A Christ Haunted Atheist

I came across a fascinating short film featuring Anne Rice on iamsecond.com. I was actually following a link tweeted by Huffington Post focusing on another celebrity's story of redemption. I stopped in my tracks when I saw her name featured on a website specifically committed to filming personal Christian testimonies. Interview with a Vampire, that Anne Rice? Yep. Anne Rice, American author of gothic fiction and erotica. The talented writer accepted Christ after 38 years as a renowned atheist. In the film she shares her theological and creative exploration that lead her to finding her freedom in Christ, (click here to watch). Below is one of my favorite statements from the film.  

"Sometimes my books are referred to as the vampire chronicles and they're spoken of as a series, but it's not an organized series. Each book is sort of a standalone story and I think each one of the vampire novels tells pretty much the same story of grief, loss and suffering. [The novels] kind of revolt against the darkness of a life without God. I didn't see that until I had been writing for quite a long time. But that's what those novels were about. Of course what these books were doing- they were reflecting my own feelings as an atheist/ agnostic and that I was cut off from God and that I couldn't ever believe again as I had when I was a child. [They were also reflecting] my own increasing dissatisfaction with a world in which salvation is not a possibility. The reason for that dissatisfaction was simple; I really believed in God. Not only did I really believe in him, I loved Him.. and I wasn't admitting it. I was a Christ haunted person; I was a Christ haunted atheist. I was a person haunted by God and my writing is just littered with accoutrements of the struggle. And yet, there is evidence that I was called back again and again to the idea that as long as you're denying God, you'll not know any rest; you'll not know any peace. You can't save yourself through art. You can not save yourself through music- you can't do it through travel; you can't do it through wealth. All of your attempts at saving and transcending through other means will ultimately fail. God saves you when you turn to him. After 38 years [presumably around age 56], I found myself very ready to give my life over to him." -Anne Rice

Judging by the comments on the video, it seems as though this was filmed after she famously ranted in a Facebook post that she "gave up christianity", (specifically Roman Catholicism). Oh, by the way, DON'T be fooled by the finality of that statement, Anne Rice continually confirms that she remains committed to Christ, but is disassociating herself from the political agenda that has become what 'Christianity' is assumed to represent. The author reiterated that her faith in Christ was "central" to her life. 

"My conversion from a pessimistic atheist lost in a world I didn't understand to an optimistic believer in a universe created and sustained by a loving God is crucial to me," she said. "But following Christ does not mean following His followers. Christ is infinitely more important than Christianity and always will be, no matter what Christianity is, has been, or might become." Read more about the context of this statement on thegaurdian.com

I love these types of stories, these types of testaments that reveal a deep struggle with important questions and painful explorations that brutally exhaust the soul. I love them because I believe in the promise, "if you seek, you shall find". Most of all I believe that all truth is Gods truth.