The magic hypocrisy

[Psalms34]

Christian MUDs?! I've been wanting to find something like that, but I never found anything. Could you tell me the names of one or more such MUDs? I'd be interested in checking them out!

Lion of Judah http://www.lojmud.com/
Ark of the Covenant http://www.aotcmud.org/

I'm also working on text MUD, a Christian based Spiritual hack and slash type MUD, but it may still be some time before I release the location of the MUD's site which is up and running right now. It's based on a C++ engine and I hope it will feature my version of a Spiritual Warfare combat system. With work and college, it'll be some time still. But I'm doing it to learn C++ programming for MUD/GMUD's so I'm sure it'll get to that point at some time

 

[Blazin4Christ]

Does anyone find it hypocritical of fundamentalists who say that Harry Potter and Magic is evil because they contain magical themes, when they support CS Lewis' Narnia stuff, or the Lord of the Rings, or even the "WIZARD" of Oz? Theres definatly a double standard going on, and caught between the blurry battle ground lines are video games. Why would parents ban games like Sacrifice while extoling N'Lightning games?

The Lord of the Rings isn't occultic, not really sure, never was really in it,


but...the Wizard of Oz occultic?!?! no way! things like the Fairy Godmother and so forth are fine in my opinion in Disney movies and such, but I think its out of hand and should be avoided when things like strong occultic points are made, sorta liek in Castlevania,

 

[The Paradox Theory]

I don't think Harry Potter itself is evil; some people just take it too far or get too obsessed with it. Since I'm an open-minded sort of person, I find people denouncing Harry Potter as demonic and the "influence of the devil" ridiculous. Personally, I think that more effort should be taken to PREVENT or DISCOURAGE people getting too obsessed or deluded after reading the book instead of condemning the book itself. I'm an aspiring writer, and I appreciate how Rowling ties in backstory and plot in so well in the series - the main reason why I find Harry Potter fascinating (same for Lord of the Rings; the backstory is excessive to the point of insanity there). At the very least, you can gain some modicum of entertainment from reading it, or maybe burn off some time.

And about the protagonist being a little "dark" himself - I find nothing dark about it. Rowling's just portraying him as a teenager with compulsions and dilemmas and making it that much easier to relate to him.

I'm very sure Narnia is based on Christianity - the Aslan/Jesus parallels are painfully obvious. Doesn't it even mention Aslan being the "Son of [the Creator, or whatever it was. I forgot the supreme Narnia deity's name]?" Not so sure about Wizard of Oz, though.

 

[Locket]

I think the name was The King Across the Sea. But I'm not sure

 

[Ryder]

I've never had a problem with magic in a game but I did quit EQ because it became an idol in my life. I remember one occasion when my dad came to visit and he's not in the best of health but all I could think was, "Man, I wish he'd hurry up and leave so I can jump back on EQ." This really shook me up and soon after, I quit playing. I ended up giving my account to someone online.

I have a good friend who is that way. She has quit EQ and plays WoW now but she plays for more than 8 hours a day every single day. We can go to visit and she'll never log out, just feign death for a while then get up and check her character periodically while we are there or sometimes she will just keep playing. I was worried WoW might have the same effect on me and I did spend many hours a day playing the first couple of weeks but now I'm starting to get bored with it and play less and less.

I had a similar problem with DoD, a mod for Half-Life. I can sympathize. I think God was trying to tell me something about spending too much time on games. I still love to play games, but now I've all but stopped playing online. I primarily play a couple times a month now when my friends have a LAN party or something. I'm not sure how great it's all going with my time management, but it's better now than before.

 

[stonetoflesh]

All these HP threads make me think of the anti-D&D crusade in the early '80s. There were people who swore they saw some kid or other who had been possessed because he had played the game, or that the rulebooks contained real spells and invocations and all sorts of bunk like that. It was a paranoid crusade based on misinformation, lies and ignorance.

Ah but the spells in there are taken from real witchcraft books.

I'd love to see the "evidence" of this...

 

[Arnediad]

*walks into the thread*

I don't like the fact that the "hero" in Harry Potter is just a lesser bad guy himself. I mean he steals and cheats and lies and everything.

Well, I suppose that means you shouldn't read any books, watch any movies, listen to any music, or associate with anyone. Everyone does those things, and they can still be heroes.

All I can do about the bit about HP and D&D having "real spells" in them is laugh =

 

[stonetoflesh]

All I can do about the bit about HP and D&D having "real spells" in them is laugh =

Yeah, I'm tempted to do the same. Then I remember that there are people out there who actually believe these baseless allegations...

 

[Fatality]

Should we portray heroes in novels to be perfect, and sinless? Remember our great Hero King David, who committed adulterey and purpously sent a innocent man to his death. He is a hero, though he does many wrong things. The point is, its a fantasy, and if the good guy does things that are bad, so be it, does not everyone sin? If you dont like it, then take your attention away from it and move on.

 

[Breetai]

Does anyone find it hypocritical of fundamentalists who say that Harry Potter and Magic is evil because they contain magical themes, when they support CS Lewis' Narnia stuff, or the Lord of the Rings, or even the "WIZARD" of Oz?

YES.

 

[Durden Singer]

*sick of mis-use of the word "fundamental"

but yeah, I don't think the hipocracy is so much in what you've mentioned, but, rather, that a Christian, who should be striving for truth, will so quickly believe rumours and lies about the author of the Harry Potter series.

I'm as yet undecided on the Potter issue. But mostly what I feel is: if you can tell the difference between fake and real, it doesn't matter too much. This is why I can play games like Final Fantasy, Grand Theft Auto and other violent or magical games, and the only time I feel guilt, is when I realise I've spent too much time doing something which is essentially useless.

To rebut my own point about truth vs. fiction though: if Harry Potter does indeed include real witchcraft, not pure fantasy, that throws a spanner in the works of comparisons with LOTR, Narnia, etc...


BTW, I've never seen anyone come out of a LOTR movie saying "those Christian overtones really helped me in my Christian walk. This is just a point to consider, please don't make a bit deal out of this one, as it's unrelated to the rest...

 

[Ryder]

Actually, on your last point, I kinda think it did help some. I don't think LOTR's Christian undertones (particularly in the books) hurt any to say the least. And I'm sure Narnia's helped people in their Christian walk too, even more so no doubt. But I somehow doubt if HP has helped anyone in their Christian walk.

 

[Durden Singer]

Fair enough, I take back my point! I just thought it was kinda interesting. Not that I'm against that kinda thing anyway. I'm currently writing the screenplay for an anime which will be jammed with such undertones... and some magic (to get back on topic)!

 

[PolskiKrol]

heh well anyway what spawned the idea of this post is kinda funny. A while ago some kid I know was refused "Luigi's Mansion" because the bible says you shouldn't commune with the dead.

...And instead his mom got him one of the new 007 games!!!

 

[Doppelganger]

It is funny that you mentioned the post about people going to the hospital after reading HP, Locket, because of two reasons. One: everything that is atypical of the Christian teaching has spawned some one that knows some one that did something to end up in the hospital. e.g. urban legend. Secondly, if they did do something stupid after reading an HP novel, good. They made a serious attempt to remove themselves from the gene pool. Granted, they were stupid and failed, but they still made the attempt nonetheless.

Truthfully, if HP novels get my nephew off the XBox, away from the nonsense on TV, and reduces his chances of coming accross something on the web, e.g. a pederast. By all means I'll buy him more novels until his parents tell me not too.