With the launch of the 2025 Jubilee, the Vatican introduced Luce, an anime-inspired mascot designed to capture the attention of younger generations.
The decision to develop a character with a fresh anime aesthetic might seem unusual to some, but it reflects a smart, current approach to cultural content creation. And it’s already taking the internet by storm.
Instead of traditional, overtly didactic “Christian fiction” that just preaches to the choir, Luce presents an authentic and accessible way to communicate Christian values in a widely relatable manner.
Related: Why Christian Authors Shouldn’t Write “Christian Fiction”
Let’s take a look at why this approach works—and what Christian storytellers can learn from it.
One of the major pitfalls of typical “Christian fiction” lies in creating characters who exist solely to deliver moral messages, making them feel unrelatable. Luce, however, is a character whose aesthetic feels natural to the medium. She belongs in the anime and manga style, appealing to an audience familiar with that scene. Her look isn’t forced or used to preach; rather, she evokes curiosity. She feels like a character people want to learn more about, making her an excellent cultural ambassador who welcomes questions rather than pelting audiences with answers.
Effective cultural content mirrors the universal human experience, rather than dictating it. In contrast to “Christian fiction” stories that focus on explicit religious lessons, Luce represents Christian values subtly embedded in her design, like an icon. Famed Catholic author Dean Koontz said “Stained glass windows don’t have subtitles.” In that spirit, Luce conveys qualities like kindness, courage, and hope—traits that all audiences can appreciate. This approach opens the door to discussing themes of faith naturally, encouraging people to delve deeper into the symbols’ Christian meanings without feeling pressured.
Luce shows that it’s possible to create Christian content that embraces the best of popular culture without making moral compromises. By choosing an anime-inspired mascot, the Vatican acknowledges and respects the interests of younger audiences, yet they still ground Luce in principles that align with Christian teachings. This respect for cultural context without losing a distinctly Christian identity strikes a balance that Christian storytellers should emulate: engaging the culture without being consumed by it.
The most effective characters leave lasting impressions because they invite the audience to make their own discoveries. Many Christian fiction™ stories fail when they spoon-feed every moral and theological point, leaving nothing to ponder. Luce, on the other hand, encourages viewers to dig deeper. Her character design sparks follow up questions. In that sense, Luce is like a gateway drug for people seeking answers.
Every author knows that the heart of every compelling story is a protagonist who overcomes real struggles, celebrates victories, and grows with experience. So while Luce isn’t perfect, neither is her intended audience. And that invitation for people to identify with the character is one of the most powerful storytelling tools in a creator’s repertoire.
For Christian storytellers, Luce is a reminder that stories with staying power are not about telling audiences what they should think or feel; they’re about presenting a character who shares a little of their own story and inspires them to seek more. She’s not a sermon in disguise—she’s a symbol open to personal interpretation.
That last aspect seems to be what’s incited the knee-jerk negative reaction from Luce’s haters. At the end of the day, they don’t trust others to derive the idea captured in the symbol. But that’s just a form of digital iconoclasm. Every apologist and catechist worth his salt knows you’ve got to start by meeting people where they are. Yes, some fall into the equal and opposite error of leaving them there, but getting them to the next step is our job, not Luce’s.
In Luce, the Vatican has created a figure that feels familiar while offering inspiration. She reflects Christian themes without needing to make them explicit. For writers, artists, and who want to share Christian values through storytelling, Luce shows a way forward. By focusing on creating characters and content that are relatable and grounded in the beauty of faith without forcing it, they can engage audiences in subtle yet powerful ways.
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Interesting, this is the first I’ve heard of this character (being myself Orthodox rather than Roman Catholic.) If I just saw Luce somewhere with no surrounding context I think I would probably assume she was a mascot for a town, power company, home goods store, or some other such thing.
I lived in Japan for years and always loved all the goofy mascots for seemingly everything. From a purely design-related standpoint, my only complain is that maybe she’s not weird enough to meet the lofty standards of actual Japanese mascot characters.
