The Spec Faith 2020 Winter Writing Challenge is now closed to new entries, and the evaluation phase is underway.

We want all the entries, even those that came in at the deadline, to have a fair shot at the finals, and an opportunity to receive the same kind of evaluation as the entries that came in earlier last week. Please take time to read and give your evaluation of the ones you haven’t seen yet. I’m speaking to myself here, because I have not had a chance to read and give feedback to all of them. You’ll find all 12 of the entries in comments to last Monday’s Challenge post.

Remember to indicate which you like best (no limit) by hitting the thumbs-up button, then reply to the entries with helpful comments as you see fit. In your replies, tell the authors what you like about their story or give them constructive criticism which might benefit them (whether you choose to give a thumb up or not). Remember, no thumbs down, please. Such negative feedback doesn’t help a writer know what they need to work on, so it is not helpful.

Next week I’ll announce the three finalists, based on your thumbs up during this evaluation phase and those given last week as the submissions came in. From those three finalists, I’ll create a poll, and we’ll vote for a winner.

The drawback of a readers’ choice challenge is that it might turn into a popularity contest. On the other hand, we need reader feedback for the challenge to be successful. With both these facts in mind, I think the best answer is for Spec Faith visitors to connect with family, friends, and followers (our share buttons make this quite easy) and encourage their fair and unbiased evaluation (as opposed to, “Vote for mine—you don’t really need to read any of the entries,” which I’ve seen from some other contests).

Thanks ahead of time for letting others know that their feedback is a helpful part of the contest.

And special thanks to each of the authors who shared their work with us. The variety of well-written entries will make choosing a winner a tough call. What a nice predicament! To find the entries, follow one of the links in this article (such as this one)—the entries are in the comments section of that post. You might consider reading them last to first.

Photo by Simon Matzinger from Pexels

This post returns to the What’s the Deal with the Devil series. I’m focusing on the idea that a clash of culture can be a reflection of a spiritual war, at least in part, and an excellent extended example that illustrates this point is in the pages of the Bible.

The first definition of culture offered by Webster’s dictionary is: the customary beliefs, social forms, and material traits of a racial, religious, or social group, also: the characteristic features of everyday existence (such as diversions or a way of life) shared by people in a place or time.

Some aspects of culture as mentioned in the definition above have little to no relationship with spiritual warfare, but some aspects do. In particular, while modern academia tends to support the idea that no one culture is ever better than another–with the idea that all should be seen from within the context of their own perspective–the idea that all cultures are equal in terms of moral beliefs and teachings isn’t Biblical. Some beliefs are better, more moral, than others–so the cultural beliefs of some groups have been better than others.

Note in practice, few people, even few academics who might defend multiculturalism, really believe that “all cultures are equally good.” Though their favorite cultures may be quite different from ones that reflect beliefs that at least in part match what’s true according to the Bible. So a matrilineal society might win the praise of some people, because it’s less patriarchal, and a society like the Sarmatians of ancient times might be considered better than our own because it had both male and female warriors in abundance and thus was more egalitarian. And on the flip side, few people defend cultural beliefs that supported offering a daily human sacrifice to the sun god as the Aztecs did or which sent millions to their deaths in labor or concentration camps as did the Nazis or Soviets.

Does the distinctly different culture of ancient Israel imply separation from the world?

A quick overview of the law and other writings of ancient Israel might lead a person to focus on how starkly different the Israelites were from their neighbors. Most of the surrounding peoples, while they tracked the movements of the moon, based their major holidays on a solar calendar. The Hebrews used a lunar calendar. While the surrounding peoples had a set of annual rituals that tended to look forward at the agricultural cycle to ensure, say, a good planting season and abundant fertility in celebrations at the Spring Equinox and a good harvest in the Fall (among many other forward-looking rituals), Ancient Israel had rituals that looked back to the past, some of which were in striking opposition to what their neighbors were doing.

So in the Spring, when the Pagans all around Israel were celebrating rituals to ensure fertility, Israelites were talking about slaying the Passover lamb, the Angel of Death, and deliverance from Egypt. At the harvest time in the Fall, in which Pagan people in some places were thinking about dead crops and therefore death in general, the Hebrews were thinking about atonement with God.

The Pagan peoples produced abundant images of the gods and many other things–whereas archaeological digs show ancient Israelite pottery was often unadorned. It seems the commandment of “making no image” (Exodus 20:4) was taken so seriously by the Hebrews that they made their entire culture different from every other nation.

Perhaps more basically, we can say that Ancient Israel represented people who reverenced written documents, the Law of Moses, wise sayings, and eventually the writings of the prophets and others. They also reverenced keeping the commandments and following laws handed down by God, as opposed to often arbitrary means of making decisions favored by Pagan peoples, such as divination.

So, it would seem, God’s plan for the ancient version of the nation of Israel was to make it as different as possible from every other nation. Which perhaps I or others could use as a launching point for the argument that Christian culture ought to be a different as possible from the “lost” culture surrounding us.

But hold on a minute:

Was Israelite culture actually that different? (Was Israelite “exceptionalism” really a thing? Or only in part?)

The overview I just gave is actually unfair. Other ancient peoples had written law codes, often with a great deal of similarity to the law of Moses (such as Hittite law and Babylonian law). Other peoples also had written wise sayings, collections of which are in fact very popular worldwide, from the ancient Egyptians to the Chinese. Other nations had prophets of various kinds, though Israelite prophets left a written legacy unlike any other nation. Though like other nations, ancient Hebrew people used the casting of lots at times to make decisions, which could be considered a form of divination–though they were supposed to go Jehovah to get the answers they sought, instead of other gods or spirits.

Worshiping the Golden Calf: A negative example of cultural influence on Ancient Israel. Source: Wikipedia Commons

Music was part of the worship of ancient Israel and was part of the worship of other nations, too. The few historic descriptions of ancient Israelite music imply it was different from other nations (for example, an ancient Assyrian king demanded tribute of musicians from Judah, presumably because they were distinct, as mentioned in the linked paper). But the instruments used in ancient Israel were similar to those of Egypt and Babylon and in fact the first reference to music in worship in the Bible is linked to the golden calf and the Pagan-influenced worship described in Exodus 32.

While we can say Israelite was past-focused in terms of rituals, the Israelite ceremonial calendar certainly did look forward to future blessings from God, even though it looked backward to past events. And the forward-looking Pagans did in fact remember legends of their gods and demi-gods during their annual rituals. And while the Egyptians were using a “lunisolar calendar” well before the time of the founding of the Israelite kingdom (the Egyptians may have switched to it as early as 2500 B.C.) they used a lunar calendar for religious celebrations.

