Luce and the Audacity of Frivolity

When describing his ministry to the Gentiles, St. Paul describes himself as being “all things to all people.”  This speaks to one of the great truths of persuasion:  you seldom if ever win one to your cause from the outside.  Whether or not it is “right”, people consider the voice of the individual speaking as much as the message itself.  None of us can project the voice of God, and even God himself avoids doing so unless necessary.  The best of evangelists are able to understand the culture they operate within intuitively.  The worst become culture vultures and phonies which can be spotted a mile away.  A recent Vatican decision I think highlights this danger well.

In preparing to celebrate the Jubilee year of 2025, the Church (like every modern corporation) feels that a brand and logo are necessary for the event.  In choosing that logo, they turned to a secular marketing company to create a fictional character.  That character was “Luce” a funko pop inspired anime pilgrim.  They had a press conference where you had an Archbishop (almost certainly told by staff this was a great idea) go out on stage and do a press conference with Luce on his desk and the sight of a bishop with an anime toy on his desk during a serious news conference causes the joke to write itself.

I think a lot of the discourse surrounding this is dumb.  This isn’t “mad trads finding a reason to be mad”, even if occasionally some dumb arguments are made.  (No, they didn’t choose “Luce” to honor Lucifer.)  I think the main issue can be summed up in one word: frivolity.  “Lack of seriousness” describes it perfectly.

Luce is not a person.  Luce is not meant to be tied to a person.  Luce is a merchandise opportunity.  When JD Flynn (who happens to like it) defended it, the first thing that came to his mind was wanting to buy one for his kids.  Whether or not he realized it, that’s the primary point of Luce:  to move merch.  Its not to celebrate the Jubilee, its to market the Jubilee.  It is to profit off of the Jubilee.  It is the Catholic Church’s answer to The Mandalorian’s Baby Yoda/Grogu:  a cute character whose entire existence is to sell a metric ton of merchandise.

Luce will not sell a lot of merchandise.  I wouldn’t be surprised if there’s a lot of excess inventory when this is all said and done.  (It is being done principally with a large gathering in Osaka, Japan, hoping to capitalize off the anime style Japan is known for.)  Why?  Because Luce is not a person.  Luce is not a character.  Luce is an avatar of something else.  Baby Yoda sold a ton of merchandise not just because he was adorable, but because he had a personality, and the wider show had a personality crystalized into that little green character. 

What is Luce an avatar of?  Does anybody know? The best merchandise is not open to interpretation on its main characteristics.  Spending a lot of time breaking down the possible theological implications of this or that stylistic choice isn’t art:  its fanfic.  Since it is fanfic, it is up to the beholder to interpret what they are supposed to be getting out of this.  Is the rainbow rosary Luce is wearing around their neck the same “global rosary” Fulton Sheen used to promote in the 1960’s?  Given it was created by a European secular company, that is questionable.  Is it a nod to LGBT issues, something individuals like James Martin will almost certainly say if a microphone is put in his face?  Is it just a general sign of peace, which the pilgrim is meant to convey?  Nobody knows, because there is no source we can check on this.  The Catholic Church has a rich history of flesh and blood people to model off and promote.  Why did they create something which, even from an anime perspective, looks like it was created by AI?

I think the reason the Church didn’t pick a saint to go with is the general allergic reaction the Catholic Church has to its heritage today. For reasons both real and imagined, every saint that can be used is problematic.  To avoid this problem of interpretation, why not just go with a clean slate?  Why not just create something new and put our stamp on it?  When you create something new, you have to use your existing legitimacy and trust with your audience that this will be worth their time.  That is where we run into a problem for the Church.  Her institutional legitimacy and trust with the faithful are below the toilet.  They are in the sewer system.  Rather than trust that they know what they are doing, the response of many will be to turn it into a meme and clown it.  You’ve already seen that with some, let’s just say, wild takes on Luce art that I am not sharing but is out there.  Luce can become an edge lord quick, let’s just say that.  How people should react is pointless to how people will react.  All it takes is for a small amount of people to transition from outrage to apathy to mockery.  Once that happens, anything the organization does gets clowned, and they get more oxygen than whatever the good intentions were. 

Those who created Luce are clear that they think this will appeal to a younger audience.  Yet it is not clear that they will.  Why?  Because you need something more than an avatar to appeal to kids.  In this, kids are just like adults.  You need it to symbolize something that they can identify and understand with.  This feels far more like what an adult thinks a child will like, rather than what a child will like.  Most children, even the Catholic children of devout parents, are not going to be aware of something called a jubilee year.

I fear what will likely happen is that by the time the Jubilee event happens in Osaka (or at least by the end of 2025), Luce will have been forgotten, and the only thing that will be remembered is the jokes.  “Remember when the Church tried to reach out to young people by creating an anime pilgrim?  That was weird.”  Far from appealing to the youth culture they are trying to reach, its just as (if not more) likely that the Church will appear as trying too hard, rather than listening to the youth as to what would appeal to them.  I don’t pretend to know that answer, and I’m not going to pretend it is exactly what I’ve been doing all along.  That’s the beauty of listening and learning:  the humility that God is teaching you in those moments.  Even the greatest of teachers not only can learn but need to learn.  The Church has forgotten that.  In today’s age she learns nothing, and as a result, teaches nothing.  Instead, she devotes her time to increasingly silly gimmicks and tricks to try and get people’s attention.  In short:  frivolity.  Like Luce is if you want.  Hate it if you want.  Your opinion won’t change the overall frivolity, and we should be a little introspective when it flops.