"Christian movies should be distinct not because the main characters don’t have sex before marriage or because they read the Bible. Rather, Christian movies should imbue the viewer with a sense of sacramentality, of the transcendent being present in the small concrete details of the production, writing, set design, and interactions between characters."
Wait! You forgot the one adorable child in town!
"Many Christians were outraged with Hallmark for giving into “secular culture” upon the release of its first gay Christmas movie, The Christmas House, in 2020. For them, the Hallmark channel was one of the last vestiges of “Christian values.” And what values are those, exactly? Contrived, recycled plotlines? Mediocre writing? D-list acting? No offense to devout Christian actors like Lacey Chabert and Candace Cameron Bure, but the only thing remotely Christian about these films are the fact that they don’t blatantly transgress Christian moral sensibilities.
"As Hans Fiene points out,
In a theological sense, the Hallmark Channel is not a Christian broadcasting network. More to the point, the 6,000 original “Christmas” movies the network airs every December are not genuinely Christian films in content … But, culturally speaking, Hallmark Christmas movies are noticeably Christian. The characters don’t take off their clothes, murder anyone, or use profanity. The hero loves children and defends the poor. The heroine who begins the story loving her self-involved life in the city chooses family and a life of self-sacrifice in her hometown by the end of the tale.
"If you’re a pious Christian mom who wants to escape into a universe where all the cynicism and immorality of modern life aren’t allowed, or if you want to snuggle up with your eight-year-old daughter and watch a silly movie without having to explain inappropriate content you weren’t expecting, the Hallmark Channel is about the only place left that will let you do it.
"Fiene also notes that there’s rarely ever explicit references to religion in the movies (church, Scripture, prayer, etc), unlike the films featured on Pure Flix
"This implies that Christianity is merely about moral rules and rituals. Christianity does have this in common with other religions, but what makes it most distinct from other religions is the belief in an incarnate Deity. God enters the flesh through Jesus. The encounter with him ontologically changes our consciousness of ourselves and of the concrete, carnal details of the world around us." . . .
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