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Do you believe that Harry Potter books promote evil? That they blur the line between Good and Evil? I ask this because not only do I work in a school where we encourage the reading of these books, I also have read all of them. As a lifelong christian, I can not believe that some people are so easily influenced by idiocy as to fall in to this line of thinking. Just trying to stir some discussion on the subject.

I'm guessing you are posting this in regards to the news stories about Pope Benedict. Well, there are several angles about this. From a Catholic perspective, John Paul was a Harry Potter fan.

John Paul II wrote:Harry Potter promotes good Christian morals.

The current pope while a Cardinal, in response to a book saying Potter could be dangerous to young Christians, was reported as follows. Note, his comments were before John Pauls above.

Cardinal Ratzinger in 2003 wrote:BERLIN, GERMANY -- In a letter sent two years before becoming pontiff, Pope Benedict XVI expressed concern that Harry Potter books "erode Christianity in the soul" of young people, a German writer says.

Ratzingers comments came from reading a book from Gabriele Kuby, a sociologist, that criticized the Potter books. The bigger question is has he actually read the Potter novels? Also, this is not a 'new' comment, but merely a thought from two years ago from reading Kuby's anti Potter book.

You are asking if something from the "fantasy" genre is bad for Christian youth... on a message board for a fantasy game?

lawl

I haven't read the harry potter books myself, but from what I see in the movies it's harmless fantasy makebelieve. As long as you're smart enough to realize that you're not going to be growing magic powers and that (remember, this is from a Christian perspective) you only have power through God above.

Fantasy books pretty much follow the ruleset of pitting good against evil. To many people get bothered by the trappings and miss the basic point of the story.

Good overcoming evil.

The hero/heroine generally shows many admirable qualities as well. Courage, intelligence, perserverance...all qualities that most people would like their children to show.

Having worked in the past in the children's department of a library for 10 years this is an argument I participated in many times.

The Harry Potter books have gotten kids reading again, and help develop their imaginations. It's so stupid that people think they're evil . They're childrens books. People are dumb.

I am a very devout christian

I feel that if you are such a poor parent that can't teach your kid to think for themselves and understand what they should keep or believe in life and what to throw away or give less weight, then you are a moron yourself and shouldn't be parenting children....

I mean really, are christians so afraid of creativity and fantasy that they can't allow their chidlren to read something that might be exciting and challenging and process it with them, letting them know what they agree and disagree with

and are people such nazi's that they are so totally afraid of creative thinking that they think the God of the universe should be afraid of a set of children's books....

people are mindless cattle if they can't figure out that Harry Potter is neither good or bad, it is and you can give your children DIRECTION

The Catholic church historically would prefer that our children not read. Keep them ignorant and pliable is the motto of the day. For hundreds of years the mass was spoken in a dead language (Latin) so that the people could ONLY find God thru the Catholic church. This keeps the church relavant and keeps anyone from having an informed conversation about religious matters. It was only the early protestant movements that changed the tradition of saying mass in Latin, at taht point the Catholics had to speak the sermon in the local language to compete with the Protestant churchs threatening their control.

People are threatened by the Potter books because they have become so incredibly popular with the youth and kids are more interested in reading Potter than the Bible. This is the "Loss of Morality" that people are really speaking about when they down those books. Also some people are phobic of any reference to magic or witchcraft in any way. Can you say Salem Witch-hunt? I thought you could.

Azlana wrote:The Harry Potter books have gotten kids reading again, and help develop their imaginations. It's so stupid that people think they're evil . They're childrens books. People are dumb.

The Harry Potter books are evil.

Apparently, this goes in cycles with every generation. When I was a kid, works by Judy Blume (of Superfudge fame) were all the rage. I learned later certain adults at the time took exception to the "coming of age" content contained within it's pages.

Fuck Harry Potter.

He stole my image.

Haylo wrote:Do you believe that Harry Potter books promote evil? That they blur the line between Good and Evil? I ask this because not only do I work in a school where we encourage the reading of these books, I also have read all of them. As a lifelong christian, I can not believe that some people are so easily influenced by idiocy as to fall in to this line of thinking. Just trying to stir some discussion on the subject.

Those books are full of witchery! You are a bad christian for reading them and more than likely will burn in hell for doing so!

10sun wrote:Fuck Harry Potter.

He stole my image.

You have a lightning scar on your forehead?

not a lightning bolt, but I have a scar on my forehead from my childhood... fell out of a car with my seatbelt on or something, I was 4 years old when this happened.

boybutter wrote:I am a very devout christian

I feel that if you are such a poor parent that can't teach your kid to think for themselves and understand what they should keep or believe in life and what to throw away or give less weight, then you are a moron yourself and shouldn't be parenting children....

I mean really, are christians so afraid of creativity and fantasy that they can't allow their chidlren to read something that might be exciting and challenging and process it with them, letting them know what they agree and disagree with

and are people such nazi's that they are so totally afraid of creative thinking that they think the God of the universe should be afraid of a set of children's books....

people are mindless cattle if they can't figure out that Harry Potter is neither good or bad, it is and you can give your children DIRECTION

I pretty much agree with this

Ned: Then Harry Potter and all his wizard friends went straight to hell for practicing witchcraft!

Rod and Tod: Yay!

some kids are stupid and easily influenced, i think the worry of some is that kids might start practicing witchcraft to be "more like harry"

of course the parent who has such a child is usually and idiot themselves anyway

They're just well written books, it makes kids happy to know that they can read this big book even though there might be a little trouble with a word thats too difficult here and there but mostly its a very easy book to read and it encourages kids to read more. The thing with that is that some people think its an obession for these kids to be always reading these books. They're just paranoid of nothing.

Mindia wrote:

boybutter wrote:I am a very devout christian

I feel that if you are such a poor parent that can't teach your kid to think for themselves and understand what they should keep or believe in life and what to throw away or give less weight, then you are a moron yourself and shouldn't be parenting children....

I mean really, are christians so afraid of creativity and fantasy that they can't allow their chidlren to read something that might be exciting and challenging and process it with them, letting them know what they agree and disagree with

and are people such nazi's that they are so totally afraid of creative thinking that they think the God of the universe should be afraid of a set of children's books....

people are mindless cattle if they can't figure out that Harry Potter is neither good or bad, it is and you can give your children DIRECTION

I pretty much agree with this

you're going to hell with haylo too then buddy!

Harry Potter is like training wheels for the satanic bible.


WITCHERY I SAYS!!!!

Silly christians...

personally i can't wait until someone whines about the new narnia movie(s?)

that'll get some laughs

my only whine with narnia is how badly they will bastardize the books

I was in the midnight line to get my book last night. I read until 2:30 this morning, got some sleep, and resumed my reading until about 30 minutes ago. This book really disappointed me, but I think it was because of the person who died and the way this person dies that is most upsetting.

My nine year old son who HATES to read has started reading the books. This can't be a bad thing. Does he think he can fly on a broomstick, conjure a patronus, and sneak around under an invisibility cloak? No, he knows it's just imaginary, but it's amazing to see him actually getting interested in reading them. My 4 yer old son has seen the movies so many times He runs around the house yelling EXPECTO PATRONUM I think that some Catholics, much like our government want to have to much control over what we and our children are doing

I've read 1/2 of it, and I'll finish it tomorrow before giving it over to my boy. It's not JKs best work, but it's par for the course.

I never read those Narnia books because I heard they were written by a Christian.