Posted on 03/10/2005 9:55:31 PM PST by Coleus
Coleus, you are RIGHT and thank you for posting this.
Some prefer to be blind. Then again ... the times we live in suggest this will happen.
We don't allow Harry Potter in our house. We have better reading material than that pagan trash.
Coincident to your comments, I was talking with a highly educated former Catholic this week who said his concept of "god" was George Lucas.
That was pretty damned disheartening.
Not surprisingly.
This essay is a superb and prophetic analysis of the Harry Potter phenomenon.
I hope more parents, teachers and clergy have a chance to hear Mr. O'Brien's well presented perspective.
Sorry, I have to disagree on this one. Magic and wishing are a natural part of growing up (as are vivid dreams and nightmares). At least kids are being inspired to experience the mysterious and awe-inspiring. (Contrast that to the "keeping it real" sex & violence on TV).
How many Hardy Boys, Alfred Hitchcock, and Poe stories did I read as a kid? Plenty. This is the same thing only different.
As kids go through their developmental stages, they learn a more refined and proper understanding of the true source for such awe and mystery. It's all part of that age-old concept called "growing up".
Of course, that presupposes they are getting other religious education besides these books. These Harry Potter books at least have kids reading. I've seen many a kid go on to read the "Narnia" series, for example.
Agreed. And many thanks to Coleus for keeping me aware of such excellent Catholic writing and analysis.
I hold no brief for Harry Potter in any way (I've never read any of the books and don't intend to) and I recoginze the very real dangers the occult/pagan elements of modern culture, but I must protest that exempting Tolkien and Lewis from criticism merely because they are famous rightwing liturgical chr*stians is completely unfair. Both Middle Earth and Narnia are full of magical beings of various sorts as well as magical humans, and Lewis fills certain parts of the Narnia books with classical pagan deities and demigods (such as b@cchus). Classical Greco-Roman paganism tends to get a pass because it preceded chr*stianity as the foundation of Western Civlilzation.
Another unfortunate fact is that Lewis was a Theistic evolutionist who in the preface to The Screwtape Letters stated that he would drop his belief in angels if "science" were to disprove them (in which case they would just be assumptions of the Biblical milieu), and Tolkien was a contributor the the blasphemously higher-critical "Jerusalem Bible." And The Silmarilion gives a complete pagan mythology and creation narrative for Middle Earth, but does anyone object? Of course not. Fantasists who are known to have been rightwing chr*stians can do no wrong. Shoot, they can even love nature, which no contemporary conservative can get away with. (BTW, I took the "see which Tolkien creature you'd be" test. I'm an Ent. I knew I would be!)
Tolkien's wizards weren't really wizards? Please! And magic is always bad? What about the "good magic" of elves such beings? I've never seen such word games!
Again, I'm not writing this to defend Harry Potter. It's true that much of popular culture makes use of fantasy supernaturalism and even dead (please G-d!) pagan religions (comic books use pagan "gxds" as characters, I hope because they are dead and they don't want to deprecate the True G-d by making Him a character in a comic book plot). It is true that this can be dangerous if one doesn't draw a strict line between fantasy and reality. But please don't be a hypocrite and excuse the same things done by others just because they were great conservative (though not Fundamentalist) chr*stian apologists.
1. Harry Potter is a global long term project to change the culture. In the young generation inhibitions against magic and the occult are being destroyed. Thus, forces re-enter society which Christianity had overcome.
2. Hogwarts, the school of magic and witchcraft, is a closed world of violence and horror, of cursing and bewitching, of racist ideology, of blood sacrifice, disgust and obsession. There is an atmosphere of continuous threat, which the young reader cannot escape.
3. While Harry Potter appears in the beginning to fight against evil, in fact the similarities between him and Voldemort, the arch-evil adversary in the tale, become more and more obvious. In volume five, Harry is being obsessed by Voldemort, which leads to symptoms of personality disintegration.
4. The human world becomes degraded, the world of witches and sorcerers becomes glorified.
5. There is no positive transcendent dimension. The supernatural is entirely demonic. Devine symbols are perverted.
6. Harry Potter is no modern fairy tale. In fairy tales sorcerers and witches are unambiguous figures of evil. The hero escapes their power through the exercise of virtue. In the Harry Potter universe there is no character that endeavours consistently to achieve good. For seemingly good ends evil means are being used.
7. A (young!) reader's power of discernment of good and evil is blocked out through emotional manipulation and intellectual confusion.
8. It is an assault upon the young generation, seducing it playfully into a world of witchcraft and sorcery, filling the imagination of the young with images of a world in which evil reigns, from which there is no escape, on the contrary, it is portrayed as highly desirable.
9. Those who value plurality of opinion should resist the nearly overwhelming power of this peer pressure, which is being accomplished through a gigantic corporate and multimedia blitz--one which displays elements of totalitarian brainwashing.