While archaeological digs show the Ancient Israel using less imagery than surrounding nations, some images, that is, visual artwork, are found at Israelite archaeological sites, such as the winged sun seal of King Hezekiah, (which included two Egyptian ankhs as well!). Lest Hezekiah be accused of using artwork in a way not authorized by the Bible, the Bible itself records God commanding that images of angels would adorn the top of the Ark of the Covenant (Exodus 25:18-20), making it clear that the portrayal of anything at all was not forbidden by the Bible so much as the portrayal of anything intended to represent God.

Craftsmen from Tyre helped build the Jewish temple at the time of Solomon (of a culture today we’d call “Phoenician”), as recorded in I Kings 5. The temples of the Phoenicians as found in archaeological sites were laid out much like the Israelite temple–except for the Phoenicians, the inner “holy of holies” was occupied mainly by a statue of the god to be worshiped at any given temple. The Hebrews were distinct in having only one official temple for one official God (of course many other gods were worshiped in Israel in a way not authorized by the Bible). And in that temple, in the space where a statue would be, angels to the side of the space without outstretched wings surrounded–nothing. Emptiness. Showing the resounding power of the idea that God cannot be portrayed visually. Yet that space was outlined and highlighted by images of angels. Skillfully crafted images.

So the imagery we get of Elijah facing off with the prophets of Ba’al (I Kings 18), that zeal-inspiring historical reality, or the historical reality of King Josiah finally putting aside the nonsense of Israelite people worshiping other gods by physically destroying their altars (II Kings 23), that zeal is a reaction to a corruption of morals that had gone too far–but that zeal was not how the religion of ancient Israel always worked. Israel did in fact maintain separate traditions from the nations around them–but the things they did were not totally separate; they were not completely different.

What does this have to do with spiritual warfare?

My presumption not fully explained so far in this post is that Satan influences cultures to steer them away from believing there is just one good and holy God whenever possible. That the belief in human sacrifice and other culturally-accepted horrors like genocide isn’t a product of human imagination alone, that demonic powers are involved as well in influencing entire cultures to do evil, just as earlier posts in this series (parts 2 and 3) make it plain the Bible teaches tempting people to sin and getting them to believe false ideas are the primary objectives for Satan in the spiritual war (also, in a post from 2018 I made the case that the Pagan deities of the Old Testament and demons mentioned in the New represent the same sinister spiritual power). Though of course there are many ways to get people to stray from doing right and Satan isn’t locked into just one method (Matthew 7:13).

So we can say to a degree that the culture of Ancient Israel represented what God wanted to see a culture believe and the methods of self-expression he believed were acceptable. We can only say it to a degree because in one specific case, the issue of divorce, Jesus stated that the Law did not represent God’s original intent (Matthew 19:8) and certainly there are reasons to believe that in other areas the Law requires an understanding of its context and how it was actually applied. But still, generally speaking, the Scripture shows ancient Israel represented what God wanted to see in a nation and surrounding nations had practices the prophets of God justly condemned.

And notice how much the Israelites were influenced by surrounding cultures in a way that reflects spiritual war. Most especially in that they wanted to worship the same gods as everyone else, but also they adopted other practices of evil common  in other nations that God prohibited, things the prophets railed against, including the oppression of widows, orphans, and other poor and disadvantaged people (see Zechariah 7:10 and many other places). This clash of cultures was not just a clash of differing groups of humans–invisible to the human eye, spiritual forces were prodding people in addition to the actions human beings took.

The bottom-line lesson from Ancient Israel:

The culture of ancient Israel in the Bible, while it had difficulty not giving in to the pressures of nations around it (pressures egged on by the Devil, according reasonable interpretations of what the Bible teaches about Satan), represented a culture God generally approved of. While that culture was distinct from the nations around it, it wasn’t totally different. In fact, all the forms of popular expression, whether laws or wise sayings, or stories, or music, or artwork, that existed in other nations, also existed in Ancient Israel. It’s just the laws and sayings came from a different authority, the stories we know about were about heroes of the past rather than gods and demi-gods, the music praised Jehovah, and the artwork left an empty space in the temple for the presence of the invisible God. The forms of popular expression, of popular culture, were either the same or very similar. But the subjects were at least a little different–and at times, very much different.

Did the New Testament change the nature of the spiritual war reflected in the clash of cultures?

The Old Testament already showed an example of doing the same sort of thing as surrounding cultures but in a different way. The New Testament is only a little different.

Idolatry is still forbidden in the NT (I Corinthians 10:14, I John 5:21, Revelation 9:20), though the emphasis is changed perhaps, because eating meat sacrificed to idols is allowed for those who could do so without violating their conscience (Romans 14:14).

Under the new covenant, it’s permissible for some of the outward symbols of having a different culture from the surrounding world that the Jewish people embraced to be abandoned, like circumcision (Acts 15:24-29). Or keeping festival days, which became optional (Romans 14:5-6).

Though presumably, these outward signs of being different from the world could be abandoned because the fruit of the Spirit as mentioned in Galatians 5 would make a Christian’s inner self already distinctly different from the world around him or her to such a degree that outward symbols were superfluous.

As far as popular culture is concerned, some references to the sports of racing (including I Corinthians 9:24) and a possible reference to boxing (I Corinthians 9:26) and a quotation of a Greek poet (Acts 17:28) indicate that Christians certainly knew about some forms of entertainment of their day and most likely attended at times. Note though that not one clear reference to attending gladiatorial games exists in the New Testament and the temple prostitution involved in sexual worship was clearly forbidden by prohibitions against fornication and adultery (not to mention idolatry). So sorting out the best from the worst of popular culture seemed to exist in the New Testament examples we have, limited though they are.

But that distinction in effect already existed in Hebrew culture, in Ancient Israel. The Israelites took the best features of the surrounding cultures and rejected the worst (when doing right). Again, Phoenician craftsmen helped build a temple very similar to a design they would have used–but where they would have put a statue of a god, empty space outlined by images of angels pointed to the Creator beyond the ability of human beings to capture in any kind of media.

So what does that this look at “cultural war” in the Bible mean to you? Is it helpful to realize “popular culture” of Bible times was influenced by the world around it, yet remained distinct in some ways? What are your thoughts on this topic?

Now that 2019 is behind us, I just ran the numbers and learned which top ten articles got the most reads last year.¹

How haven’t we done this before?

Well, let’s do this for the first time.

BONUS: 11. Captain Marvel Left Me Baffled and Disappointed

Of course most of us here are MCU fans. But the Marvel fandom felt it when Captain Marvel powered up the universe with no small controversy, and even negative reviews from good-faith reviewers. This included Marian Jacobs, who couldn’t help not praising Carol Danvers, but instead pitying the heroine:

. . . There’s no need to pick on Brie Larson. Anyone who has seen the film Room will know she’s an amazing actress. This is a Marvel problem.

