I don’t watch Christian or what they call faith-based movies. The last time I did was in high school where the low-budget feel left me unimpressed to this day. Now since those days were such a long time ago, I am sure the production quality has improved but I still stay away because I don’t understand why we need fictional Christian stories when true stories abound?

Fictional faith movies only make the faith more fictional and I would think---I am going out on a limb here---that there’s only one possible ending. No need to read any spoilers. Yes, we can argue that it’s how things develop or lead to the ending that would spell the difference but I still find it manipulative. I see it like man making God in his own image---this is how God will or will not in this particular situation. Anyone who really knows the Bible and life knows no one can ever predict how God will or will not act. If I were a scriptwriter, I would think of a storyline other than telling a prophet to marry an unrepentant prostitute which leads us to the point of this article.

I came across this Christian review of the faith-based movie, “Redeeming Love” which I gather based from the synopsis is a modern adaptation of the life of Hosea. The contention of the review is the sex scene. Although it didn’t show any nudity, it was something you don’t expect from the genre. As a marketing professor, I assume that faith-based movies target the conservative evangelical community who support family-friendly movies because they want to feel safe from the plethora of movies filled with sex and violence. What a jolt it must have been to them, especially uncomfortable if they were with their young teenagers and ministers...

Some might argue that the movie is only depicting life. While that might be true, think of the great Hollywood classics. Gone with the Wind implied marital rape, Double Indemnity had a murderous couple, Rear Window was about voyeurism and A Cat on A Hot Tin Roof had a lonely, beautiful wife. If these were made today, I am sure there would be a lot of sex scenes but the fact that they were still able to tell marvelous stories about life sans them means such are not needed visually. If a non-faith-based movie can do that, surely Christian movies can?