The Gospel According to Monsters

Regular readers know that I used to write a lot about Halloween and monsters. A chapter in Unclean is devoted to the psychology of monsters.

Last Wednesday I was asked last minute to do the lesson at Freedom. So, given that Halloween was just around the corner, I dusted off that old monster material and did a class on "The Gospel According to Monsters."

I talked about four classic monsters--werewolves, vampires, mummies and Frankenstein--and I used each to talk about our spiritual predicament.

Werewolves remind us that we have a "beast" inside us. We like to think we're in control, but we are very much not in control of ourselves.

Vampires remind us that evil is attractive, even sexy and romantic. But behind the allure, is death and a parasitical existence.

Mummies remind us that, although we are shambling around, we are dead inside.

Finally, in an interesting twist, the story of Frankenstein reminds us that we're actually not very good a locating monsters. In the Frankenstein story the mob is the monster. In hunting monsters we've become the monster.

So given all that mess, what is the gospel according to monsters?

I read Romans, but changed a single word:

"God loved us while we were yet monsters."


I hope you have a blessed and haunted Halloween.