From a very young age I loved comic books. The brightly colored images and the dynamic action kept me glued to the page. For a long time I was only able to read a few here and there because it wasn’t a hobby I shared with my parents. Then things changed in 1984, when I began my lifelong faith journey through a conversion experience on, of all days, Halloween.
My family went the Pentecostal route at the beginning. The late 80’s was like the cultural golden age for those kinds of churches. The music scene was thriving, and Christians were going mainstream whenever possible. Moving into my teen years gave me more financial freedom, but the dearth of Christian comic books left me with few options to explore. It was hard to imagine a Christian superhero existing in mainstream comics, because my parents were convinced that anything that wasn’t in the Bible was fiction, and fiction was the antithesis of truth.
So when I first heard about the “christian” superhero from Marvel Comics, I was intrigued. No, this wasn’t the Illuminator. He came later. This was the Crusader. Bang howdy, but I was excited! Then I found his Marvel Universe Handbook entry.
Waitaminute! Heaven calls a guy to battle evil in the world, imbues him with supernatural armor and abilities, and the first person he goes after is Thor?! One of the good guys?! Because he’s a false god?!
Of course this was before Marvel leaned heavily into the Asgardians=Aliens theme. So, to all intents and purposes Thor was a god. And there were many of them in the Marvel Universe. DC, too. Yet I was sorely disappointed that this guy was just a tool to seemingly make Christians look foolish and inflexible in a world of gods and monsters, aliens, and ghost riders.
The irony was, as I grew older and learned a lot more about the actual Crusades, I began to see how much this character made sense. And in many ways it contributed to my own evolution, as I continued another lifelong pursuit, one of questioning and using my head. More on that for next time.
I have no idea where Crusader ended up over at the house that Stan built. I’d like to believe he found his faith again, maybe learned a valuable lesson about the greatest commandments, and went off to face Mephisto or Dr. Doom. Because, priorities, man!
I have my own version of a divine hero planned for my comic imprint, who already makes an indirect appearance in the Red Cat miniseries. Who you might ask? All will be revealed in time. Because over forty years later my faith, evolved as it is, still feels like a superpower to me. I can only hope my crusade is better aimed at bringing a little light of my own to the world. Ecclesia!
