Can my Kids read Harry Potter?

 By Samuel Thambusamy

Harry Potter – a household name

You just can’t ignore Harry Potter. He has become a household name, courtesy the powerful engines of Globalization. Harry Potter books and its product spin-offs are found everywhere. Even if you don’t want to read the book/s (watch the films), you still cannot manage to stay insulated. Hogwarts’ magic is slowly but steadily invading our living room through everyday conversations. Trust me, it is extremely difficult to be indifferent about Harry Potter and Hogwarts. Few books/films, like the Harry Potter series have evoked such ‘equal’ and ‘opposite’ reactions, all at the same time.

Pottermania: The arguments for and against

Ardent Potter fans find nothing wrong in the imaginative story that seeks to feed the human hunger for enchantment. While others hold author J.K. Rowling guilty of introducing magick to younger children. They allege that although the book/s unfold the proverbial ‘good-versus-evil’ theme, witchcraft and occultism form the subtext of its plotline. The worst fear is that the book/s (and films) would de-sensitize children to the dark shades of spirituality, now resurgent in the West.

Living the question: In the midst of a culture war

Would it be wrong for a Christian to read a compelling novel, which is creative, insightful and funny? How do we respond to the Harry Potter Phenomenon from a Christian faith perspective? What’s wrong about Harry Potter anyway? Can I allow my kids to watch Harry Potter movies? Answers aren’t easy to these questions. Troubled parents are living these questions. The return of Harry Potter through the sixth book in the series: Harry Potter and the Half-blood prince (2005) and the movie version of Harry Potter and the order of the Pheonix (2007) have only re-opened the debate, re-drawn the battle lines and kicked off the latest culture war.

Do not be squeezed into the (cultural) mould of the world

Living out the Christian faith in the contemporaneous world is a counter trend. Christian lifestyle is opposed to self-interests, self-gratification and self-sufficiency, which are at the heart of our culture. Apostle Paul had warned us, ” Don’t let the world squeeze you into its own mould”.  It doesn’t come easy. It takes a lot to be able to face the contemporary challenges. The challenges to our faith come in different colors, shapes and sizes and contemporary Christians must skillfully relate their creedal affirmations to the emerging contextual challenges. Unfortunately, most Christians I meet, are unwilling to think through issues ‘Christianly’. The temptation is to settle for either ‘restatements’ or ‘readymade answers’. Some how, I sense a lack of enthusiasm to study God’s Word, stretch the mind and discover biblical principles for everyday life issues.

Thinking ‘Christianly’

Thinking ‘Christianly’ is only possible if we construct a Christian worldview. What is a worldview? A worldview is ” simply the sum total of our beliefs about the world, the big picture that directs our daily decisions and actions”.  A worldview helps us to make sense of the world we live in and also helps us order our lives accordingly. It provides clarity, consistency and coherence to the answers for questions concerning origin, meaning, purpose and destiny. Genuine Christianity is all about accepting the Christian worldview as a framework for the totality of life. Charles Colson contends

” Genuine Christianity is more than a relationship with Jesus as expressed in personal piety, church attendance, Bible Study, and works of charity. It is more than discipleship, more than believing a system of doctrines about God. Genuine Christianity is a way of seeing and comprehending all reality. It is worldview”.

Apostle Paul, in his letter to the church at Rome, points to the need to be transformed by a constant renewal of the mind

” …As an intelligent act of worship, give him your bodies as a living sacrifice, consecrated to him and acceptable by him. Don’t let the world squeeze you into its mould, but let God re-make you so that your whole attitude of mind is changed.”

Faith seeking application

Today, we live in the market place of ideas that compete for our attention and loyalty. The challenge, then, for a Christian is to expose counter claims and defend Christian truth in the everydayness of life. Theology, then, is not an exercise removed from everyday life but it is ” faith seeking application”. Commitment to the Christian worldview requires us to evaluate every truth-claim. Anything we accept as ‘true’, ‘good’ and ‘right’ must be compatible with our Christian worldview. This would mean that any and every idea must pass through the Christian grid, which would either validate a claim or expose its inadequacies.

The challenge ahead

Is the Harry Potter phenomenon a challenge to the Christian faith? I don’t think so. The Harry Potter phenomenon is not a challenge to the Christian faith as a belief system. Nevertheless, it poses new challenges to the Christian readers of the book. The book/s (and film/s) promote a neo-pagan worldview contrary to the biblical understanding of life and hence, the book/s (and films) require us to duly approach it with ‘Christian’ caution. Any compelling novel/movie presents its own challenges to the Christian. There is a tendency to look at life through the eyes of its lead characters, particularly when we are emotionally absorbed into the story. Like any other idea or a cultural product, the Harry Potter books must be evaluated through a Christian grid. It is at this point that Christians need tools to raise and resolve worldview questions.