So let’s just say it straight: the writing for this film was a mess. They pitched Danvers’ character arc as first being abused by her so-called commander, Yon-Rogg. He told her repeatedly to suppress her emotions in order to have success in battle. And yet this was not believable. What emotions? She had some simmering-below-the-surface moments here and there, but was she a highly emotional female? Not even close. With a couple small (too small given the situation) emotional spikes when she learned more of her own backstory, Danvers remains, well . . . stoic throughout the entire film.

10. Why Rick Killed King Jellybean: Exploring ‘Rick and Morty’

This 2018 review from Parker J. Cole drew plenty more fans—presumably Rick and Morty web-searchers—last year.

Many Christians, and theists for that matter, would postulate the idea that a multiple universe, realities, and etc., would point to signs of a Creator. Although I do not believe a multiverse exists, I’m not completely against the idea because it would still have to come from the mind of our Creator, the God of the Bible. What the creators of the show want to show is that nothing matters. We’re not important. Dealing with tragedy and difficult situations have to be dealt with by either acknowledging our lives have little meaning or that in a different reality, your choices would be different and it wouldn’t matter in that world either. Instead of showing the awesomeness of a God who can create the complexities of a multiverse, instead, through nihilistic existentialism, they say, “See, there are a million of you in different realities. Who cares?”

9. Should Christians Enjoy Fantasy?

That’s just a fantastic, simple, very search-engine-indexable title from Pam Halter. So no wonder it trended again, despite being from 2014.

As Christian readers, how do we choose a fantasy novel to read for enjoyment? How well do we know ourselves? What can you handle in a speculative novel? Do we only read Christian spec? Is there good fantasy in the general market? How do we know what’s good and what’s not? Once you read something, it’s there in your brain – forever. Scripture tells us to think about “whatever is true, whatever is noble, whatever is right, whatever is pure, whatever is lovely, whatever is admirable …” (Philippians 4:8) Are there fantasy novels like that? Of course, there are. Lots of them. If you love speculative fiction, do your research. Ask your friends. Read reviews. If you pick a novel and it doesn’t sit right with you, stop reading it. Yes, I heard some of you gasp. Stop reading a novel? Sacrilege! But if the Holy Spirit is poking you in the gut, yes, stop reading. Stop watching that movie. Stop going to that blog or website. It’s really okay.

8. ‘Game Of Thrones’ Sex: It’s Not Just Awkward, It’s Violation

Cap Stewart’s 2017 article trended again as the Game of Thrones TV series ended. Meanwhile, more Christians (including more Christian leaders) began sharing their concerns about the series’s indulgent exploitation. And more actors began sharing their real thoughts.

Game of Thrones is emblematic of a widespread moral epidemic. Sex is sacred, and yet we’re willing to put up with sexual sacrilege and manipulation of other human beings, so long as it provides us with a cathartic experience. The love we are to show to our neighbor, even at the expense of our own freedom, is mysteriously absent.

Taking into account how much sexual degradation actors go through for our amusement, I find it concerning that so many people—especially professing Christians—would not only excuse, but also defend such content.

7. 2019 Spec Faith Summer Writing Challenge

You folks love these writing challenges, and this is the first of several related articles to appear in the 2019 top-ten list. Rebecca LuElla Miller has been hosting these challenges twice every year! (The newest one is just out.) So of course, this second such challenge last year drew many readers, and of course writers who threw in their creative hats to finish this line:

Jag couldn’t be a part of the rebellion any more—not with what he knew now—but could he convince the other rebels to lay down their arms?

6. Finalists – 2019 Spec Faith Winter Writing Challenge

And this update from last year’s first writing challenge (again from Rebecca LuElla Miller) was widely read:

Special thanks to all who entered and all who gave their feedback in the preliminary round. We had some that came so close to making the finals—it was hard for me to follow the rules for the contest and include only three in this poll.

• Sarah Daffy
• Jay DiNitto
• L. G. McCary

By the way, the eventual winner was Sarah Daffy.

5. Six Christian White Magic Spells Worse Than Fantasy Magic

Here’s one of my articles. It’s from 2016. It still stays evergreen, probably and partly thanks to that provocative title. If I redid that, I’d grace it up a bit by putting “white magic” in quotes. But it remains true that even many thoughtful Christians, who keep guard against evil black magic (legit and otherwise) walking boldly up to the front door, just can’t seem to catch the very same occult practices disguised as light-angels sneaking in the back way:

God never establishes a magic system.

God never promised us that if we do X, we’ll achieve some reward—health or wealth, protection from evil influence, personal guidance, romance, or popularity in the world.

Instead He promises something better: Himself, with grace to meet every challenge.

What if we reject His real promises and substitute our own? What if we blame other things as if they are the worst sources of occult magic—things like fantasy stories? Then we’re not being spiritual or biblical. We’re acting like practitioners of the occult. Dare I say it, we’re acting like the diviners and sorcerers God has promised will not inherit eternal life.

4. Analysis Of ‘Hell Is The Absence Of God’ By Ted Chiang, Part 1

Almost every day I see this article appear in the “top searches” panel. This despite the fact that it’s one of our first-ever articles, from the old site’s archive. It dates back to 2006, by then-SpecFaith regular writer Mirtika Schulz:

This novelette won the Hugo and the Nebula awards. And what an exhilaratingly plotted story with a horrifying and perplexing and brilliant and vexing conclusion. It’s a complicated story told in a clean, simple prose. . . .

The “what if” behind it is simple: What if Hell, Heaven, Angels, and God were a reality, something factual, something you saw and experienced and that got reported on the news? What if faith was removed from the equation, because there was no longer room for doubt? What would the world be like? What would individual human reaction to the world be like?

When I kept seeing this article reappear, I did some research and discovered:

• SpecFaith’s article appears as the seventh result whenever people search for the story.
• That’s likely why the article has proven so popular.
• The author, Ted Chiang, also wrote a novella called “Story of Your Life.”
• That story was adapted for the screen under a different title for the 2016 science fiction film Arrival (with Amy Adams).

This makes me wonder what other amazing articles from SpecFaith’s early days might also have such staying power. Alas that some articles from that earlier version of the site (pre–2009) were lost. That site’s platform was an old and buggy blogging engine. Its content would not have easily transferred to the new host (and would have required hours and hours of manual conversion).

3. Standing Up to the YA Fantasy Impuritans

This is just the sort of guest article SpecFaith readers love. And guest writer L. Jagi Lamplighter did not disappoint in her firm yet gracious rebuke of “YA Twitter” activists. She identified the bullying, legalistic impulse behind these activists, who try to rally moralistic mobs on social media to “cancel” certain novelists—such as Amelie Wen Zhao—whom the aspiring moralizers find problematic.