10. Since through the Potter books faith in a loving God is systematically undermined, even destroyed in many young people, through false "values" and mockery of Judeo-Christian truth, the introduction of these books in schools is intolerant. Parents should refuse permission for their children to take part in Potter indoctrination for reasons of faith and conscience.
See related LifeSiteNews.com coverage:
Pope Opposes Harry Potter Novels - Signed Letters from Cardinal Ratzinger Now Online
http://www.lifesite.net/ldn/2005/jul/05071301.html
RIMSTING, Germany, July 13, 2005 (LifeSiteNews.com) - LifeSiteNews.com has obtained and made available online copies of two letters sent by Cardinal Joseph Ratzinger, who was recently elected Pope, to a German critic of the Harry Potter novels. In March 2003, a month after the English press throughout the world falsely proclaimed that Pope John Paul II approved of Harry Potter, the man who was to become his successor sent a letter to a Gabriele Kuby outlining his agreement with her opposition to J.K. Rowling's offerings. (See below for links to scanned copies of the letters signed by Cardinal Ratzinger.)
As the sixth issue of Rowling's Harry Potter series - Harry Potter and the Half-Blood Prince - is about to be released, the news that Cardinal Joseph Ratzinger expressed serious reservations about the novels is now finally being revealed to the English-speaking world still under the impression the Vatican approves the Potter novels.
In a letter dated March 7, 2003 Cardinal Ratzinger thanked Kuby for her "instructive" book Harry Potter - gut oder böse (Harry Potter- good or evil?), in which Kuby says the Potter books corrupt the hearts of the young, preventing them from developing a properly ordered sense of good and evil, thus harming their relationship with God while that relationship is still in its infancy.
"It is good, that you enlighten people about Harry Potter, because those are subtle seductions, which act unnoticed and by this deeply distort Christianity in the soul, before it can grow properly," wrote Cardinal Ratzinger.
The letter also encouraged Kuby to send her book on Potter to the Vatican prelate who quipped about Potter during a press briefing which led to the false press about the Vatican support of Potter. At a Vatican press conference to present a study document on the New Age in April 2003, one of the presenters - Rev. Peter Fleetwood - made a positive comment on the Harry Potter books in response to a question from a reporter. Headlines such as "Pope Approves Potter" (Toronto Star), "Pope Sticks Up for Potter Books" (BBC), "Harry Potter Is Ok With The Pontiff" (Chicago Sun Times) and "Vatican: Harry Potter's OK with us" (CNN Asia) littered the mainstream media.
In a second letter sent to Kuby on May 27, 2003, Cardinal Ratzinger "gladly" gave his permission to Kuby to make public "my judgement about Harry Potter."
The most prominent Potter critic in North America, Catholic novelist and painter Michael O'Brien commented to LifeSiteNews.com on the "judgement" of now-Pope Benedict saying, "This discernment on the part of Benedict XVI reveals the Holy Father's depth and wide ranging gifts of spiritual discernment." O'Brien, author of a book dealing with fantasy literature for children added, "it is consistent with many of the statements he's been making since his election to the Chair of Peter, indeed for the past 20 years - a probing accurate read of the massing spiritual warfare that is moving to a new level of struggle in western civilization. He is a man in whom a prodigious intellect is integrated with great spiritual gifts. He is the father of the universal church and we would do well to listen to him."
English translations of the two letters by Cardinal Ratzinger follow:
Joseph Cardinal Ratzinger
Vatican City
March 7, 2003
Esteemed and dear Ms. Kuby!
Many thanks for your kind letter of February 20th and the informative book which you sent me in the same mail. It is good, that you enlighten people about Harry Potter, because those are subtle seductions, which act unnoticed and by this deeply distort Christianity in the soul, before it can grow properly.
I would like to suggest that you write to Mr. Peter Fleetwood, (Pontifical Council of Culture, Piazza S. Calisto 16, I00153 Rome) directly and to send him your book.
Sincere Greetings and Blessings,
+ Joseph Cardinal Ratzinger
=======================
Joseph Cardinal Ratzinger
Vatican City
May 27, 2003
Esteemed and dear Ms. Kuby,
Somehow your letter got buried in the large pile of name-day , birthday and Easter mail. Finally this pile is taken care of, so that I can gladly allow you to refer to my judgment about Harry Potter.
Sincere Greetings and Blessings,
+ Joseph Cardinal Ratzinger
Links to the scanned copies of the two signed letters by Cardinal Ratzinger (in German) - In PDF format:
http://www.lifesite.net/ldn/2005_docs/ratzingerlet...
http://www.lifesite.net/ldn/2005_docs/ratzingerper...
See LifeSite's Harry Potter resource section at:
http://www.lifesite.net/features/harrypotter/
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