We fear what we don’t understand

Many parents have been living the question: How do we encounter the Harry Potter from a Christian faith perspective? Would it be wrong if children read it purely for entertainment? Should it be ignored, avoided or at least read with caution? The debate rages endlessly.  Ravi Zacharias has rightly reminded us “it is far better to debate a question before settling it than to settle a question before debating it”.  I guess, the issue needs to be understood through an informed debate, intense scrutiny and diligence and more importantly drawing principles from the Bible to bear upon the debate. It is said, “we fear what we don’t understand”  and often times our responses have only been knee-jerk reactions rather than ‘reasoned’ answers. Children are greatly in need of a framework – a Christian grid – through which all of life is understood and interpreted. An informed discussion would help children acquire skills to address this issue and every other issue in the contemporary world.

Challenging cultures; Changing Individuals

As Christians, we also bear the responsibility of transforming the culture around us. This means, we must detect the socio-cultural underpinnings in the cultural landmarks of our time. This would help us ‘correlate’ the gospel to the questions raised within our context and setting. A study of the Harry Potter phenomenon will help us understand the issues of identity (who am I?), the longing for a new myth (What gives meaning, purpose and destiny for our times?) and the socio-cultural and religious mood (How do we now understand reality?) embedded in the collective consciousness of our children. This would help us to evangelize and nurture our children within our churches and beyond.

Can my kids watch Harry Potter films? Well… you be the judge. Remember, we’ve got to help our kids live out real faith in the real world. Engaging with the films which a christian filter is perphaps the best way forward

THE TALE OF TWO MIRRORS

 A faith commentary on Harry Potter by Samuel Thambusamy

“ It (The mirror of Erised) shows us nothing more or less than the deepest, more desperate desire of our hearts… However, this mirror will give us neither knowledge nor truth. Men have wasted away before it, entranced by what they have seen, or been driven mad, not knowing if what it shows is real or even possible…It does not do to dwell on dreams and forget to live, remember that…” – Aldus Dumbledore in Harry Potter and the Philosopher’s Stone, Chapter 12If you hear the message and don’t obey it, you are like people who stare at themselves in a mirror and forget what they look like as soon as they leave. But you must never stop looking at the perfect law that sets you free. God will bless you in everything you do, if you listen and obey, and don’t just hear and forget. – (Jam 1:23-25 CEV)

Dumbledore’s words to Harry Potter are perceptive about human search for meaning and fulfillment in life. Faced with the cultural crisis of purpose, we seek after the desperate desires of our heart. These ‘deepest and more desperate’ desires of the heart are expressed in the realm of arts. Today, media reflects the hungers of the human heart. Off late, sex, sleaze and violence have become Bollywood’s selling mantras (especially if you don’t have Shah Rukh Khan). Film actors hide behind ‘the-script-demands-it’ excuses, movie-makers resort to deliberate padding and producers blame the changing tastes of audiences. Ever wondered why there is an overdose of sex and violence? The cultural products of our time betrays contemporary outlook on life. Media is our mirror of Erised. It reflects ‘nothing more or less than the deepest, more desperate desires of our permissive cultural mindset. Advertising is, Stewart Ewen contends, “ not about the qualities of the products being sold, but about the lives of the people being addressed.” Filmmaker and researcher Vasudevan argues, “ We must historicise media forms and conventions’ and ‘that would tell us more about the media as well as the people who consume its products — and about society.” We watch what we are. Not surprisingly, the dream merchants of our tinsel town tell us, “What you want is what we give”.

True, we watch what we are. But, we are what we watch. ‘We become what we behold”, said Marshall Mcluhan. Media, not only presents the troubled nature of our society but it also promotes the same troubled nature as prescription for the societal dis-ease. Fyodor Dostoevsky’s prophetic words are painfully true now more than ever before. He said, “at first art would imitate life, then life would imitate art and finally, life would draw the very reason for its existence from art”. Our cultural products are bedecked with images and visuals devoid of conscience, story line without conviction, characters without purpose, technical sophistication and finesse devoid of wisdom, music without content and lyrics without meaning. We are technical super giants and yet moral dwarfs. Little wonder then, if we have lost our moral moorings, and consequently distorted the imagination of our hearts and minds .Media, as the mirror of Erised, reflects ‘ the deepest and the most desperate desire of our hearts’. And thereby we know who we really are. And yet, we are lost in the fantasy world and we fail to detect the malaise. The blurring of line between reel and real life, and societal approval of it, is the true horror of the situation.