If we modern Christians give way to this mob mentality of immorality and outrage, rather than standing up to those who abuse the truth, we could lose our promised land. America has been a promised land in many ways—a place of freedom and human dignity. These benefits have been vanishing in recent years, not because some tyrant has taken them from us with bayonets, but because we are ceding the willingly, due to the insistence of the Impuritans.

Amelie Wen Zhao has had her promised land, the happy future she had envisioned since she was eight years old, snatched from her. If we continue to allow this to happen, we, too, may find that we have lost ours.

2. ‘Sorry Your Dragon Show Ended Stupidly’ Meme May Insult ‘GOT’ Fans

Here’s another of my articles, this one from the actual current year. It left me in the unhappy place of saying something positive about people’s show, which I would never fault for being a “dragon show” but for being a naked show. Still, I found myself laughing at a short-lived meme trend before I realized that this may actually show a disrespectful attitude toward fantasy as a genre and its fans as people:

If we share the “sorry your dragon show . . .” meme, with that phrase, fantasy fans might actually hear an echo like this:

• I don’t care about the stories you’re interested in.
• Fantasy is intrinsically shallow, absurd, and stupid.
• By not caring about the stories you like, I care little about you.
• Hey, nerd! Put down your dopey comics and pay up yer lunch money. Haw, haw!

I kid with that last bit. But honestly, the “dragon show” part could sound like plain bullying. I see those non-fantasy “jocks”—possibly wearing ’90s faded-denim cutoff shorts and backward-turned baseball caps—harassing the “nerd” with thick glasses and knee-high socks.

1. 2019 Spec Faith Winter Writing Challenge

And last year’s unquestioned winner (atop from the homepage) was the intro to Rebecca LuElla Miller’s first 2019 writing challenge.

Nearly 300 commentators competed to continue or offer feedback for this starter sentence:

The guard would never let me enter if he knew what I was planning.

Again, the direct sequel just arrived yesterday. So why not go make that article the potential winner for the top ten most-read SpecFaith articles in 2020?

Thanks for reading Speculative Faith last year, and presumably long before and long after then.

For my individual part, thanks also for reading and subscribing to Lorehaven magazine, which will have its own update before long . . .

Godspeed in 2020!

Stephen

On to 2020—a leap year, an Olympics year, the beginning of a new decade, a Presidential election year in the US . . . and one that will again see Spec Faith host our traditional Winter Writing Challenge!

Certainly 2020 gives us much creative writing fodder, and some that might carry over to a piece of speculative fiction. But that’s for writers who wish to enter the challenge to decide.

As we have done in the past, Spec Faith will offer a prize for the winner of the 2020 Winter
Writing Challenge. Of course there’s also feedback from other Spec Faith visitors, which all entrants may enjoy, but there’s a $25 gift card from either Amazon or B&N for the winner. (For last year’s results, see this post). For readers, there are stories or story beginnings to enjoy. It’s all very win-win for all our visitors!

As a refresher, here’s how the 2020 Winter Writing Challenge works:

1. I’ll give a first line, and those who wish to accept the challenge will write what comes next—in 100 to 300 words, putting your entry into the comments section of this post.

“What comes next” may be the opening of a novel, a short story, or a completed piece of flash fiction—your choice.

In keeping with Spec Faith’s primary focus on the intersection of speculative fiction and the Christian faith, writers may wish to incorporate Christian elements or to write intentionally from a Christian worldview, but neither is required. Likewise, I’d expect speculative elements, or the suggestion of such, but entries will not be disqualified because of their omission.

1. Readers will give a thumbs up (NO THUMBS DOWN, PLEASE!) to the ones they like the most (unlimited number of thumbs up), and, if they wish, they may give a comment (please do!) to the various entries, identifying what elements particularly grabbed their attention or in what ways they can strengthen their writing.

I encourage such responses—it’s always helpful for entrants to know what they did right and what they could have done to improve.

1. After the designated time, I’ll re-post the top three (based on the number of thumbs up they receive) and visitors will have a chance to vote in a poll for the one which they believe to be the best 2020 entry (one vote only).

2. The entry which receives the most votes will earn a $25 gift card (from either Amazon or Barnes and Noble). In the event of a tie, a drawing will be held between the top vote getters to determine the winner.

And now, the first line:

The fact was, Kelly simply didn’t have time or opportunity to find out if the offense required the death penalty.

Finally, those silly little details we all need to know:

• You must include the given first line without changing it. Changes to the prompt will disqualify an entry

• Your word count does not include this first line.

• You will have between now and 8:00 AM (Pacific time) this coming Monday, January 13, 2020, to post your challenge entries in the comments section.

• You may reply to entries and give thumbs up, this week and next. To have your thumbs up counted to determine the top three entries, mark your favorite entries before Monday, January 27, at 8:00 AM (Pacific time).

• Voting begins Monday, January 27, after the poll is posted.

Feel free to invite your friends to participate, either as writers or readers. The more entries and the more feedback, the better the challenge.

However, please note, the challenge is not a popularity contest. We want to give writers a chance to find out what readers actually think of their writing. Consequently, please do not ask your social media followers to give your selection a vote unless they read the other entries as well. Thanks for making this little exercise a valuable help to all who enter.

Photo by Simon Matzinger from Pexels

So what did the fiction of the past predict would happen in 2020? Science fiction often sets stories in the future without specifying a date, but sometimes authors have specifically projected when they thought certain events would take place. 2020, that nice round repeating number (like 20/20 vision), has been the target for a number of science fiction predictions, through future references in novels, short stories, movies, TV series, comics, and video games. I’ll list the predictions I could find specifically linked to 2020, then make some comments about making predictions in science fiction below that.

1. Voyages to other worlds:

This is the poster for the Spanish sci-fi film (in English translation) Stranded, which predicted hardship exploring Mars in 2020.

VENUS: The 1965 B-movie Voyage to the Prehistoric Planet predicted that there would be a manned landing on Venus in 2020–and we’d find dinosaurs there!

MARS: Kim Stanley Robinson’s 1993 novel Red Mars predicted the first man on Mars would set foot on the red planet in 2020. The Spanish film Stranded, made in 2001, features a crew marooned on Mars in 2020. The movie Mission to Mars in 2000 predicted the same thing–and also imagined the “face” on Mars (now long since shown not to look like a face at all) was an alien spaceship in disguise!

SATURN: Someone in the Star Trek universe somewhere made reference to a manned mission to Saturn happening in 2020 (source Memory Beta).

2. Cyber, Artificial Intelligence, Tech, and Robotics:

INTERNET BRAIN: The 2005 novel Air (Geoff Ryman) predicted by 2020 human brains would routinely be permanently connected to the Internet.

