On “Christian” art

One of the, kind of the bad consequences of Christians retreating from the public space is that there’s often been a kind of Christian art which is frankly made to sort of, this kind of whistling to keep our spirits up, and there is some dreadfully sentimental Christian art out there. On the whole, if you have to add the word “Christian” to art, it’s probably not very good art.

But there is as much scope as there ever was for art that takes Christianity’s profound insights into the human condition and mobilises them in making, in media as yet unthought-of, adventurously spreads out as wide as it possibly can the kind of the Christian questions, the Christian enquiry into who we are, and where we are, and where we ought to be. It’s a question-asking religion, it’s not a tidy answer-giving religion. Questions go very well with art.