Who Can Have a Christian Imagination?

Who owns the Christian imagination?

October, painter Makoto Fujimura, poet Malcolm Guite, and (prophet?) Beth Moore gathered in Oklahoma City, Oklahoma, for a new faith and arts conference called Painters Prophets Poets. Author Hannah Anderson convened and hosted the event in order to serve Oklahoma artists and churches by demonstrating that creativity is more than a profession and more than the products it creates. Rather, according to Anderson, imagination is an avenue by which we can see God, serve him and his church. This is what Painters Prophets Poets was about. “Gather together around Christian imagination,” Anderson said, “regardless of your profession, and learn from people who have learned how to imagine.” Before the conference took place, I sat down with Anderson to discuss the conference.

Why do Christians need a new faith and art conference?

What is different about Painters Prophets Poets — and HopeWords as well — is that it kind of rejects professionalization of Christian imagination. This is not a conference that’s for people in the industry of creativity or people who define themselves as artists. Instead, this is allowing all of us to learn from artists, to learn from painters, poets, and prophets. This is an invitation for us to listen to what the creative process has taught other people that we might benefit from. So in that sense, it is in the space of art and theology, Christian imagination, but it’s more about equipping the whole church by listening to the artists of the church.

You included Makoto Fujimura, Beth Moore, Malcolm Guite, Miroslav Volf. That’s a pretty eclectic line up. Why them?

Why not Malcolm Guite, Miroslav Volf, Beth Moore, and the Fujimuras? I think folks may see the lineup and not immediately see any logic to it. It’s very eclectic. It doesn’t fit neatly in either the tribal boxes that we have or even the industry boxes that we have. We’ve got a Bible teacher, a poet, a theologian, a visual artist, and a lawyer. The question — “What do all of these people have to say together?” — is exactly the point of the conference. We believe that Christian imagination is for every calling. What we consider the thread pulling these folks together, even though they’re in potentially disparate places, is that vision for a different world, a belief in the new creation that the spirit is birthing.

We see within all of their work a movement toward that end, and we believe that’s something that all of us can learn from. There’s something just beautiful and unexpected in making space to put people in conversation who may not already be in conversation and just create the space for God to bring something new into existence.

You’re involved with HopeWords writers’ conference, of which PPP is an offshoot. How does that shape this?

Bluefield, West Virginia, called out from us a hospitality and an invitation to everyone. There is just no pretentiousness, there’s no sense of hierarchy, there’s no sense of getting ahead. You don’t go to Bluefield to further your career in writing. That allowed for an invitation for all kinds of people who may not be professional writers, but who are writers, who were called to write, whether it was to write their family history or to write poetry that’s going to be tucked in a box under their bed for their grandchildren to discover.

That openness, that hospitality, that generosity, that lowering of barriers is a core value in both of these conferences. One of the subversive elements of these conferences is demonstrating that everyone deserves to hear world-class authors. Everyone deserves an invitation.