CYBERPUNK: In 1988 the role-playing game Cyberpunk 2020 was created by Mike Pondsmith. Predicts completely immersive virtual reality in our time.

ARTIFICIAL INTELLIGENCE: Arthur C. Clarke (author of 2001: A Space Odyssey) specifically predicted that by 2020, devices built by human beings would have the same general intelligence as humans. (Which almost certainly will not happen this year.)

US ROBOTICS: The I, Robot film of 2004 predicted the founding of the US Robotics company in 2020. Decades before, Isaac Asimov, author of the I, Robot short story collection, had predicted that “by the early 21st Century” household robot servants able to carry out simple conversations would become common. Which he fictionally predicted would be built by the US Robotics Corporation.

Edge of Tomorrow, supposedly happening in 2020, features mechas in combat.

ROBOTIC SPORTS: The 2011 film Real Steel rather boldly predicted that boxing would be made illegal for human athletes (due to its brutality) in 2020. Why the 1991 video game Super Baseball 2020 would predict baseball likewise would be entirely played by robots and not humans, is a mystery to me.

WAR MECHAS: 2013’s Pacific Rim is set in 2020 and of course features giant mecha combat robotics fighting giant undersea creatures. In 2014, Edge of Tomorrow predicted that a global military alliance would develop mechas to fight aliens in 2020. But the Japanese anime cartoon Platinumhugen Ordian (in 2000) was already predicting that in 2020 Japanese high school students would pilot mechas.

OTHER TECHNOLOGY: The 1999 game Sim City 3000 predicted that microwave power plants would be invented in 2020. 2005’s movie Stealth predicted a new kind of ultimate stealth fighter jet in 2020. The film stinkeroo Thunderbirds (2004) directed by Johnathan Frakes of Star Trek The Next Generation fame (William Riker) was set in the year 2020, where a spaceship like the Thunderbird 5 (from an earlier cartoon) is a reality.

3. Dragons, Monsters, and Alien Invaders (oh my!):

DRAGONS: The Reign of Fire movie of 2002 is set in 2020, after decades of dragon rule over Planet Earth. Similarly the video game 7th Dragon from 2011 imagined dragons invading Tokyo in 2020.

Reign of Fire–nothing like a dragon Dystopia. Set in 2020.

MONSTERS: Godzilla: Final Wars Film (2004) features giant monsters and mutant superhumans recruited to fight them. The 1991 video game Beast Wrestler features fighting monsters including dragons in a ring–and is oddly set in the year 2020.

ALIEN INVADERS: I’ve already mentioned alien invaders with the Edge of Tomorrow, but the British TV puppet-based series Terrahawks (1983) was set in the year 2020, after an alien force has destroyed NASA’s Mars base and Earth is under threat.

4. Dystopia, Post-Apocalyptic, and Other Political Predictions:

DYSTOPIAN MEGACORPORATE: There have been many dystopian futures set in 2020 but a number were about corporations dominating the future.  Perfect Dark: Initial Vector, Greg Rucka’s novel published in 2005, the world is dominated by hyper-corporations recruiting their own military forces to fight in clandestine battles in order to gain power. Similar corporations dominate the world in 1984’s comic series Iron Man 2020. The video game Perfect Dark Zero (2005) likewise predicted a world largely controlled by powerful international business conglomerates.

RELIGIOUS DYSTOPIA: Robert A. Heinlein, “Golden Era” sci fi author, predicted in his Future History stories that the 2020’s in the United States would be dominated by a quasi-Christian Fundamentalist cult that would set back technological progress and space travel until the 2070s.

GENERAL DYSTOPIAN: In 1997-1998 a comic series called 2020 Visions based on the predictions of the future for this year mostly made dystopian predictions, such as Ellis Island becoming a plague colony, Detroit ruled by Sharia law, and unlicensed children becoming illegal. Likewise an even earlier short story anthology in 1974 called 2020 Vision (unrelated to the comic series) edited by sci-fi great Jerry Pournelle, including stories by famous authors of the past such as Poul Anderson, Harlan Ellison, Larry Niven, AE Van Vogt, Norman Spinrad, and Ben Bova, made mostly dystopian predictions for 2020. The British TV Series Knights of God in 1987 predicted a fascist and religious (but anti-Christian) order ruling most of Britain by 2020 (and was actually a show for kids!). Also note the events of 2019’s Terminator: Dark Fate, in which dystopia is at hand, are supposed to happen in 2020.

POST-APOCALYPTIC: The Dollhouse TV Series in 2010 had an episode set in 2020 (“Epitaph Two: Return”), which showed a post-apocalypse in which most of humanity have had their minds wiped. In 2009, the ridiculously bad TV movie Annihilation Earth opens as a team of scientists in the year 2020 wander through a post-apocalyptic wasteland.

WAR SIMULATIONS AND BATTLE GAMES: For whatever reason, a number of these video games have been set in the year 2020. Battlefield 4, made in 2013, is set in the fictional “War of 2020.” Crysis, made in 2007, is centered around a North Korean invasion happening in 2020. MAG: Massive Action Video game of 2010 portrayed a “second war of the S.V.E.R” starting this year. Tom Clancy’s EndWar (2008) imagined a European super-state called the European Federation and the militarization of space in 2020. Supreme Ruler 2020 (2008) was a grand strategy game about a protagonist’s quest to unify a region of fragmented states into a single government. And the Senran Kagura game (first released in 2011) predicted 2020 will be dominated by female ninja champions of good-versus-evil. (Senram Kagura seems in some ways similar to 2004’s Sekirei Manga, which produced a video game in 2009, which predicted “Sekirei,” women fighters, would battle to determine the fate of the world. Both series, from the few images I’ve seen of them, seem very interested in the portrayal of busty female combatants. Note the Sekirei anime was listed as for “Mature Audiences.”)

Senran Kagura, in which female ninjas fight evil…in 2020.

OTHER POLITICAL: The TV film from 2000 named Code Name Phoenix predicted world global peace by 2020–but that a genetically engineered virus that can stop the human aging process would threaten that peace. The Korean movie Yesterday (2002) was an action film set in 2020, in the backdrop of reunification of North and South Korea. And the campy cartoon from 1972, Sealab 2020, imagined undersea, quasi-utopian laboratories where people permanently live under the ocean as of 2020.

The futures that were almost close–and not close at all.

Looked at overall, the story predictions for 2020 mostly over-predicted change. We don’t have decent spaceships, interplanetary travel, artificial intelligence, good virtual reality, robot servants, robots playing sports, mechas, Korean reunification, undersea laboratories, or worldwide peace. On the other hand, neither do we have alien or dragon invaders, giant monsters, a religious dictatorship in the USA, Sharia in Detroit, a fascist government in Britain, our brains haven’t been wiped clean, our societies haven’t been reduced to a continual state of war, female ninjas are not running through the streets, and we aren’t wandering through a post-apocalyptic wasteland.

