To a person who grew up in the church, where conversion was more a realization of what they believed than a decision made at one moment, most conversion stories aren’t going to feel as realistic. In contrast, someone who had a radical conversion moment, such conversions are going to feel real.

Someone who grew up seeing people converted regularly will tend to have fewer issues with conversions in fiction. In short, one’s overall experiences will vastly influence the believability of a fictional conversion that lands in the middle of the bell curve.

By way of example, in growing up and through most of my adult life, I rarely spent much time around people who cussed a lot. Sure, I experienced it here and there, but by and large the people I hung out with didn’t cuss. If they did, not around me.

Consequently, a book with a lot of cussing doesn’t feel realistic to me. It takes me out of the story. Meanwhile, someone else whose parents cussed regularly, or most of their friends do, is going to feel like such language makes the story more true to life.

Believability is based on our own beliefs and life experiences.

Take the conversion of the “journalist” in the God is Not Dead movie. The whole movie she is out to prove this whole God thing is nonsense. Within a few minutes of confronting the Duck Dynasty group about their faith, she talks with the singing group and converts, seemingly out of the blue.

From my perspective, that conversion falls into the first category. Not that it is impossible, but there wasn’t much character arc foreshadowing indicating she was struggling with her faith that God didn’t exist.

However, someone who had such a Pauline conversion, or watched it happen frequently at church, that conversion will look quite believable. It all goes back to any one person’s experience and beliefs as to whether it feels realistic.

Can you name some conversions in novels you’ve read that felt real to you? Can you identify some that didn’t ring true? Why or why not?

R. L. Copple
As a young teen, R. L. Copple played in his own make-believe world, writing the stories and drawing the art for his own comics while experiencing the worlds of other authors like Tolkien, Lewis, Asimov, and Lester Del Ray. As an adult, after years of writing devotionally, he returned to the passion of his youth in order to combine his fantasy worlds and faith into the reality of the printed page. Since then, his imagination has given birth to The Reality Chronicles trilogy from Splashdown Books, and The Virtual Chronicles series, Ethereal Worlds Anthology, and How to Make an Ebook: Using Free Software from Ethereal Press, along with numerous short stories in various magazines.Learn more about R. L and his work at any of the following:Author Website, Author Blog, or Author Store.
Website ·
  1. Lyn Perry says:
    July 15, 2014 at 6:51 am

    Good summary. I think genre expectations have a lot to do with it, combined with a very high percentage of CBA readers who are quite quite conservative. Different topic, but my niece who writes Christian women’s fiction included a damn in her book, an organic expression from a character who was failing in life but eventually got back on the road to restoration. A reviewer marked her book as one star saying there were vulgarities in it! Hello. There was one word. Another commented on her blog that in her family growing up she wasn’t even allowed to say darn because it was a substitute for damn. Sheesh. No wonder a lot of “Christian” fiction is formulaic – it’s not really Christian, it’s just conservatively prudish to meet the expectations of a (large) segment of readers (and to avoid those one stars).

    Reply
    • Tony Breeden says:
      July 15, 2014 at 11:45 am

      Lyn,

      Since you mentioned profanity in a Christian novel, here’s an article I’ve written recently on the subject: @#%*!!, or Dirty Words & the Christian Author – Part 1

      On the subject of this post: I’m currently writing a conversion scene in my WIP so this post was helpful. In my debut novel, Johnny Came Home, their is an unsuccessful conversion attempt. I put it there because it was natural for the character, a preacher, to attempt to share the Gospel… and natural for the person listening to reject it for the reasons he did. It also served as crisis point for the preacher, sort of a What do you do when everything fails? moment. We’re given the Great Commission, but I think sometimes we forget that it is God who grants repentance not our arguments that convert.

      I also think that another reason why conversion scenes are so common in Christian fiction is the writer’s need to resonate with the reader. Christian books are generally written to Christian audiences. Conversion is one experience all Christians have in common.

      Likewise, I think another reason conversions are common in Christian books is the idea that Christian fiction ought to be evangelistic, that it ought not only show the truth about God and Christian doctrines, but  show also the hoped-for unsaved reader their need for salvation and how they might receive it.  Authors hope to generate a larger audience and are, thus, very aware of their responsibility to the Great Commission if the opportunity exists.

