Literature and Crisis of Faith

Yesterday was our Teen Wednesday discussion of the new Harry Potter book and it was a great discussion. There was one tidbit that sticks out in my mind and I just have to share with you all.

The subject of Philip Pullman's books came up. One of the teens, an incredibly bright and faithful young man, who is about to head back to college for his Sophomore year, shared how The Golden Compass and it's sequels caused a crisis of faith for him. He found himself questioning whether God was really all He was cracked up to be, as a direct result of this literary series.

The young man also shared that he once had a similar crisis and that was after reading The Da Vinci Code. That time, he found himself questioning the Church. He said, "Satan knows I LOVE books and that's how he's going to attack me."

I asked if the HP books caused any kind of spiritual crisis. "No," he replied, "quite the opposite." He, and all of the young people present at this discussion, found the HP books to be morally uplifting.

The Golden Compass is coming out as a movie soon. Please don't be duped by the media into going to see it. It is not in the tradtion of LOTR as they claim. Pullman has publicly stated that his goal in writing children's literature is lead them away from Christianity.

Every now and then I'll run into a good Christian homeschooling parent who mentions their children love the Pullman books, being completely unaware of the books' content. They assume they're good literature because of all the hype and awards they've received.

This is what Jeff Miller referred to as swatting at gnats while letting the camel through. We need to see all the effort that has been placed into attacking HP placed into warning parents about the Pullman books.