The "Christian" (answer) to Harry Potter (book)

[Solly Mack]

http://www.azcentral.com/arizonarepublic/arizonaliving/articles/0727shadowmancer.html


G.P. Taylor, an Anglican vicar, one-time roadie for the Sex Pistols and former all-around sinner, was roaring across the Yorkshire moors on his Yamaha XV1100 in a lightning storm when the idea for his hit Christian children's book, Shadowmancer, came to him.

Like some other committed Christians, he had been disturbed by the amount of witchcraft and the occult in children's literature. Harry Potter, for instance. Author J.K. Rowling gives too much power to the forces of evil in her books, he told parishioners. Well, one congregant replied, why not write your own book?

snip...

Some of those sales have been fueled by the Christian media, which has hailed the "Christian Harry Potter" for its religious references and its celebration of God's power. Taylor's American promotional tour not only included the predictable appearance on the Today show, but an interview with Pat Robertson on the Christian Broadcasting Network's 700 Club. A reviewer for Pluggedin.com, the online magazine of the conservative Christian group Focus on the Family, wrote, "It could be just the thing to counter Harry Potter's magic." And while Christianity Today magazine was more critical, it nonetheless credited Shadowmancer for showing "something that some of the others do not - characters relentlessly calling on God to shine his light into the shadows."

That was what attracted Anne Pouns of Houston, who describes herself as a born-again Christian. She had not allowed her children, who are now teenagers, to read Harry Potter when they were young, and hadn't read the series herself. "I don't desire to have it in my hands because of the witchcraft," she said.

[POed_Ex_Repub]

1. Christians can be silly wabbits sometimes n/t

[Solly Mack]

3. I've never understood why Harry Potter was seen as a threat

I remain baffled.

[aquart]

2. So, do we have a paragraph of the new literature?

[Solly Mack]

4. I'll look. n/t edit: to add links

review:

http://www.amazon.co.uk/exec/obidos/ASIN/0571220460/202-0956987-1335018

excerpt:

http://www.readersread.com/excerpts/shadowmancer.htm

[Gore1FL]

12. jeez what crap

the first paragraph is 3/5 passive sentances.

The second has two sentances, both are active, but entirely too wordy.

The third is some weird half active/half passice run on.

It's crap. I can't bear to read further in the excerpt and one would think they would have chosen it for quality.

[Tom Kitten]

5. Hasn't this been done before?

Something about Narnia and Aslan? By a guy C.S.Lewis who was probably a lot more thoughtful than people give him credit for?

[Lorien]

7. Good point n/t.

[Solly Mack]

8. they felt the need for something to directly "counter" Harry Potter?

:shrug:

I dunno. I loved "The Lion, the Witch and the Wardrobe" as a child.

[Lorien]

6. One of the really disturbing things about these people

is that they really DO believe in supernatural "magic", while Rowling and her readers see it all as entertaining fiction!

[Solly Mack]

9. Guess some forms of magic are more acceptable than others?

I honestly don't "get" the problem people have with the Potter series.

I actually heard a lady call the books satanic while in a book store..and wondered why she was even in a book store. Somehow, the two just don't mesh...that type of thinking in someone who reads

[nemo137]

10. In his defense, I read the first part of the book at work

and it was pretty entertaining. Maybe he gets real preachy in the part I didn't read, but I thought it was ok.

[Solly Mack]

11. But could not the books have been written without feeling the need to

claim Harry Potter is a book of sin? and "evil" witches", and *gasp* magic? Harry Potter doesn't need a "counter" as the books don't attack anyones religious beliefs. They're fantasy.


There was no need to attack the Harry Potter books, in other words.