      Reply
  2. Travis Perry says:
    July 15, 2014 at 7:10 am

    I have actually read very few stories that contain a conversion scene. One I read recently did feel rather forced because it was intertwined with a romance in which the Christian male protagonist was attracted to the unbelieving female–and subsequently led her to Christ. I’ve heard of people with romantic entanglements leading one another to the Lord, but I’ve never witnessed such a thing and never knew anybody in person who did so. So, as per what you said, the material being outside my experience made it seem unrealistic (though at times I read things outside my experience and they seem right anyway).

    I think an important factor about conversion scenes is that Evangelical Christians believe such a thing exists! You’ll see secular science fiction writers continually talking about how evolution, the struggle for survival, has shaped this or that alien species. Such a discussion is part of the landscape for them, because random, purposeless evolution driven only by survival IS where they see life coming from. We Christian writers see a message from and a response to God as an ordinary part of human existence–therefore we are likely to portray it.

    Reply
  3. Fred Warren says:
    July 15, 2014 at 10:54 am

    I don’t think conversion can be portrayed effectively as something incidental to the story. It’s too important. For the best examples in literature I can think of, the journey of conversion–before, during, and after–*was* the story, and it wasn’t a quick fix. Omit it altogether if you’re going to present it superficially, like a tick-mark on a checklist or changing a character’s t-shirt.

    We’re talking about a life transformed. Go big, or go home.

    Victor Hugo’s Les Miserables comes to mind.   http://www.gutenberg.org/ebooks/135

    Reply
  4. Bethany A. Jennings says:
    July 15, 2014 at 3:39 pm

    This is a new and interesting take on the “conversion scene”!  I have to say, I have this idea of a cliche conversion scene that, in actuality, I’ve never (or rarely) seen in real Christian fiction.  Most Christian fiction I’ve read does have conversion scenes, but they’re very organic and natural, not stilted.  I avoid bad books, though, so maybe that’s why.  😉  A character can’t just have a conversion “scene” – they generally need a conversion *plot arc*, and it must be well-done.

    Reply
  5. Julie D says:
    July 15, 2014 at 5:53 pm

    That makes a lot more sense to me.

    Reply
  6. Janeen Ippolito says:
    July 15, 2014 at 6:25 pm

    I really appreciated this perspective!  It makes a lot of sense.  I had to write a conversion scene in the story, because it was part of a conversion arc, and just made sense with the character.  However, since I came to faith early, I did some interviews and research, and the variety of ways people came to Christ was astounding, as was the way that faith manifested in their lives afterwards.  For some, it was a complete switch over, without the emotional drama, but for others it was this long, drawn-out struggle.  It really helped give me insight on how to write that kind of scene.

    Another thing I had to come to grips with is that for a secular audience, a lot of people are just going to think any kind of conversion is crazy.  Even the disciples had to deal with flack about their faith in Jesus–and that was when He was on earth, working miracles!  The Good News is just too good to be true, and too outside the world’s wisdom for them to get it.  Since I write novels with a mix of Christian and non-Christian characters (and no, not all the non-Christians convert, and they do represent different faiths as well as atheist/agnostic), I feel this disbelief is an important thing to show.

    Also, one thing that’s important to realize is how you write a scene too.  It takes skill and good editing and a strong knowledge of character and plot to pull it off well.  Otherwise a conversion you pulled directly from a true story can seem fake to Christians AND non-Christians.

    Reply
  7. R.J. Anderson says:
    July 22, 2014 at 6:51 pm

    Interestingly enough, the most shamelessly blatant conversion scene I’ve ever read wasn’t in a CBA-published book, it’s in that old hoary classic ROBINSON CRUSOE. In the words of the Eleventh Doctor, “I was not expecting this!”

    Reply

What do you think? Cancel reply

  • The Searcher by Ross Wilson. Photo credit: GenvesselChristian Fiction = ???
  • What Does Self-publishing Accomplish?What Does Self-publishing Accomplish?
  • Jack Chick tractThe Crossover Bug
  • Cliff edgeFinding The Edgy In Christian Fiction
Lorehaven magazine, spring 2020

Wear the wonder:
Get exclusive shirts and beyond

Listen to Lorehaven’s podcast

Authors and publishers:
Reach new fans with Lorehaven

Lorehaven helps Christian fans explore fantastical stories for Christ’s glory: fantasy, science fiction, and beyond. Articles, the library, reviews, podcasts, gifts, and the Lorehaven Guild community help fans discern and enjoy the best Christian-made fantastical stories, applying their meanings to the real world Jesus Christ calls us to serve. Subscribe free to get any updates you choose and to access the Lorehaven Guild.
Website · Facebook · Instagram · Twitter