If you’re tired of ESPN’s one-sided analysis of the Big XII South title controversy, my good friend and fellow-blogger, Keith Rogers, makes an excellent case for OU over Texas.
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Several months back, my fellow blogger, Jason Lee wrote, “If you follow Christian fiction at all, you’ve likely heard of The Shack, a novel by Oregon salesman William P. Young.” Today, even if you do not follow Christian fiction, you have likely heard of the book or perhaps will receive it as a gift this Christmas.
In fact, the book is earning huge praise from prominent Christians including Eugene Peterson and Michael W. Smith, one even calling it The Pilgrim’s Progress for today (and by this blog’s title, you can guess the weight of comparing anything to that classic).
Having just finished the work, I estimate otherwise, and believe The Shack could more appropriately be called a pilgrims regression. Why do I say that?
First, while the work paints itself as fiction, it is clearly designed to contain teachings about the nature of God. And it is the author’s (mis)understanding about God—especially the Trinity—that presents the most problems. I do not think it spoils the plot to tell you that, amid a great tragedy, the protagonist meets the Father, Son and Holy Ghost in a remote shack, each of whom is a separate person. The Father (or “Papa” as He is called) manifests Himself as a large, African-American woman with somewhat lacking grammar. The Son, meanwhile, is presented as a sort of fuzzy teddy bear, and the Holy Ghost (also a woman) is nebulous and even apologizes at one point to “Mack,” the main character. There is also a dialogue in which the Holy Spirit is approvingly equated to the legendary American Indian’s Great Spirit.
Just a quick technical note for the curious: I just noticed this morning that comments were disabled, a mistake I have rectified. The blame for the disabled comments is probably mine, as I’m pretty sure I unchecked one too many boxes during our migration from wordpress.com. Sorry about that.