OPINION - Star Wars and Christianity

“I find your lack of faith… disturbing” - Darth Vader

From a very young age I felt an almost spiritual connection to Star Wars. It was only years later that I think I worked out why.

I used to watch the original trilogy most days after school. I would come home and play my copies on VHS video, recorded off the television at Christmas. (I’m a Gen-Xer, and we just fast forwarded through the adverts.) By the time I was at secondary school, I had pretty much memorised the scripts of all three films.

From a very young age I felt an almost spiritual connection to Star Wars.

I still remember the day I got my first Star Wars toy figure - Darth Vader, complete with a red lightsaber that ‘emerged’ from his arm. And my X-Wing Fighter toy space ship whose wings opened by pressing down the head of the R2D2 droid.

The first three films (and my focus here) were Episode IV: A New Hope, Episode V: The Empire Strikes Back and Episode VI: Return of the Jedi. (The Star Wars universe has expanded hugely since then in both film and television.) 2023 sees the 40th anniversary of the conclusion to the initial trilogy that became the classic space-opera trilogy. Four decades on, I still love it.
But I honestly think my connection with Star Wars was more than just childhood fantasy. I was always deeply drawn to the story of Luke Skywalker. His is often noted to be an archetypal ‘hero’s journey’. In A New Hope, he is a young orphan from a backwater planet with a mundane life and not much hope. That is until Obi-Wan Kenobi, an old Jedi Master, enters his life. Obi-Wan invites Luke to join the rebellion against the evil Empire, dominated by the imposing figure of Darth Vader. And Obi Wan gives Luke good reason to, explaining that Vader murdered Luke's father.

With Luke beaten and vulnerable, Vader then reveals the devastating truth: "I am your Father". It's the existential centre of the whole narrative.

Luke is reluctant at first, until he sees first hand the destruction Vader’s Imperial power can bring. Following the classic hero arc, Luke goes with his new mentor, taking his ‘first step into a larger world’ as the old Jedi Master puts it. That is the world of the Force, the ancient religion that binds the galaxy together. It transforms Luke and sets him on a path to becoming a Jedi Knight.

Luke’s story, however, has an exceptional moment of crisis, just over half way through the trilogy, Near the end of The Empire Strikes Back, Luke and Vader confront one another. Their battle has a brooding atmosphere, set in an industrial complex in a sky city. Vader overpowers Luke. With Luke beaten and vulnerable, Vader then reveals the devastating truth: "I am your Father". It's the existential centre of the whole narrative.

As a boy I had really felt the emotional impact of that moment for Luke. Later, I wondered, was it even a sense of foreboding? It was as an adult I learned my own father was not who I thought he was. All those years I had been gripped by Luke’s story, not knowing what was waiting to be revealed to me. The irony isn't lost on me. As Han Solo would say, "never tell me the odds".
I have often thought of Luke Skywalker through the lens of my Christian faith. His story captures something at the heart of a Christian view of humanity: that we don’t always grasp the truth about ourselves.

There are some famous examples of this in the Bible. Take the Prodigal Son in Jesus’ parable. He’s the younger brother who leaves home thinking he knows everything about life. It takes a catastrophic crisis before he comes to his senses about how lost he truly is. Or consider the woman at the well Jesus meets in John’s gospel. She is in plain sight but in reality hiding from everyone. It is Jesus, she says, who tells her everything she has ever done.

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The human heart is often in the dark about itself. When revelation comes it can feel like the ground is breaking beneath our feet.

Luke Skywalker’s story, however, is that the worst possible news about ourselves may indeed be true, and yet redemption is still possible.

In the final episode, Return of the Jedi, Luke is convinced Vader is not beyond hope. Luke seeks out his father to bring him back from the dark side. But the story acknowledges that for this to happen, a sacrifice is needed.

The human heart is often in the dark about itself.

Vader and Luke confront one another again, this time in front of the even more evil Emperor Palpatine. When Luke refuses to kill Vader, the Emperor turns his anger upon Luke. Vader watches as his son’s life is being drained by the Emperor’s terrifying power. And Vader then puts himself in the way. He absorbs the Emperor’s wrath, saves Luke in the process, but deals himself a death blow as a result. Vader pays the ultimate price so that his child may live.

I have always seen this as an echo of the Christian story. That is, that God himself in Christ absorbed the full extent of evil, that his children (humanity) might live.

In Star Wars, you could say different aspects of salvation are dispersed. Obi-Wan Kenobi is like the forerunner, prophesying what will come. Luke’s is the plight of the suffering figure alone and cut off. At the climax he cries, “Father, please. Help me”. I’m not sure it could be more like Christ’s final agony. While Vader is the one who dies and is resurrected as a new self. No longer the twisted machine Vader, but once again the man, Anakin. Death and new birth.

God himself in Christ absorbed the full extent of evil, that his children (humanity) might live.

I’m not saying that Star Wars was intended as a Christian story. However, as literature professor C. S. Lewis put it, stories like these resonate in us because they echo the ‘true myth’ of the Christian story. That is, that the Christian story works on us with the same power that great myths and legends do. They evoke our emotions of fall and redemption. But in the case of the Christian narrative, the difference is the myth is actually true. We love those other stories because they channel a greater story deeply wired into us.

Many are sceptical about the Christian faith. You may be one of them. Even Han Solo talked about “hokey religions”, so you’re in good company. Yet do you ever wonder why we have such an appetite for grand narratives that call us to believe in sacrifice, redemption and resurrection?

For me, the threads run from the Star Wars epic I love, and even my sense of my own story, and connect me to a richer and deeper narrative of a triune God of true salvation. A “larger world” into which Jesus invites me, and you.