The Golden Compass is the first book in Philip Pullman’s fantasy trilogy His Dark Materials. New Line Cinema is set to release their movie based on the book on December 7, just in time for the holiday movie going season. As Ken Myers, host and producer of the Mars Hill Audio Journal, has noted, “In an interview with a Washington Post reporter in 2001, Philip Pullman candidly remarked, ‘I’m trying to undermine the basis of Christian belief.’ It’s ironic that the makers of The Golden Compass hope their film will make more money by opening in the season of the birth of the One who is the basis of Christian belief.”
There has been no small stir among Christian conservatives, led by William Donahue of the Catholic League, in denouncing as “pro-atheist” both the movie and the book upon which it is based. But are we overreacting?
During the first full hour of Wednesday’s program we sought to answer that question. We heard from Philip Pullman via excerpts of interviews he conducted with Al Roker of NBC’s Today Show, as well as an interview Mr. Pullman sat for with Donna Freitas, the author of both the book and film Killing the Imposter God.
For an indepth look at the philosophy and atheistic worldview of Philip Pullman we turned to the perspective of Alan Jacobs. Dr. Jacobs is a Professor of English at Wheaton College and is widely respected as an authority on fantasy genre, in particular the works of C. S. Lewis. Dr. Jacobs sat in 2000 for an extended interview with Ken Myers of the Mars Hill Audio Journal where they discussed Philip Pullman’s trilogy His Dark Materials in detail.
On Thursday’s program we once again take the full hour to return to a consideration of Philip Pullman’s work, this time focusing on the specific plot elements he uses to present his atheistic world view. Stream the program from 4:00 pm – 6:00 pm EDT.
Erika Faye,
So when St. Paul went to the Areopagus in Athens, interacted with the philosophers and scholars there, and QUOTED THEIR OWN WRITINGS TO THEM, he shouldn’t have been reading that “garbage”?
Your analogy of the professional boxer breaks down as well. Boxers are preparing for the fight IN THE SAME ARENA. He’s preparing in the same way HIS OPPONENT is preparing.
*Does a Christian need to see a movie about killing God to understand that it is not good?* NO. But a Christian certainly wants to understand his opponent. St. Paul said of Satan, “We are not ignorant of his devices.”
Many of today’s Christians are so busy living their best life now they have no concept of what it means to challenge themselves intellectually. Most just stick their heads in the sand and their fingers in their ears and pretend the big, bad culture doesn’t exist except in someone else’s world. Guess what? Jesus calls us to redeem that big, bad culture. You won’t do that with your fingers in your ears. It requires actually hearing what the culture is saying and speaking the gospel in response (Matthew 4).
So in essence we should give our dollars to satan to support his ministry ? That is what we are doing when we but the harry potter and golden compass books and attend the movies etc…What of the unsaved children who don’t live in Godly households ? How much more difficult will it be to minister to them in adulthood because they are being fed this AS A CHILD. Children do not have discernment yet that is why God gave them parents who should have more sense than to expose them to this garbage. I don’t have to actually drink, fornicate, and murder to know that it is wrong, why it is wrong, and how to defend my beliefs about it being wrong to someone else. A professional boxer fights his opponent to TEST his physical strength much like the SPIRITUAL test some here speak of. Does he smoke and eat garbage in the weeks leading up to his battle or does he feed himself the GOOD things that he will need to win the fight. Im sure he doesn’t need to load up on twinkies to know that they are no good. Does a Christian need to see a movie about killing God to understand that it is not good ?
Did I read correctly? It ISN’T a good thing for our children to be challenged in their Christian beliefs? How is it not a good thing to prepare our children to give an answer to any one who asks a reason for the hope that is in them?
“Behold, I send you forth as sheep IN THE MIDST OF wolves,” Jesus said. The Christian life, especially its intellectual life, is supposed to be lived in the presence of OPPOSITION, therefore it is by its very nature challenging. We cannot “love what is good and hate what is evil” until we TEST it. And we can’t TEST it if we are hiding in an evangelical enclave where anything and everything we are exposed to comes to us “purified” by an evangelical imprimatur. The life of the Christian mind is developed by exposure to things with which we are going to disagree, allowing the light of God’s word and the leadership of the Holy Spirit to expose the false and exalt the true.
Running and hiding from The Golden Compass will only serve to teach your children that Christians run and hide from things they disagree with because we aren’t prepared to stand in the marketplace of ideas and have our own ideas challenged. That’s not the way it works in the real world.
I was terribly disappointed to hear Mr. Edwards and his guest agree that it is a GOOD thing for children to be challenged in their Christian beliefs. If they are attending public school, they are being challenged in their Christian beliefs every day. We are supposed to “flee from evil”, “love what is good and hate what is evil”. Why on earth should we further encourage our children to dive into falsehoods for their entertainment or to challenge them? We need to be the salt and the light and to foster them to be strong in the Lord and to grasp the Truth in everything they do. It is shameful for a Christian pastor to challenge our youth with false fantasies. We have to remember the warning that It would be better to have never been born or to have a millstone tied around our necks and be thrown into the sea if we ever mislead the little ones. “Garbage in, garbage out”. I am grateful that there have been reviews of The Golden Compass so that I might know to steer clear of it. And to keep my children pure.
~~~~~~~~~”…The servant is not greater than his lord…”~~~~~~~~~
~~~~Satan tried also with the same success this bird can expect!~~~
Matthew 26:66
What think ye? They answered and said, He is guilty of death
Mark 14:64
Ye have heard the blasphemy: what think ye? And they all condemned him to be guilty of death.
17 And when I saw him, I fell at his feet as dead. And he laid his right hand upon me, saying unto me, Fear not; I am the first and the last:
18 I am he that liveth, and was dead; and, behold, I am alive for evermore, Amen; and have the keys of hell and of death.
Undermine NOTHING!
Nahum 1:7
The LORD is good, a strong hold in the day of trouble; and he knoweth them that trust in him.
Jackie Gleason (circa 1968) “How sweet it is”
In the vernacular ~~~ BRING IT
I closed the html tag for you Tom!
My apologies for not closing that html tag!
I’m downloading these interviews and will be most interested to hear them. I’ve been reading the books and watching developments on the movie. It seems to me this is a matter of which Christians ought to be aware and to remain watchful; but it’s not something to panic over. It’s coming out at Christmastime, and it’s a great time to tell our story, the true story of Christ. It’s a better story than Pullman’s by far. I would love any opportunity to stack the two up against each other.
There is another current going on of which Christians ought also to be aware. The Scholastic publishing house, which co-produced the movie, is also heavily promoting the film and the books as teaching materials for public schoolchildren. This is crossing a line. The books denigrate the Church, raising First Amendment fairness issues, and in some places (see Chapter 2 of the second book, for example), there is language that is shocking for any age, student or adult.
So parents ought to pay close attention to what their children bring home as required reading from school.
I don’t think that the Christian community overreacts in this case.
But these types of books and movies still remain very popular, and Hollywood like most of the publishing companies care about one thing: the bottom line.
It is, however, very disturbing the fact that media gives it so much coverage.