Your comment jibes with the general types of reactions I’ve been seeing online …
BOOMERS/MADTRADS: Anime has brought the smoke of Satan into the Church!
ZOOMER CATHOLICS: This is super based and will spark worldwide interest among non-Catholics.
NON-CATHOLICS: That looks pretty cool. I wouldn’t have expected anything like it from the Church.
And that is how viral marketing works.
“NON-CATHOLICS” is my reaction, though I am a Catholic. I assume most normal Catholics who are older than 20 (no offense to the Zoomers, just saying that most people above a certain age don’t really vibe with “moe”) are the same way.
Interesting. I had heard about this at work, but given that it came from my reflexively anti-Catholic coworkers (you know, the kind that never gets tired of making jokes about pedo priests), I initially had a negative reaction, mostly because of it being filtered through them. Thank you for “giving me back” Luce, in a way – yknow, allowing me to see this properly.
My pleasure.
“B-b-but her name has the same root as Lucifer!” – people who need to spend far less time online
I think this was a perfect test in regards to how much people understand modern culture.
If Luce makes you angry, you are not to give future commentary on anything culture related, including discussions on how to reach the masses. Such conversations are clearly beyond you. This is not meant to be insulting, it is just clear that such people have no idea what is going on in the culture around them and are woefully out of their depth here.
As an aside, anime has been mainstream in the West for nearly three decades now. The excuse of being so completely ignorant on it to this degree is running low for anyone under the age of 50.
Spot-on.
Nor is there any reason to roast the Boomers who are flying off the handle over Lucé, as I’ve seen some Zoomers doing online. The outgoing generation forfeited the culture due to deeply ingrained neuroprogramming. So, we shouldn’t expect them to have broken the conditioning en masse.
I had a tough time explaining what anime was to my parents back in the late ’90s so I couldn’t even imagine doing so today instead. It’s a foreign art from a foreign culture so I can understand difficulty in adapting to such a thing.
People younger than me, though? Bro, you have no excuse. Dragon Ball was in Walmart back in 2004.
Luce ranks up there with Little Nuns for wholesome Christian characters.
Those are just darling.
My 19-yr-old daughter was the first to show me this. The one thing that seemed to come out was how it goaded the traddies into apoplexy, while looking both cute and adventuresome (with that little walking stick). The memesters have been in overdrive about this!
Lucé is under fire from MadTrads on one side and BoomerCaths on the other. Errors really do come in twos.
And if something is being attacked in the same respect for opposite reasons, it’s probably true.
I have been attracted to the MadTrad culture in the past. I’m so grateful to God for leading me out of it.
Praise God for the grace of deliverance!
I first saw Luce on the feed of an American Orthodox who was patting himself on the back for making the right choice to not join up with those loser Catholics. (Okay, my words, but the sentiment was accurate.) Many OrthoBros are just MadTrad Protestant converts, so there was that usual criticism of her.
The very next day, I’m seeing Luce in his feed in Pepe cartoons. The situations were generally what people do with they mess around with characters that they like. And I thought: the Vatican has hit a home run with this character.
Cringe. Not an argument, just my immediate gut reaction when I saw it. I assumed others would feel the same way and clicked the article literally thinking the title was sarcasm.
All art risks cringe. Cringe is quite often about culture and expectations. (Yes, I understand my statement is cringy, so at least it’s self aware.) People into high medieval religious art may cringe. So may young people and the Japanese, whom Luce is aimed at. It only matters if the later group cringes. The first group has practically every church building in Europe, if they are so inclined to travel. I think we might be able to offer Luce to the later.
Nice pope cope. lol
The One, Holy, Catholic and Apostolic Church is fulfilling the Great Commission, and there’s nothing you can do about it.
I think the blowback is coming from three areas:
1.) People who hate the “anime aesthetic” (even though western stuff has been using it since the 00’s.) Largely clueless boomers.