The actual future is mostly boring–which in a way is not a surprise. Of course storytellers are going to gravitate towards the most astounding predictions. But the corporate mega-conglomerate stuff is actually happening. Just in a way less interesting than predicted. The development of artificial intelligence is also taking place, but more stealthily, leading to what exactly we don’t know. Virtual reality is coming about, as is hooking up your brain to the Internet. Just more slowly than thought. And there sure is plenty of combat ongoing in 2020–though that’s pretty much always been true of the human race.

An interesting tidbit was my as-thorough-as-I-could-make-it sweep didn’t include any stories predicting climate change would destroy the Earth in 2020–though there were some stories that predicted the Earth would be destroyed before 2020 and some predict it afterwards.

For writers, maybe the best advice this review of already-existing stories gives you is that if you don’t want to seem too silly in your predictions of the future, perhaps it’s better not to tag them with a date. Though of course for story reasons of seeming both real and immediate, avoiding dates isn’t always possible.

What stories have you seen that made predictions for 2020 or the 2020s? What are your thoughts about writing near-future sci fi that makes predictions you might have to live with?

The New Year is a cheerful holiday. It’s more trifling, perhaps, than the sacred holidays and even weighty days of remembrance like Memorial Day and July Fourth. But if more trifling, it’s also lighter, and that also has its charm. The turn of the year is a hopeful time, turning people to to the future, to dreams and wishes and resolutions. The New Year is so cheerful it is, in fact, almost sad. We are a little too eager to sweep up the old year and discard it.

Some more eager than others, of course. Still, no one’s happiness is so pure as to entirely exclude relief. Welcome the New Year, and good riddance to the old. Everyone likes New Year’s because the New Year is about change, and we could all use some of that.

The celebration of New Year’s is more free-form than that of other major holidays – and, let us add, more voluntary (another reason for its popularity!). Our society has only a few broadly established traditions. There is, of course, the ball drop in Times Square, which has a rich history and symbolism and, anyway, it’s sort of fun to watch heavy, glittering objects fall. We have our one certified New Year’s song, “Auld Lang Syne”. Admittedly, no one understands more than two lines of the song, and sometimes one suspects that there are only two lines. Nevertheless, it’s nostalgic.

Even more universal: New Year’s resolutions. I am firmly opposed to breaking New Year’s resolutions, which is why I never make them. And I already think of things I ought to do and then don’t do them, so it doesn’t really seem necessary as a holiday tradition. Many people do make New Year’s resolutions, though. Sometimes the same ones, year after year, because the idea is good even if the flesh is weak. New Year’s resolutions come from that sense of change, that same stirring of hope, that makes the holiday so attractive. In this manifestation, though, it is change from ourselves and even change of ourselves. Here is another truth we edge up to on New Year’s: We could all be better, all try harder.

We probably won’t, of course. That’s another truth we come up against, usually shortly after the New Year. But every holiday consists at least half in remembering, in certain realities brought to celebration and thus, perforce, to mind. And for all we know – for, though the world is old, it is still a place of miracle and wonder – we may even keep those New Year’s resolutions.

So Happy New Year. I hope that 2019 was good to you, and 2020 will be even better. I hope that you will have the change you want, and the change that you need, and that your heart will be refreshed as the new year brings us that much closer to the day when everything will be new.

And I said to the man who stood at the gate of the year:
“Give me a light that I may tread safely into the unknown.”
And he replied:
“Go out into the darkness and put your hand into the Hand of God.
That shall be to you better than light and safer than a known way.”

– Minnie Louise Haskins, “God Knows”

In western society there is a long lead up to Christmas. No sooner have the gifts been opened and the discarded boxes added to the trash, we are on to the New Year. Lots of talk about resolutions and a new decade and a fresh beginning. Today Marks the day before the day before.

Tomorrow—New Year’s Eve—is as much a holiday as New Year’s Day. Maybe more so. Today is just the day before the day before the new year. And when New Year’s Day falls in the middle of the week, as it does this year, no one really knows what to do with the day before the day before. Do we go back to work? Try to return to our normal routine? Extend the usual day off for New Year’s?

It’s awkward. A bit of 2019 we simply don’t know what to do with.

The good thing is, God knows.

No days are wasted in His economy. No passing of time slips by His notice.

So, too, the day before the day before.

For one, we can use the day before the day before the New Year begins to evaluate the old year, and in this end of the decade, we can even evaluate the past ten years.

I mean, people are always making a five year plan or even a ten year plan. Where do you see yourself in ten years, they ask.

Looking back is a great prelude to looking forward.

When we think about the great goodness God has shown to us over the past decade, it can give our faith a shot in the arm.

The Bible is replete with “stones of remembrance.” God wants us to remember. In the NAXV the word “remember” occurs 168 times, most (but not all) in a positive light. Many of those references identify things God remembers, such as His covenant with the people of Israel.

Still others are admonitions for His people to remember His wonderful deeds.

To help out, God gave, at various times, tangible objects which were to trigger our memories. For example, to the people coming out of Egypt, God gave them commands and directed Moses to put on the priestly garments, tassels to remind them of the commandments.

There were also the piles of stones when Israel crossed the Jordan God miraculously dried for them: one pile from the river, deposited in the Promised Land; another pile from the Promised Land into the bed of the Jordan River.

I could go on about Passover and the institution of the celebration to remember God’s miraculous deliverance of His people from Egypt. Or the institution of the Feast of Booths or many other tangible “stones of remembrance” God gave. The Sabbath, for example. God tied the Sabbath to one main thing: His creation of the world. When the people of Israel kept the Sabbath, they were to rest as God rested from His creative work.

In the New Testament, God instituted communion and baptism for the purposes of remembering. Jesus specifically said we are to take of the cup and the broken bread in remembrance of Him and His death. Baptism does even more, bringing to life our identification with Jesus in His death and resurrection.

Amazingly, in the New Testament letters, the writers, from time to time, told Christ followers to remember where we came from, what our condition was like before we gave our lives to Jesus. I find that interesting because God says He forgets our sins, that He puts them from Him as far as the east is from the west. But we, on the other hand, He tells to remember our former condition. Not necessarily former specific sins; but lost estate:

Therefore remember that formerly you, the Gentiles in the flesh, who are called “Uncircumcision” by the so-called “Circumcision,” which is performed in the flesh by human hands—remember that you were at that time separate from Christ, excluded from the commonwealth of Israel, and strangers to the covenants of promise, having no hope and without God in the world. But now in Christ Jesus you who formerly were far off have been brought near by the blood of Christ. (Eph. 2:11-13)

The point is, in remembering we can more clearly move forward, embracing the good gifts God has give us, whether salvation through Jesus or the everyday gifts we share with the common sparrows and the unremarkable flowers which God feeds and clothes.

