Yeah, it was only a matter of time before this happened.
Nothing like an Avengers/Friends intro mashup to get me pumped to see The Avengers: Age of Ultron come May. ‘Course, being an unapologetic superhero fan, it doesn’t take much.
But coming on the heels of watching some of the Jesus-centric programs coming to television (A.D. on NBC and Killing Jesus on the National Geographic channel), it also reminded me that the Avengers we see here, and the apostles we read about in the Bible, share something in common: They were all friends.
No, no. The Avengers and the apostles weren’t friends with each other—though, admittedly, it would be pretty cool if they were. It would’ve helped me pay better attention in Sunday School, that’s for sure, and there would’ve been significantly fewer martyred apostles if Iron Man had been watching their backs. But in their own respective worlds, they were friends—a divergent and sometimes disparate collection of individuals who came together to support each other and serve a common goal: To save people, often putting themselves in mortal danger to do so.
Christianity’s apostles seem a bit more pedestrian. No one in the New Testament flings an extraterrestrial super-hammer or turns green. And yet, they had some super powers of their own, performing “signs and wonders” throughout the book of Acts—breaking out of prisons, saving folks from demons and even raising people from the dead.
If we wanted to press the analogy even further, I suppose we could: Peter, post-crucifixion, shares a few similarities with Captain America, given his leadership role and all. Paul feels a little like Iron Man to me, given his less-than-savory backstory, his penchant for gab and his propensity to gallivant around the known world to get the job done. John, he might be the Hulk: He seems like an emotional sort.
But let’s stop right there. I’d rather not have to think of an analogy for Scarlet Witch.
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