Christianity in Lars and The Real Girl

Unfortunately, for a person to behave morally some motivation might be necessary. Emotional appeals are used by authors to create strong feelings within the audience, some of which include fear, pity, and guilt. A documentary call Scared Straight attempted to use fear of prison life as a reason for the featured teens to alter their lives. However, author Kathy Feinstein disputed that idea in her article, stating that the “Change Within” program used in the video was not ultimately successful. In Jonathan Edward’s sermon “Sinners in the Hands of an Angry God,” he too, uses the appeal to fear to persuade his audience of unbelievers to convert and accept Christ. With the evidence and effects of appealing to fear, along with the arguments made by Feinstein, this tactic is still the best motivational force for three reasons.

This aspect of religion makes it useful even if it is based on lies. Christianity and other religions also provide a sense of community through churches and religious organizations. The tight community tie that religion establishes creates a strong trust in the other members of the religion. Hazel Crosby, a Christian traveling to San Lorenzo, expressed her unwavering trust in Christians by her comment “I’m sure glad it’s a Christian country, or I’d be a little scared.” (page 137) Religion, whether it be based on lies or truth, often creates a trust that all members are moral people. The idea of God also provides followers with comfort. When the narrator talks to Miss Faust, an employee of the same laboratory Dr. Hoenikker belonged to, she says she accepts God as love. (page 55) Christians are comforted by the thought that God provides a love that no mortal could give. Religion provides this

Even though he will not let himself be beaten for no reason, if he has made an inadvertent mistake, he will try to correct it, as he does with his grandmother, after accidentally embarrassing in church. “Later, I convinced her that I had not wanted to hurt her and she immediately seized upon my concern for her feelings as an opportunity to have one more try at bringing me to god. She wept and pleaded with me to pray... I promised; after all, I felt that I owed her something for inadvertently making her ridiculous before the member of her church.” (Wright 119) And he follows through with that. He prays, daily, for an hour. That hour is torture, but he keeps his promise, abiding by his moral code. He is different from the boys and girls of his church congregation, and class: they have been indoctrinated and do as they are told, docilely. One boy walks up to Richard, prompted by the congregation, who think that Richard is doomed to burn in Hell, and tries to convert him; it is obvious that the boy has no real conviction in God of his own, rather, the belief in God has been forced upon him by his parents and community. “Though older than I, he had neither known nor felt anything of life for himself; he had been carefully reared by his mother and father and he had always been told what to feel.”(Wright 116) Meanwhile, Wright, in stark contrast, resists the attempts of his Grandmother and extended family to indoctrinate him into religion, instead deciding to

Some adults may live much of their lives with a literal faith. Stage three is group faith Young people start to value the importance of friendship and often come to view God as one who treats them much like a trusted companion. Stage four is person faith. People strengthen their faith by questioning earlier beliefs. Stage five is mystical faith. At this stage of faith the awareness of God’s inner presence leads one to become more aware that God also dwells in others. Interfaith dialogue now becomes not a threat but an opportunity for new understanding. Stage six is sacrificial faith. Jesus, Dorothy Day, and Archbishop Romero are examples of this sacrificial faith. Such people display radical and consistent commitment to the doing of God’s will that is uncompromised by concern for personal security.

The Samantha Thrasher’s faith story began in her life at the age of thirty-two. Samantha connection with God started out as being angry, because people were not living according to the word of God from her point of view. It was shared that she had a visitation from God at the age of six. Samantha share how she talked to God and express that she was angry with adult and that if she died, she did not want to go to heaven with them. She said, God laughed at her, and then God explain to her that the adult behavior was wrong. She wanted God to tell those mean adults about themselves. She said, it was then God said to her, “you are a good girl” and everything was going to be alright. Samantha felt the comfort of God and the anger being to release from her spirit.