So perhaps the day before the day before is the best day to remember. What good things has God done?

In this last decade, we’ve seen changes here at Spec Faith. We have said hello to some regular contributors and good-bye to others. We’ve reviewed any number of books, critiqued any number of movies and even TV programs. We have talked about social trends and spiritual trends. We have hosted numerous guest writers and read a good many novel or story excerpts.

Undoubtedly the biggest development has been the launch of Lorehaven and the efforts to engage readers in actually reading, reviewing, discussing speculative fiction. (If you haven’t already signed up to receive your free copy, I suggest you do so ASAP.)

May you, on this day before the day before, take a moment or ten to look at where you have been—as a reader, a writer, a person—and thank God for what He has done in your life during this past year, this past decade. And may you have a safe and sane New Year’s Eve and a happy New Year.

Photo from Pexels by Jill Wellington, Anna-Louise, and cottonbro

For those of you who routinely bask in joy on Christmas and other family-centered holidays, I’m sincerely glad for you. Perhaps you may not have the means to buy all the presents you like, but you are able to buy some. Likely, you have the day off and can actually be at home, because working at a convenience store or nursing home or being thousands of miles away from home for work (perhaps because of military duty, like I’ve experienced) are generally not positive experiences. To enjoy yourself as people normally do, you also have enough cash for a decent meal and your family in addition enjoys one another’s company–because in some families getting everyone together only increases tensions and is more unpleasant that joyous. If your Christmas really has been nothing but joy for as long as you can remember, this post is not really for you, though you probably know someone who is in the situation this article describes.

But I think a great many people find disappointment in holidays, at least at times. I think a particularly common form of holiday disappointment will be felt today, the day after Christmas, because many people had high expectations for Christmas and may have worked hard to provide for those expectations as in working in a kitchen to prepare food or were self-sacrificially gift-giving or something else along those lines, only to find the actual day fell short of all the hopes and efforts that had been invested in it.

But again, that post-frenetic-activity-but-was-it-really-worth-it-holiday-heaviness is by no means the only kind. Perhaps a precious loved one was in the hospital on Christmas. Perhaps there even was a serious accident on the holiday, or today. Or perhaps unkind, unloving, and unappreciative people have soured what otherwise would have been good. Among other potential issues.

I remember a particular time when I was overseas during a holiday–in this particular case the holiday was actually Thanksgiving and I happened to be in Afghanistan–and I attempted to make a video call home to see and talk to my family. The Internet connection was terrible, so poor that the call never really functioned. It barely connected, glitched the entire two minutes or so I was connected, and I couldn’t really see anyone or talk the way I’d wanted to. Eventually the call cut off and I couldn’t initiate it again, though I tried, in spite of how badly as it had functioned in the first place, leaving me alone and unsatisfied. So something as basic as losing an Internet connection was a crushing event for me. So I know these things happen to other people too: You want or expect something good to happen, you need it to happen and when it doesn’t–or when something horrible happens instead–you walk away more emotionally hurt than if you’d never hoped for anything good at all.

This can be especially crushing if you used to have holiday times of warm feelings, surrounded by family and friends, but have them no longer for whatever reason. Nothing makes the present seem so bitter as when the past was clearly better (though at times the past seems better in memory that it actually was).

Someone might respond to this kind of problem by lowering all expectations. And perhaps in some situations that’s realistic–because maybe you shouldn’t expect people who act one way year after year over Christmas to act any differently than how they always act. But I don’t think that’s a good solution to the problem of holiday disappointment, generally speaking.

Doesn’t part of the actual joy of any holiday, or any future event even that turns out well, lie in the anticipation of it happening? As in, chocolate tastes good, but tastes better if you’ve been longing for it before you get any, assuming receiving what you’ve longed for meets the expectation of your desire. So lowering all expectations for joy at all times, maybe even to the point of feeling something is inherently wrong with joy, as would an ancient Stoic like Marcus Aurelius or the fictional Mr. Spock, isn’t the answer. Why should we reduce the possibility of joy permanently because of problems that are temporary?

And with my last statement I find I’ve wandered into a rhetorical minefield of potential issues. Some Christians believe joy isn’t important–God cares about our holiness, therefore if we feel bad we shouldn’t care, we need to “suck it up and drive on” (as we say in the US Army). Others think joy is all-important and therefore (even if they usually don’t say it directly) if you are not experiencing joy right now then you are therefore somehow disobedient to God. I mentioned last week how Satan can attack our emotions, which may lead someone to think I meant (as some Christians actually say) that all our negative emotions are of the Devil, therefore we should never experience them if we are following God as we should. Though that’s not what I meant.

I unfortunately have to gloss over these issues compared to the time and attention they deserve due to the limitations of the size of this post, but while the Scripture tells us to take our worries to God as part of a spiritual life of trusting God that relies on him continually, that doesn’t mean we will never experience sadness or disappointment. How can we be commanded to bring petitions to God, as is said in Philippians 4:6, if we don’t have anything to be concerned about to ask about in the first place? Then, after bringing those concerns to God, we can experience peace in faith and confidence in the Almighty (Philippians 4:7), which will allow us to deliberately put our focus on positive things rather than negative (Phil 4:8-9).

Philippians 4, a great passage about contentment, then goes into an explanation of a situation someone reading through the Bible for the first time may not entirely understand. But in essence, Paul expresses gratitude to the Philippian church for them donating money to meet Paul’s basic needs. But in so doing, he makes an important statement that he (Paul) has learned to be content no matter what is going on (in immediate context, whether they gave or not), whether he has nothing or has much (Phil 4:11-12) because he (Paul–or us, too) “can do all things through Christ.” But this is not a statement that having nothing is exactly the same emotionally as having much!

If that were true, if having nothing and being at the point of starvation and other kinds of suffering were meaningless (2 Corinthians 11:24-29 and other passages reveals that real suffering is where Paul was, many times), why would Paul thank the Philippians for finally sending money? If Paul (or us) had nothing in circumstances that would naturally cause a person to be anxious, why would Peter tell us (I Peter 5:7) to cast our “cares” or problems on the Lord? Why would Paul tell us to pray about our issues in Philippians 4:6 and say all the rest through verse 13, if what he said earlier in verse 4 about rejoicing in the Lord were something we are really able to do at all times, one hundred percent, without any consideration of what he said after that?

