Christianity vs. Cat Religion by MoonTabby

Moontabby compares the belief system in Warriors with Christianity.

(Mod note: This article does discuss in detail the concepts of Heaven and Hell as described in Christianity. If these topics or the discussion of religion make you uncomfortable, feel free to tune out and read another article! Stay comfy, everyone <3)

Hi, everyone! MoonTabby here, very excited for this article. Today I’ll be drawing similarities and differences between Christianity and cat religion in Warriors, specifically the StarClan/Dark Forest theme. I’m a Christian girl who is always trying to improve and work on my spiritual soul, so I’m very excited to bring one of the first religious articles to the Blog! 😄 If you’re not a Christian, I still hope you’ll stick around and hear what I have to say. Without further ado, let’s get into it!

The warrior Clans all share the same religion: they worship their cat ancestors and believe in two worlds you go to after you die: StarClan, for good cats, and the Dark Forest, for evil ones. Pretty simple construct, not a lot of requirements in order to enter. Let’s examine, first off, this set of spiritual realms.

The idea of having an afterlife for good and bad does not stop with Christianity. Many religions throughout the world share that idea, which makes you consider: if so many religions have the same theme going for them, isn’t it likely that there’s a good reason for that, like the actual reality of an afterlife? Many of them do believe in a heaven and hell. In Warrior Cats, cats have very watered down replicas of that concept.

To understand that, we need to explain what Christians believe about Heaven and Hell. Heaven is an eternal realm of everlasting joy and peace for true believers, where they will live in God’s holy City forever and ever. Only God and only He knows the deepest hearts of people; unlike StarClan’s extremely faulty trial system, His judgment is perfect and He makes no mistake with who he admits into Heaven.

Let’s contrast this with StarClan. It’s like Heaven, in some ways. A starry land of good hunting, rest, and without the earthly boundaries the Clans had set up. However, there are a lot of sad differences elsewhere. Cats there don’t actually have true peace. They’ll still get angry, sad, worried – they’re only living in a world of better hunting and somewhat looser boundaries. And like I said before, their trial system is all messed up! Unlike Christianity, which believes in a single, perfect God, StarClan doesn’t have a sole head or leader. Therefore, when you give many ordinary cats the ability to make lasting decisions and pretending that they’re holy, it can only lead to trouble. These cats are NOT perfect. They might have done good things on earth, but they still make bad decisions sometimes. How do you think Ashfur was let in?

Now, for Hell. Christians believe in the exact alternative of Heaven: where there was light and joy, in Hell there is darkness and despair. Where there was peace and freedom from all pain in Heaven, there’s torment and everlasting agony in Hell. One thing to note is that the Bible describes Hell as being a lake of fire, and often uses intense heat and flames for it.

The Dark Forest is very similar, but slightly different too. Instead of a fiery lake, it is a cold, foggy, desolate forest where eerie fungus grows on the trees and you can’t see the stars. You almost never cross paths with another soul, and you might be wandering around that forest your entire life. There’s pitch black water that either drags you down or kills you if you step into it. For the most part, the Dark Forest isn’t painful, it’s just lonely.

The final segment of this article is about spirits fading after they’re already dead. Warning that there’ll be spoilers from OotS and TBC!

From just a logical place, at least for me, this fading makes no sense, right? How can you just… disappear? Your mind, your thinking soul, can’t just evaporate into nothing. What would you do, just… float around in space forever? The most common reason for fading is because cats on earth have forgotten them. This, of course, is inevitable, even for famous cats over time. Someone like Firestar or the Clan founders may not be forgotten quickly, but the ordinary cat after a while won’t be remembered. Thus, they all will fade.

Another reason for a spirit fading is if they’re killed a second time. Spottedleaf and many Dark Forest villains were killed again in OotS; in TBC, Bristlefrost died in the DF river because, although she was technically living, she was still in a spirit realm. We don’t know where these cats went next. Honestly, this is a really pathetic end. They can’t just disappear! They may take on another form or go somewhere else, but they’ll never truly fade away.
*End of spoilers*

Contrast with Christianity. We don’t believe in your soul fading to nothing. You’ll always be alive in some form, it just depends on whether you go to Heaven or Hell after you die. We think our life on earth is so long, but we actually only have a very short time, if you think about maybe 70 to 90 years (at best) versus eternity! If you’re a believer in Christ, you will be saved by God’s grace, and if you’re faithful throughout your life, you’re guaranteed a special place in Heaven!

Thanks so much for reading! I thought this would be an interesting topic to look at with Warrior Cats. I know people who’ve told me they don’t know a lot about Christianity but want to learn more, so I hope that I explained this well while making it fun with our favorite cats! If you want to learn more about it, there are actually a good amount of Christian BlogClanners who can help you out further.
Don’t forget to leave your thoughts, I hope you’ve enjoyed this article!
Have a wonderful day,
MoonTabby, out — 👋