Harry Potter And The Ministry Of Fire – Forbes.com
Why are these guys are always getting the press? I mean first of all it shouldn’t surprise me that is it s a father and son pastor team. There is nothing wrong with that but it always seems that churches that do these types of things are all two or three large families. And I almost lost it when the article recounted the other books being burned included, a Non-King James Bible (If the apostle Paul used the King James it is good enough for me, right?) and a copy of Coneheads. (I know it was a bad movie but burning?)
I am a Christian; I am a minister and I LOVE HARRY POTTER! J.K. Rowling is a great story teller; she weaves her tales together with great care, and I have lost at least one parishioner because of it. I love to read fantasy from Hickman and Weis, Tolkien, Lewis, Robert Jordan and Piers Anthony and I unlike these gentlemen I can tell the difference between reality and fantasy. But these men would probably burn The Chronicles of Narnia and The Lord of the Rings as evil as well, because they could never be bothered to read them to understand the greater things being said. I get the impression these men feel the evil in the potter books are more powerful than their God, but I am only assuming this based on conversations with people who share their feelings.
From Paul’s speech from Mars Hill we should have learned to engage culture, he didn’t burn the alter to the unknown God he used it as he quoted Greek poets. He didn’t run and hide his head from their teachings, he was educated in their culture and their philosophy, he understood that all truth leads to God. Humans have told stories as long as we have been around, because at the core of many stories are truths that we all relate to. Harry Potter is a story that deals with many issues, growing up, not fitting in, fighting for the greater good, and standing up in the face of adversity. Things every Christian should be able to relate to even if the back drop of the story is fantasy. As CS Lewis said “Some day you will be old enough to start reading fairy tales again.” I hope these men grow up quickly, so they stop making Jesus look stupid.
2 responses to “Harry Potter And The Ministry Of Fire – Forbes.com”
OK – I agree these guys are nuts, but you stated that non-KJV bibles were burned as though these guys did the burning — the crowd they had gathered “got out of control” and started burning other material including the conhead movie and the bibles. These guys – although they are way off – were only burning the Potter books.
The fact that this type of story gets any airtime at all is the real shocker. I have family that are very anti-potter without ever having read a single book or seen a single movie. They watch rated R movies – one I know was about a psychic serial killer that used fear to determine how to kill.
Anyway – can’t we all just get along?
I guess we are reading it differently because I don’t see that he was against the extra burning. But even if that is the case; birds of a feather flock together.