Dirk at Journalista has a link to this story which has had me giggling hysterically for the last few minutes – the Catholic Church is using manga comics as a way to encourage yoof into an ecclesiastical career. From the Independent Catholic News: “The Church has also stepped into new territory, using Japanese Manga style cartoon characters in its new posters, representing priesthood and religious life. This has been done with the aim of specifically attracting a teenage and twenty-something audience“. Father Paul Embery was quoted as saying, “Cartoons, particularly Manga-styled ones, are a good way of reaching young people, even up to the age of 25“.
I’m not so sure that the church has its finger as solidly on the pulse of youth culture as they seem to think; for sure nuns have been popular characters in manga, but in my (admittedly limited) manga experience they usually tote big guns and dress in a somewhat naughtier garb than might be expected for your average nun, as in Daisuke Moryama’s Chrono Crusade. I also strongly suspect that there are people well over the venerable old age of 25 who still read manga.
I wonder if they will be endorsing Battle Pope as a means of reaching out to different people next? Perhaps protestant churchs can use Preacher for a similar recruitment drive? Okay, maybe not… Still, this attempt to connect with yoof culture isn’t as bad as the Lake District tourist board updating William Wordsworth’s The Daffodils into a rap sung by a man in a squirrel suit (no, I’m not kidding).
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April 26th, 2007 at 11:13 am
[...] Remember the article I posted a few days ago, borrowed from Dirk’s Journalista entry, about the Catholic Church using manga-style comics art to recruit younger folks to an ecclesiatstical calling? Read the hip manga, see The Light, become a priest or nun. Well, Garen Ewing, creator of the excellent Rainbow Orchid, dropped me a line after that, commenting that the art style looked familiar. In fact Garen thought it bore a strong resemblance to the work of one Mr Neill Cameron, an ittinerant artist-about-town better known for corrupting impressionable young comics readers with Absolute Dumbass and Bulldog Empire than for being on a mission for God. On closer inspection I thought Garen was onto something and so a few emails to Neill later and verily we had The Truth: it was indeed a commission undertaken by Neill because “it was one of those commissions that was just way too wonderfully mental to turn down!“. Well spotted, Garen. [...]