True Detective – Is The Series Anti-Christian?

This Sunday, the maiden season of True Detective will conclude, and the story of Rust, Marty, and the serial murder case that has framed a 17-year period of their lives will come to a dramatic end. The country, and the roughly 11 million fans that tune in to each episode of True Detective are tense with anticipation. Despite the wild popularity of the series, some are questioning whether True Detective is “anti-Christian.”

True Detective creator, Nic Pizzolatto, sat down for a long interview with the Daily Beast – in it Pizzolatto discussed his childhood experience with religion. Based on the characters in the True Detective, this past experience has influenced his thinking about the usefulness of organized religion. Pizzolatto appears to have created a dichotomy in True Detective between investigation and religion; investigation representing the “truth” or “good”, and religion representing the “mysterious” or “bad.”

Looking back to segments of prior episodes, you can see how each component of the dichotomy is treated in True Detective. Here is Martin Hart (Harrelson), in Episode 2, laying out his responsibilities as a detective – investigation:

“You know the job. You’re looking for narrative. Interrogate witnesses. Parcel evidence. Establish a timeline. Build a story, day after day.”

On the flip side, look at how Rust Cohle (McConaughey), in Episode 3) speaks about religion:

“You got to get together and tell yourself stories that violate every law of the universe just to get through the goddamn day? What’s that say about your reality? Certain linguistic anthropologists think religion is a language virus that rewrites pathways in the brain. Dulls critical thinking.”

Cohle goes on to characterize religion as “a yen for fairy tales,” a scam perpetrated on people who are full of “fear and self-loathing.” Pizzolatto, through his True Detective characters, seems to be putting out the message that investigation equals a search for the truth, while religion is more of an escape from it.

It’s important to get a glimpse into Pizzolatto’s personal experience to understand why he feels the way he does. There is a detailed discussion of religion in the Daily Beast interview, but this passage is representative of his experiences:

“I’m not religious, but I was raised in a heavily religious household. The kind that believed the Apocalypse was going to happen before 1990, and that believed in visions of the Virgin Mary and Medjugorje. As a child it scared the hell out of me that these adults who controlled my world didn’t seem to know the difference between imagining something and having a vision. They didn’t see the difference between thinking something and hearing a voice.”

True Detective, Episode 7, is heavily steeped in pseudo religion, as Tuttle’s Christian charter schools were feeders, and Tuttle’s ministry a cover story, for the pagan Yellow King and Carcosa cult that seems to be some sort of sadistic family tradition. When asked if either of the True Detective stars would be willing to die in pursuit of their case, he indicated that “they would have to be willing to die to fully pursue their absolute justice. And they each understand this.”

It is too easy to call True Detective, or its characters, “anti” Christian. Clearly, there is a healthy amount of religious skepticism, but Pizzolatto personally seems to subscribe to a more rational line of thinking – more detached. One that suits a detective. Find the truth. The officers in True Detective can’t deal in the abstract- they need solid evidence to prove their case, and the fans can’t seem to get enough of it.

[Image via baltimoresun.com]