At Theology on Tap this week, Rev. Danielle Elizabeth Tumminio, an ordained Episcopal priest and doctoral student at BU, spoke on Christology in Harry Potter. She has taught a course on Christian Theology and Harry Potter, and written a book on it as well. She completed an MDiv at Yale studying with Miroslav Volf, author of Exclusion and Embrace (the book we are currently reading together in Tanks to Tractors).

In her introduction, she gave a brief overview of Christology to set the stage for the discussion of the Potter books. In it she surveyed the early Christian church's struggle to agree upon Christ's nature and work. She also gave an overview of the life of Christ throughout the Gospel accounts, noting both their similarities and differences. A central commonality she emphasized was Jesus' "radical hospitality." By this she is referring to Jesus' deliberate status-quo-challenging embrace of outsiders—women, Gentiles, the stigmatized, and the poor—for which he is scandalized and eventually executed.

Naturally, no Christological discussion is complete without a healthy dose of atonement theory. Rev. Tumminio presented three to four models for understanding the role of Christ in atonement and therefore the accomplishment of the cross. The first two could count as one: Christ as Teacher and Moral Example. In this model, humanity's problem is a lack of knowledge in how to love and Christ's entire life and ministry serve as part of his work, as well as the cross, to address this need by providing a loving example from which we can learn. Second, was Christus Victor. In this model, evil is humanity's primary problem and Christ's work on the cross accomplished the overthrow of evil's reign. (I also believe Christ's life and ministry should be included in this model, since Christ engaged the powers through his miracle working). The last model was Christ as Satisfactory Sacrifice, in which Christ bears the wrath of God for personal sin.

From there, she proceeded to discuss the characters in the book, the ways in which Christ's character and work can be seen in them and in which ways they each fall short of being a perfect Christ figure. Having only seen the movies, several characters I had not considered even remotely Christ-like were discussed and successful arguments were presented for why Christ could be seen in them. For example, some characters are sources of consistent, unconditional love. Other characters selflessly sacrifice themselves for others. Harry, who is an obvious choice, is himself the "chosen one" and is on a mission to vanquish evil. Nevertheless, no one solitary character perfectly reflects Christ's robust and full-orbed character and work.

This led to a surprising insight. Perhaps the series' author, J. K. Rowling, utilized all these partially Christ-like characters together to paint a grander portrait of Christ. Perhaps the message she intended to convey was that we must work side-by-side, in community to ultimately defeat evil. This suggestion was quite a stimulating thought. Was it not the revelation that it was Christ himself Paul was dead-set on eradicating that ultimately converted him on that Damascus road? And did he not develop in great detail the teaching that the church is Christ's body? What are the implications for this view on ecclesiology?

The discussion as a whole brought to mind a familiar passage from one of Paul's letters. When I reread it in light of the discussion it had a profound impact on my vision of the church's role in the missio dei (God's mission). I pray these words will impact your vision as well:

"For Christ’s love compels us, because we are convinced that one died for all, and therefore all died. And he died for all, that those who live should no longer live for themselves but for him who died for them and was raised again. So from now on we regard no one from a worldly point of view. Though we once regarded Christ in this way, we do so no longer. Therefore, if anyone is in Christ, the new creation has come: The old has gone, the new is here! All this is from God, who reconciled us to himself through Christ and gave us the ministry of reconciliation: that God was reconciling the world to himself in Christ, not counting people’s sins against them. And he has committed to us the message of reconciliation. We are therefore Christ’s ambassadors, as though God were making his appeal through us. We implore you on Christ’s behalf: Be reconciled to God. God made him who had no sin to be sin for us, so that in him we might become the righteousness of God."

- II Cor. 5.14-21