The following is from my recent Substack Note responding to Chad Arneson’s series of hit-pieces against my friend Annie Crawford (which he published here, here, and here). I hope that even those who haven’t been following this debate will be enriched by this reflection on how the patterns in good stories, such as sacrifice and redemption, reflect the eternal truths of the gospel.
Consider how stories involve elements such as the following:
• crossing the threshold
• atonement
• descent into Hades
• growing strong through ordeals
• resurrection
• sacrifice
These elements resonate with us in stories because they are deeply true to how the world is. A good story, even if it’s make-believe, will be true to how the world is, showing patterns that lie at the heart of reality. For example, in the real world, monsters can be defeated, there is always hope, and everyone’s true nature is eventually revealed. In the real world, we discover ourselves, not through a process of self-making but through humility, virtue, and the arts of self-limitation. In the real world, selfishness leads to loss and division but virtue leads to restoration. Pride leads to folly but humility leads to wisdom. True love is found not in consuming and devouring but in self-giving and sacrifice. These are inevitable structures of narrative because they resonate with how the world is at a deep primal level.
One structure that is particularly significant is sacrifice…. If sacrifice is not rooted in the structure of reality, and is not discoverable in the nature of things, then it is not intrinsic to reality but layered over the top through divine fiat. But if sacrifice is not in any sense “built into” reality, then biblical patterns start to look arbitrary and typology becomes less intelligible.
Creation is not neutral “stuff” but exists by participation in divine energies; therefore, it is iconic/symbolic in its very structure. Reality is ordered sacramentally, which is why we cannot separate the meaning of sacrifice from structures of narrative/reality, or treat symbolic systems (even alchemic symbolism or “story structure”) as mere interpretive overlays. Reality is structured by patterns that are inherently meaningful. Stories, myths, rituals reflect deep structures of being. So when we come to something like sacrifice, it is not just commanded—it is inscribed in the fabric of reality. Revelation fulfils a pattern that is already primal within reality itself…. Revelation unveils, purifies, and fulfills meanings already rooted within creation through the participation of the latter in the divine logoi and energies. Fire, ascent, purification, sacrifice, light, and transformation are not arbitrary metaphors imposed upon reality from without; they are real correspondences grounded in the structure of being. Sacrifice is ontologically real and perfuse throughout creation and literature, because creation itself is ordered toward communion, self-offering, transformation, and participation in divine life. This matters enormously because once meaning is detached from the inherent structures of creation, Christianity risks becoming something merely added onto an otherwise secular world. Then nature becomes spiritually mute while revelation becomes external legislation imposed upon reality from outside, leading ultimately to a separation of grace and nature….
It is precisely because we affirm a Logos cosmology (rooted in God’s revelation, both special and general) that the pattern of sacrifice is perfuse throughout the created order and has left its footprint inevitably—I would even say, with some qualification, “necessarily”—on narrative structures. To be sure, human beings distort symbols, misunderstand sacrifice, and corrupt worship. Pagan sacrifice itself demonstrates how easily sacrificial logic can become twisted and demonic. But distortion presupposes an underlying reality being distorted, as C.S. Lewis shows so well in Till We Have Faces.
The existence of corrupted sacrificial systems suggests that humanity dimly perceives something true about the structure of reality, even while misreading it. Revelation is necessary, but not because concepts like sacrifice are meaningless apart from revelation, but because fallen humanity misinterprets creation. But the church fathers are clear that this misreading and misinterpretation is never total, which is why the project of assimilation and adaptation with paganism was a key part of the Patristic agenda, in the spirit of “logos spermatikos.” I give examples in my book Rediscovering the Goodness of Creation, and my priest has emphasized this as well in a recent sermon about how all beauty is God’s beauty. Thus, when we notice that sacrifice is basic to mythic narrative structure, or that Christ’s life follows the patterns of the hero’s journey, this should fill our hearts with joy just as much as finding the story of the gospel written on the stars.
You can read the remainder of my response to Chad Arneson by visiting my Substack note.
Further Reading