Dominic de Souza is the founder of LegendFiction, a writing community for Catholics and Orthodox Christians to share their love of faith and fantastic fiction. This October, LegendFiction is holding its third annual online convention, LegendHaven. In this discussion, Dominic shares his thoughts about imagination, evangelization, and storytelling in community.
Thomas Salerno: You’ve started a vibrant, growing community of Christian storytellers called LegendFiction. What were some of the stories that formed your imagination as a child and a young adult?
Dominic de Souza: I don’t know what it is, but there’s something so riveting and visceral about a number of H.G. Wells’ novels! I would go back to them again and again, and then try to iterate on them and retell them in my own ways. Wells is certainly one of those formative authors that got me really thinking. Arthur C. Clarke was another science fiction author I really enjoyed as a young teen.
Fairy tales and world mythology, along with the “modern mythology” of superheroes, were the stories that really resonated with me over the years. There’s just something about science fiction and fantasy that has called out to my soul throughout my life.
Those genres that are sometimes called “speculative fiction” (sci-fi, fantasy, and horror) often have a transcendent dimension to them. These stories are often about other worlds, or they’re about a world that is like our own but not quite the same. Experiencing these stories can open up new perspectives. The reader is able to look at the “mundane” world with fresh eyes. Can you talk about the power of these stories as windows into a transcendent dimension?
Stories and metaphors have an origin point that is perhaps deeper than we realize. Our souls communicate in stories. I think modern sci-fi and fantasy “fandoms” are a phenomenal insight into that. Why do we love so many fandoms, and why do we love rereading these stories and rewatching so many movies? Why does any of this matter to us? Well, it’s because we are feeding our imaginations, feeding our soul’s ability to ask questions like: “Why am I here? What am I supposed to be doing? How do I relate to everything?” Stories give us identity and community and purpose. They help us unpack the transcendent meaning of the world around us.
Evangelization is the sharing of life. Holiness is a human need. We can’t reduce the concept of holiness to catechesis.
This theme that we’re developing of story and myth as ways to communicate the transcendent or the ineffable relates to an emerging topic in Catholic circles today of “evangelization through imagination.” Would you say that this concept is another way of imitating Christ who was a master storyteller? (Just remember his parables!) After all, we are called not only to see Christ in others but to be Christ to others.
I think it is absolutely vital that we recognize that the concept of evangelization has sometimes been co-opted by a specific subset of content creators who do very well communicating in tracts and checklists of “here’s what you need to understand about what the Catholic Church teaches.” I’m convinced that method is not actually evangelization. That’s more about marketing membership in the Catholic tribe. And that’s a very sad definition of evangelization. Whereas I am moved to say that evangelization is the sharing of life. Holiness is a human need. We can’t reduce the concept of holiness to catechesis. A ton of “head knowledge” does not automatically translate into “being Christ” to others. Christ became man and he spent all three years of his public ministry feeding, calming, healing, storytelling, answering questions. He will ask people at the Last Judgment: “Where were you when I was hungry? When I was alone and cold and imprisoned?” You can call it the social dimension of the Church’s experience. It’s about communicating and sharing life. That’s essential to evangelization.
Staying on the topic of “evangelization through imagination,” there’s sometimes a temptation to turn the primal impulse of storytelling into a utilitarian mode of evangelism, to the point where storytelling becomes dominated by a proselytizing message.
I absolutely agree! We can be extremely utilitarian with all of our concepts of evangelization, and the problem with that is that humans don’t like to be used. When you use something, you label it, you turn it into a tool so you know when to use it and when to get rid of it. We do that to objects because that is the appropriate thing to do to an object. It is not an appropriate thing to do to a person. There are things that we do as persons that are innately or intensely human that are so bound up in our humanity that they can’t be objectified. One of those being something like our relationship with Christ; you can’t turn that into an object. The moment you objectify God, you have a serious problem. There’s always the danger of idolatry.

In the matter of storytelling, if we are thinking primarily about “here’s a way to evangelize someone,” I think that’s a problem. You’re not called primarily to do something. You’re called to be more like an instrument through whom and with whom God makes beautiful music that is then communicated out to others. That’s the life of grace. You are an unrepeatable image of God that wants to be communicated to and shared with others. I’m not supposed to just “bring Christ” to other people. He’s actually supposed to be fully in me, and I’m supposed to be fully in him, and my storytelling is a part of that too. The stories that I want to tell should emerge from who I am, how I see the world, what I’m trying to contribute, how I am experiencing a journey with Christ.