Info-tainment is not really the answer to the hungers of the human heart. Every attempt to reduce us to mega bytes, mega-pixels or machines has failed. We are more than machines. It is a pity that we do not recognize that media can “ neither give us knowledge or truth”. Media messages are constructs that are designed to gain profit/power. Media content is colored by the intent of media managers. News channels are not neutral. Newsgathering and analysis are not innocent. Entertainment is not value free. Programming is not for public service. Can we rely on the media to give us knowledge or truth? Dumbledore’s words come as a wake up call. Like those who have stood before the mirror of Erised (and wasted away before it, entranced by what they have seen, or been driven mad, not knowing if what it shows is real or even possible) humanity has surrendered its call, conscience, and character to the media. Dumbledore’s closing words are instructive: It does not do to dwell on dreams and forget to live, remember that. Likewise, we must not do to dwell in a media-ted world and forget to LISTEN, as we ought to, to LOVE, as we ought to and LIVE humanly as we ought to. Who or what can show us who we really are?

The mirror of Erised shows us what we deeply desire and helps us live out this fantasy. It is of no help when we seek knowledge or truth regarding what makes us human? We must wrestle with the basic questions of origins, destiny, meaning and purpose if we are to find answers to that question.

When we stand before the mirror of Erised we see what we want. When we stand before the mirror of Truth we see who we really are. We see our disfigured faces and fragmented lives. The Bible, as a mirror of truth, discovers our inner most desires and thoughts of our hearts (Heb 4:12-13 ) and moves us into the realm of truth, not fantasy. If we look into this mirror we gain knowledge and Truth about ourselves and about the world around us. Jesus said, Your word is the truth. So let this truth make them completely yours (John 17:17 CEV). How can a disfigured and fragmented humanity belong to God? Bible, as the mirror of truth, leads to life (1 John 1: 1). The mirror of Truth is “ for teaching and helping people and for correcting them and showing them how to live” (2Ti 3:16). Therefore, it we see, listen and obey the mirror of truth we have a grasp on life. We must never stop looking at this mirror of truth, for it sets us free.

We have two mirrors before us: The mirror of Erised and the mirror of Truth. The mirror of Erised shows what we would like to see. The mirror of Truth shows us what we ought to see. The choice of the mirror is completely ours. We watch what we are and we are what we watch. Let us remember Dumbledore’s words: It does not do to dwell on dreams and forget to live, remember that.

Kids finding Faith

by Samuel Thambusamy

Read I Samuel 3: 1 -21

” Samuel served the LORD by helping Eli the priest, who was by that time almost blind. In those days, the LORD hardly ever spoke directly to people, and he did not appear to them in dreams very often. But one night, Eli was asleep in his room, and Samuel was sleeping on a mat near the sacred chest in the LORD’s house. They had not been asleep very long when the LORD called out Samuel’s name. “Here I am!” Samuel answered. Then he ran to Eli and said, “Here I am. What do you want?” “I didn’t call you,” Eli answered. “Go back to bed.” Samuel went back. Again the LORD called out Samuel’s name. Samuel got up and went to Eli. “Here I am,” he said. “What do you want?” Eli told him, “Son, I didn’t call you. Go back to sleep.” The LORD had not spoken to Samuel before, and Samuel did not recognize the voice. When the LORD called out his name for the third time, Samuel went to Eli again and said, “Here I am. What do you want?” Eli finally realized that it was the LORD who was speaking to Samuel. So he said, “Go back and lie down! If someone speaks to you again, answer, ‘I’m listening, LORD. What do you want me to do?’ ” Once again Samuel went back and lay down. The LORD then stood beside Samuel and called out as he had done before, “Samuel! Samuel!” “I’m listening,” Samuel answered. “What do you want me to do?” The LORD said: Samuel, I am going to do something in Israel that will shock everyone who hears about it! I will punish Eli and his family, just as I promised. He knew that his sons refused to respect me, and he let them get away with it, even though I said I would punish his family forever. I warned Eli that sacrifices or offerings could never make things right! His family has done too many disgusting things. The next morning, Samuel got up and opened the doors to the LORD’s house. He was afraid to tell Eli what the LORD had said. But Eli told him, “Samuel, my boy, come here!” “Here I am,” Samuel answered. Eli said, “What did God say to you? Tell me everything. I pray that God will punish you terribly if you don’t tell me every word he said!” Samuel told Eli everything. Then Eli said, “He is the LORD, and he will do what’s right.” As Samuel grew up, the LORD helped him and made everything Samuel said come true. From the town of Dan in the north to the town of Beersheba in the south, everyone in the country knew that Samuel was truly the LORD’s prophet. The LORD often appeared to Samuel at Shiloh and told him what to say.”
(1Sa 3:1-21 CEV)

Ideas for Conversations

• What is this passage about?
• Who are the characters mentioned in the passage? What do we know about them?
• The Lord spoke to Samuel. Could Samuel have understood what God told him? Discuss.
• Do you agree that all children have a natural spirituality? What qualifications would you put on this?
• Think of groups of children you are journeying with? What evidence can you offer that children have sensitivity or openness towards God?
• Can you share some spiritual lesson that you have learnt from Children you journey with?
• What are the factors in our church/community/culture that work to damage or deaden this awareness about God?
• What is God telling you through the passage? What are you going to do in response to God’s word to you?