There is a sentence in the endnotes of the text that really hit home for me and it was “nevertheless, we can never fully rise above our own assumptions, and none of us can completely rise above our cultural and historical conditioning” (pg. 118). When I read this my mind went back to a time when I thought I could take no more of what life was handing me. I went to my chaplain with what felt like the world on my shoulders and anger in my heart because I thought that I had been stupid to give my boyfriend a second and third chance, he had hurt me just like ‘everyone else’ but my chaplain reminded me that it is my faith in god and my heart that is why I kept giving him new chances. He did so by having me recall one of my favorite passages from the bible “Love is patient, love is kind. It does not envy, it does not boast, it is not proud. It does not dishonor others, it is not self-seeking, it is not easily angered, it keeps no record of wrongs. Love does not delight in evil but rejoices with the

“A Prayer for Owen Meany” by John Irving is a novel in which religion plays a significant role. One of the main themes in this novel is faith in God and faith in oneself, and the conflict between belief and doubt. It is this need for faith that brings the two main characters together. John and Owen seem to need each other and there is an odd connection between the two that is shown throughout the novel. This connection seems to “curse” them to eternal friendship and forces each other to depend on one another. There are many reasons as to why John and Owen fit together, but few stand out as primary reasons. This is a lack of guidance, religion and faith.

This argument of an eternal presence working through people to generate change where there once was destruction is why Caine feels "the Samaritan had compassion and so he went” to signify that someone (Jesus) had once done the same act of compassion for him (Samaritan) (Caine, 8). This movement of showing compassion for those caught in the midst of destruction gives the Bible credibility in society today.

In his book Share Jesus Without Fear, William Fay lays out an easy and attainable way for one to reach people for Christ. A former mobster, and prostitution house owner, Fay says that if “God can take somebody like me and change him, he can take anybody in your life and change him as well.”1 In an easy to understand, comprehensive way, Fay shows how to overcome your fears and witness to those who are lost. By breaking down the six most common excuses one uses not

“Faith is what someone knows to be true, whether they believe it or not.” Whether provoked by doctor’s grim diagnosis or inspired by something else, these words of Flannery O’Connor are a good example of how one should always follow this rule in order to meet their expectations of life. However, it is in our human nature to think, dream, and imagine things that are far from our knowledge. O’Connor’s “Good Country People” tells the story of Hulga, a girl with an artificial leg who loses it after blindly believing the lies of astute Manley Pointer, a Bible salesman. Using the example of Hulga, “Good Country People” proves how unrealistic expectations can lead to unhappiness and dissatisfaction. This happens because faith does not play a role

The book is neither meant to be a theological treatise nor an academic exposition but a toolkit to unleash human potentials; a resource for intervention in dealing with human life hurts and as a channel of Gods healing and liberation through Jesus Christ.

The author Langston Hughes reminisces about when his Aunt took him to church when he was thirteen years old; ‘Every night for weeks there had been much preaching, singing praying, shouting, and some very hard sinners had been brought to Jesus’(1059). At the end of revival the children were asked to approach the ‘mourners’ bench ‘To be saved!’ Langston’s Aunt told him about how when you were saved ‘something happened to you inside.’ (1059) So Mr. Hughes went to the bench with the fellow children in the church, the preacher preached, hymns were sung they keep saying ‘wont’ you come, Young lambs to Jesus?’ One by one the children rose to Jesus. Leaving Langston Hughes and another boy Westley; the boy Westley got tired of sitting on the bench he stood up to be saved. Langston Hughes sat there waiting for Jesus he too grew tired of sitting on the bench and he figured that Jesus didn’t smite Westley for lying; so he stood up.

The first time I read the novel “The Shack,” I immediately empathized with the main character. The story is about a little girl who was abducted from a camping site and found murdered. Its main story line follows the emotional roller coaster of her father, Mack. Not to give the entire story away, I will not discuss exactly what Mack experienced. However, losing his daughter filled him with so much pain and anger. Mack could not understand how this could happen, why this would happen to his daughter. Ultimately he struggles with God, wanting to know why God would let his daughter be taken away in such a brutal murder. I have faced struggles and sadness in my life that made me cry out to God asking,

    C. S. Lewis, a well-known author and apologist, is best known by people of all

Some of the connection I’d experience during the service was when the pastor was talking about having hope and sticking by someone who have continuous mistreated you. A wave of confusion struck me, I was unaware at the time that it was anger and pain that connected to my past experiences with others who I have devoted my time to, whom happen to mistreated me. Therefore, in the