Because if joy in the Lord were an absolute gift of the Holy Spirit, then we would be able to have it gushing out of us at all times, no matter what is happening (and would not have to be commanded to seek to rejoice for that matter). We then would have nothing to bother us that we would need to pray about, no rough circumstances we’d need to lean on the power of Christ to enable us to survive. Paul would not have praised the Philippians for “sharing in my distress” (4:14) if Paul had never felt any distress or concern in the first place and Peter would not tell us to “cast cares” on the Lord because we’d never feel any cares or worries at all.

Furthermore, the Bible would never tell us to “weep with those who weep” (Romans 12:15) if we are never, not for one instant, supposed to feel negative emotions or sadness. That’s why having “peace that passes all understanding” (Phil 4:7) is not quite the same thing as having joy, and while we are commanded to seek the joy of the Lord (Phil 4:4) and told such joy is a gift of the Holy Spirit (Galatians 5:22), all we have to do is really read what the Bible says about what the apostles went through (e.g. Phil 4:14) and how they felt about it to understand that joy is not a continuous experience for a Christian and cannot be if we are to be empathetic to others (again, Romans 12:15). Having peace, yes. Finding the ability through Christ to face the worst life may bring, yes. Always being joyous, no.

So if your holidays have been less than stellar, don’t add to your sense of hardship by concluding that since things have gone wrong for you over Christmas and you feel bad about it, that clearly means you are somehow a terrible Christian. Don’t feel that having worries or concerns or heartaches itself is a sign there’s something wrong with you (by the way, I believe this is something the Devil would like to tell you). No, recognize having worries and concerns is normal–but don’t wallow in them. Take them to the Lord. Keep taking them to the Lord, because they will keep coming up at various times. Find the peace of trusting God to answer your prayers, even if you can’t imagine how. Find the joy of the Lord in being close to him, relying on him, no matter what people will do.

Be ready for God to answer your prayers, even if you don’t know when, like a holiday coming but you’ve lost the calendar–you know the Lord’s answer is coming, eventually, so you trust him in anticipation of him coming, like a normal, healthy kid waiting for Christmas. Don’t give up on the possibility of future joy by turning stoic, but don’t be broken by a lack of joy right now, either. Trust God to care for you–take your worries to him in prayer, continually, often, in faith. Rejoice when the answers come–as Paul rejoiced when receiving help from the church at Philippi.

And remember that you are not alone. You are not the only person to feel disappointment this time of the year. I’ve felt it too, and others have as well.

If you are Christ’s, much better things are coming for you in your future, for certain, eventually. When, I don’t know, but if at no prior point, for certain when you see the Lord in person. Though I think if you pray in faith and seek God’s joy, you will feel joy much sooner than that. And your experience of joy won’t be uncommon. Even though feeling tragedy and loss is normal and real and human, the normal Christian life means taking those worries to God and trusting he will take care of you. Eventually. For certain.

I hope my look at the potential lack of Christmas joy hasn’t discouraged anyone. But for readers of this post, what are some of your favorite passages of the Bible you turn to when you feel down? Or when things have gone badly? Any other thoughts?

Several of my friends have sent us Christmas cards. I love getting every single one of them.

Similarly, I love how many people have the time and resources for beautiful backyards: the kind with perfect grass, a fenced garden, plenty of room for pets, and a fully loaded swimming pool with separate hot tub and artificial rock wall for an ultimate summertime getaway. (Complete with water slide. Clink.)

In either case, folks: I can’t do that myself.

But I fight the sin of covetousness. I want to be grateful for those who have these gifts–grateful that they exist.

Plus, if you haven’t noticed, Christmas cards have gotten better. They’re less cheesy.

Most of the time it’s just a photo of my friend’s smiling family. Along with seasonal and Christlike wishes for the recipient’s best. Sometimes a family update letter is enclosed. And the letter tends to include rejoicing for blessings and lament for trials and sufferings in the previous year.

C. S. Lewis hated secular, sentimental ‘Exmas cards’

(Image from rawpixel.com / New York Public Library)

This model of Christmas card is apparently an improvement over the saccharine, sentimental Christmas cards of yore.

Which, it seems, are exactly the sorts of cards that C. S. Lewis made it very clear he despises with all his being.

You won’t of course find an anti-card rhapsody in Lewis’s fantasy books or apologetics works. Instead, we find this scathing takedown in a Lewis collection called God in the Dock: Essays on Theology and Ethics, edited by Walter Hooper.

In Lewis’s satirical essay “Xmas and Christmas,” his logic isn’t very deep. But his passionate conviction is.

Lewis describes a strange land oh-so-cleverly called Niatirb, whose residents “use the following customs”:

In the middle of winter when fogs and rains most abound they have a great festival which they call Exmas, and for fifty days they prepare for it in the fashion I shall describe.

First of all, every citizen is obliged to send to each of his friends and relations a square piece of hard paper stamped with a picture, which in their speech is called an Exmas-card. But the pictures represent birds sitting on branches, or trees with a dark green prickly leaf, or else men in such garments as the Niatirbians believe that their ancestors wore two hundred years ago riding in coaches such as their ancestors used, or houses with snow on their roofs.

And the Niatirbians are unwilling to say what these pictures have to do with the festival, guarding (as I suppose) some sacred mystery.

And because all men must send these cards the market-place is filled with the crowd of those buying them, so that there is great labour and weariness.

But having bought as many as they suppose to be sufficient, they return to their houses and find there the like cards which others have sent to them. And when they find cards from any to whom they also have sent cards, they throw them away and give thanks to the gods and this labour at least is over for another year. But when they find cards from any to whom they have not sent, then they beat their breasts and wail and utter curses against the sender; and, having sufficiently lamented their misfortune, they put on their boots again and go out into the god and rain and buy a card for him also.

And let this account suffice about Exmas-cards.¹

And they buy as gifts for one another such things as no man ever bought for himself.

—C. S. Lewis

Lewis: ‘For the sellers … put forth all kinds of trumpery’

This holiday season, find you Lewis’s complete essay “Xmas and Christmas.”

Because Lewis in full satire-Scrooge mode goes on to share his gentle opinions about more Exmas traditions:

• Gift-giving

And the sellers of gifts no less than the purchasers become pale and weary, because of the crowds and the fog, so that any man who came into a Niatirbian city at this season would think some great public calamity had fallen on Niatirb. This fifty days of preparation is called in their barbarian speech the Exmas Rush.

—C. S. Lewis

• Father Christmas cosplay
• The Exmas Rush
• Overeating
• Overdrinking
• Secular holiday traditions versus sacred traditions

Lewis concludes, “It is not likely that men, even being barbarians, should suffer so many and great things in honour of a god they do not believe in.”

Ouch.

However, Lewis also had many a friendlier take on Christmas. For this, we need only recall the arrival of this man into a far more sensible land:

To all our readers at Speculative Faith, especially those to whom I didn’t send an Exmas-card (i.e., all of you):

“A Merry Christmas! Long live the true King!”