UCC Is Going After Anne Rice

I guess this is an admission that liberal churches have quit being Christian too:

The United Church of Christ is trying to get Anne Rice to join its flock after the Interview with the Vampire author announced her highly-publicized decision to “quit being Christian” this past week.

Just days after Rice’s announcement, the 1.1-million member UCC launched the”You’d Like the UCC, Anne Rice” campaign on Facebook to offer support for the acclaimed author and to introduce her and others to the historically liberal church body.

“Many of us who are Christian share Anne Rice’s values of inclusion and reason,” remarked UCC’s communications director, the Rev. J. Bennett Guess, who initiated the Facebook campaign. “It’s important that she and others know that a church like the UCC exists.”

via UCC Makes Pitch to Ex-‘Christian’ Author Anne Rice | Christianpost.com.

I think it highly unlikely that Anne Rice will join a liberal Protestant church. Even in her disillusionment, a version of the church that seems to agree with her will hold little appeal. Hunter Baker makes this point:

What fascinates me about the way she has done this is how Catholic she is in her rejection of the Catholic Church.

If Anne Rice were a Protestant of almost any kind, she would surely flee to a denominational group or congregation which embraces Jesus while more closely approximating her values. There is no doubt it would be possible to do so. There are liberal Baptists, liberal Lutherans, liberal Methodists, etc.

But Rice doesn’t avail herself of that opportunity. And I think I know why. Anne Rice movingly wrote of her Catholic childhood and of her dramatic return to the church. At no point did she apparently consider returning to faith as a Protestant. She clearly believes that the Catholic church is the only true manifestation of the Christian church. And thus, when she rejects it, there is no other church for her to join. She is affirming the church at the same time she loudly and publicly is slamming the door and running away.