Can a theatrical production take a loving but questioning look at the story of Jesus Christ without proselytizing or chastising anyone for their beliefs?

Against all odds, the answer is an emphatic yes. Don Horn’s new musical JC: Gospel According to an Angel, which he began writing in 2009, with Michael Allen Harrison composing the music and writing additional lyrics, is no rote Sunday school lesson, but a thought-provoking and thoroughly entertaining play.

The story, which Horn directs at Triangle Productions!, the LGBTQ+-identified theater he founded in 1989, centers on a dying man (Kenneth Dembo) who converses with an angel (Tasha Danner) in his hospital room. The man, who’d like some solid proof of life after death, is understandably frustrated with the angel as she dances around his questions by saying things like, “We get ahead of ourselves.”

The angel does, however, show him highlights from the life of Jesus (a mesmerizing Jack Harvison), from a slightly different perspective than what I recall hearing in church as a child. Here, Jesus is not only the Son of God: He’s also the son of two parents who know he’s on the path to dying a horrible death for the sake of all humanity. Horn emphasizes this humanness with the song HIStory [You are my miracle], which Lauren Allison, as Mary, performs with passion, calling Jesus “my son, my gift, my love.”

At this point, the play’s February 8 performance was on the runway and accelerating. Then John the Baptist (Michael Hammerstrom) appeared, and JC took glorious flight. Hammerstrom’s soaring performance is so sincere that it alone is reason to see the show, although there are plenty of others, too. After his brief appearance in Triangle’s Flo last year, I was in no way prepared for the force of Hammerstrom’s stunning voice as he belts out a jazzy tune. If Jesus, in his white robes and beatific blondness, resembles the radiant images in vintage Bibles, John is of this earth, with his rustic walking stick, furry brown garment, and rock-steady determination to defy a political tyrant: “Herod can’t touch me,” he says with conviction. “I only spoke the truth.”

Hammerstrom, it turns out, is just warming up. Later in the play, he portrays Judas, one of Jesus’ disciples, and his tender chemistry with Harvison is transporting. Sitting on the edge of the stage, Jesus calmly insists Judas is predestined to betray him, while Judas protests he loves him too much ever to do such a thing. In this breathtakingly intimate scene, Jesus touches the anguished Judas’s knee, then the two men grip each other’s hands, as if clinging to a rock in a biblical storm. Behind them, the angel stands, calling to my mind a celebrant at a rapturous wedding.   

The show also includes scenes in which characters discuss the difference between miracles and magic tricks, and Horn told Michael Montgomery of Out NW that he was nervous about presenting a play that conflicts with some people’s beliefs. But, as Harrison told ArtsWatch, neither he nor Horn want to tell audiences what to think: They simply hope to start conversations.

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For his part, Horn’s own life serves as the background for the musical’s book. “I had gone to Bible college,” he told Out NW. “I was a Jesus person, you know, handing out tracts on the sidewalk and all that. So, I’ve been around the block with Jesus a couple of times.” Even beyond that experience, he did extensive research, saying he used about a 100 books as reference, including five versions of the Bible.  

Don’t let the weight of his research fool you, though. J.C., above all else, is absorbing theater, with live music, including Ed Stevens playing the cello on one side of the stage and Harrison playing piano on the other side. And while it’s definitely a drama, the production employs plenty of humor, mostly in the form of a deliciously naughty serpent (Dave Cole), who slinks onstage in sheer black pants, glittering nipple pasties and a tower of black rococo curls on his head.

Emitting a full-throated laugh reminiscent of Disney’s 1989 Ursula, The Little Mermaid character, who, according to Out Magazine, was inspired by the drag queen Divine, the serpent flirts with Harrison. “Hello, handsome,” he says to Portland’s renowned pianist. When he gets sassy with Jesus, too, remarking on his “pouch” and “family jewels,” Jesus lifts his eyes to the sky and says, “Forgive him, Father, for he knows not what he does,” raising a sinuous question about our varied views of morality. Is the serpent evil simply because he’s Satan? Or is the musical probing the idea held by many religions that gayness is ungodly?

The entire cast (which also includes Alyssa Beckman, Jason Coffey, and Adam John Roper) is a heaven-sent ensemble, with vibrant singing voices that are up to the challenge of Harrison’s score as it flows from jazz and blues to tender ballads. Just as striking is their uniform commitment to this unique production, exhibited by an unabashed earnestness, even when Mary of Magdala (Beckman), for example, repeatedly talks about being possessed by seven demons. Trevor Sargent’s lights, too, melt from a peaceful blue to an angsty orange or red,  giving the show an opulence that belies the simplicity of Horn’s set design, which features wooden stools and swooping fabric overhead.

Horn’s choice to place actors in front of the stage and in the aisles also adds to the audience’s engagement. This story, after all, belongs to all people, regardless of our beliefs. Like the old man, we all face death, whether we have faith in what comes next or not.

When the angel shows the man the story of Judas, he has a hard time swallowing this sympathetic version of the infamous betrayer, protesting that he’s one of the most hated men who’s ever existed. “With the exception of Hitler,” the man says, then turns to the audience and pointedly adds, “and a few others,” eliciting a cathartic laugh.

As moving as Horn’s production is, it underscores the ongoing tragedy that people persist in hurting each other, and often in His name.

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“JC: Gospel According to an Angel” continues at Triangle Productions! in The Sanctuary at Sandy Plaza, 1785 NE Sandy Blvd., through Feb. 22. See ticket and scheduling information here.