2.) People who didn’t do any investigation, and so believe that Luce is now “the official symbol of the Catholic Church” or that there are going to be statues of Luce replacing statues of the saints, etc.
3.) People who do not see any need for Christian art. The idea here being that we have real saints that we can use in place of fictional mascots. But of course you can do both. People have always related to both real and fictional characters. Some of this probably ties back into 1, since no one wonders why people could look up to the likes of Spiderman or Superman. Some of this comes from the “there’s no need for conservative art” crowd.
1 & 2 fall into the “Having to say something despite having nothing to say” category.
3 runs directly counter to the Conciliar decree Inter Mirifica, which magisterially affirms art as a good in and of itself, not simply a means to an end.
Regardless of “intent” as some use for a hat rack, what are the outcomes of Luce’s use? Those will tell the tale.
This Joneser thinks good things are happening here.
The multiple screen shots of heathens on Japanese art sites asking Catholics how to pray the rosary support your premise.
Wish I could see some of those!
Wow! Hit that target!
Another observation:
Growing up in the 90’s, I can’t remember Christianity being “cool” in any context. The majority of kids were legitimate Christians, but in private conversations you’d always downplay it. Church was something that you did on Sundays (and that’s exactly how TV and movies intended you to view things.)
But today in pretty much any comment section on stuff like this you will see people saying “Praise be to Christ,” “We now have the power of God AND anime,” “Viva Cristo Rey” and “Deus Vult.” Sure some of this is definitely tongue in cheek, but some of it isn’t, and in the 90’s even if you praised the Church ironically you’d still look like a dork.
Makes you think.
The cultural shift you highlighted is what winning the culture looks like. Yet Boomers will ignore rosary discussions becoming all the rage on Japanese art boards in favor of dooming.
Personal favorites are:
“My brother in Christ” and “This is a Christian server”
Even though oft used as a joke by non-Christians in obviously wrong context, the prophetic superversion is a sweet hope.
Yes, much of the terminology being used today, even in a joking matter, was completely foreign to how it was back in the ’90s. And especially in the 2000s. The only time you mentioned Christianity in the 2000s was to sneer at it and its practitioners as stupid. Now even non-Christians roll their eyes at that kind of thing.
There has been a change. It might not be happening fast, but it is real and I do not see it slowing down (or as some people think, will reverse) simply because the fruits of those years are showing themselves constantly around us. No one is retreating back into fedora-ism when they see what fedoras support and where their beliefs have led them. All the anti-theists from the explosion are either Christian, questioning, or reluctant atheists today. The ones that aren’t? Well, look them up today. Not a single one of them is better off now than they were when they started their sad crusade.
We’re eventually going to have a real proper revival movement. It might not be tomorrow, but it’s coming eventually. It might even be sooner than we think.
What’s glaringly obvious in hindsight is how shallow and artificial Gen Y edgytarian snark was. Prefab carny acts like Jon Stewart, Bill Maher, and Sam Harris can only become household names in the short window after a culture hits Ground Zero but before its social capital nosedives. They need that odd combination of decadence and lingering trust in institutions to parasitize their host.
Which is why there can be no aughts nostalgia movement, as you’ve correctly said.
I’ve lived in Indonesia for about half a year now. And it’s the first time since I became a Catholic. I noticed how in my parish we use cutesy pics (and also what looks to be AI images) in some of our posters and announcements stuff (they’re not quite anime, but it’s the kind of thing that trads would have seizure if they see it especially since they depict Jesus or Mary). So I do wonder if the angry Luce reaction is an American phenomenon. I’ve never even seen/heard of this “controversy” in IRL, not one peep of it. I assume the people here just go, “oh that’s cool” (which was my initial reaction before I became aware of the craziness).
Catholics buying into American fusionism during the Reagan years was a mistake.
On some level, the sad thing is that to long tradition of Western allegory is so dead that it’s necessary to go to an exotic culture to revive it.