Writing is often spoken about as a lonely vocation, but it doesn’t have to be that way! I know Catholic writers who work in front of the Blessed Sacrament and just drink in that energy, that grace that’s coming from the Real Presence of Christ to fuel their creativity. We’re not alone on the journey. Christ was the stranger on the road to Emmaus walking with his disciples. As Catholics, we believe in the Church as the Body of Christ, so we’re all about communion and about community. Did these ideas in any way play into the genesis of LegendFiction?
I’m still trying to discern my own vocation. I have loved writing ever since I was seven years old, and I haven’t stopped messing around and ideating and coming up with cool things. But the number one thing that I struggled with was the utilitarian sense that you mentioned earlier where my faith community would react this way: “You’re having too much fun, and you’re not actually winning souls. You need to stop kind of wasting your time with your head in the clouds, and you need to be helping to create evangelistic and Catholic literature that helps us to advance the kingdom.” Meanwhile, I’m just thinking: You know what? Christ spent thirty years living as a man before he got up and started proclaiming the kingdom. That actually means a lot. That means he spent a lot of time in his imagination, he spent a lot of time engaging with people, he spent a lot of time storytelling, a lot of time within community—his human nature learning from this experience of being in communion with others and then also giving to it. We’re then called to do that same sort of thing, and we create and ideate and learn to share to figure out why this vocation seems to matter to us.
LegendFiction was created purely because I wanted a place to meet up with people and to make friends and to share progress and keep myself motivated because I felt alone. Our community is anchored in the sense of not being utilitarian with your vocation to write. Our goal is to enjoy the creative process! I would say don’t put pressure on yourself to shoehorn the faith into every single thing you write. It’s all about being part of the community. I wanted a space where you’re not judged by a standard where you’ve got to be creating classical literature or you have to be creating evangelistic tracts, or you need to be expanding the Christian section at Barnes & Noble.
You’re called to be more like an instrument through whom and with whom God makes beautiful music that is then communicated out to others. That’s the life of grace.
That’s a notion I struggle with myself. When I write fiction, I often find myself thinking, “Does the story help people? How can this story communicate the faith? How can this story be Catholic?”
I’m going to use myself as an example here. I have a novel that I’m trying to write, and I’ve been in it for almost a year. If you were to ask me, “Where’s Catholicism in this thing?” I would say on the one hand it’s nowhere and on the other hand it’s everywhere. I don’t see Catholicism as a label, as a definition among other definitions.
How does that insight shape the way you view discussions of the “Catholic imagination”?
I’m going to be the annoying guy and say I don’t like the phrase “Catholic imagination.” What many people mean by that is really a modern Eurocentric Christian imagination. Imagination in and of itself is a fundamental human experience. It is an essential part of what it means to be a human being. Imagination is not just escapism—it’s not just something your brain goes into like autopilot when you’re sleeping. It’s not just a pointless, additional thing that you do. Your imagination is the meeting point between you and reality. The words “Catholic imagination” assume that there is one specific way, a “Catholic” way, to go about imagining.
Being careful to avoid the utilitarian temptation, what roles do you see imagination and storytelling playing in evangelization, particularly at this moment in history when many people seem disillusioned with the dominant secular narratives?

Evangelization through imagination should not be a “soapbox” because that’s not how the imagination works. Soapbox moments are often when you lose people. There is a time and a place for those kinds of messages. There are times when you have to get up and you tell everybody how it is. Sometimes people need strong medicine. But an antidote only matters if the person needs it right now. Evangelization should be about sharing life, about thriving. How many of our contemporaries don’t want to be alive or don’t even want to have kids anymore? This is a horrific, depressing thing. People don’t even know why they’re here and don’t even care to find out. Well, that’s not being alive.
Becoming fully alive—to me, that’s the bedrock beginning of any discussion of the Gospel. If people don’t even want to be alive, and they’re too depressed about life, and you show up talking about the Catholic creed, it can be a bridge too far if they’re not even prepared to be fully alive at all.
So, the question then becomes: How can we reach those kinds of people?
Exactly! There’s a baseline: Feed them, clothe them, care for them, be a human being to them. Then the next step is: How do you be a friend to them? Storytelling is one way! By watching things together and reading things together and enjoying things together. At that point, you’ve then created a bridge of connective tissue with that other person. You’re now in a relationship with them.
The best situation is where they look at you, and then they ask you what the reason is for the hope that is in you. And you have to let the Holy Spirit guide that conversation without trying to impress or compel. Allow your own life to be that invitation. We need to recognize that the glory of God is not just somebody standing in a pew who knows all the liturgical rubrics and credal doctrines by heart. The glory of God is a human being fully alive!