The Theology of Fishes: Magic
I like to reflect on my personal theology from time to time, as a matter of best practice; I do not believe it is best for one to just sit comfortably in one’s legalistic rules for Godliness and preach down one’s nose at others, as the Pharisaical right-wing hypocrites do. With my parents’ impending visit later this afternoon, I got to reflecting on Dungeons & Dragons, Magic: The Gathering, and the fantasy worlds of sorcery, magic, and the demonic realms that get them all in a tizzy. I recalled to mind the following passage, from 1 Corinthians 8: (verses 4, 7-9)
So then, about eating food sacrificed to idols: We know that “An idol is nothing at all in the world” and that “There is no God but one.” … But not everyone possesses this knowledge. Some people are still so accustomed to idols that when they eat sacrificial food they think of it as having been sacrificed to a god, and since their conscience is weak, it is defiled. But food does not bring us near to God; we are no worse if we do not eat, and no better if we do. Be careful, however, that the exercise of your rights does not become a stumbling block to the weak.
It occurs to me, then, that these so-called “demonic” games/books/fantasy universes that my parents banned in their house are along the same lines as this meat sacrificed to idols from the days of the Apostle Paul. After all, is magic real? Certainly not. Do witches have real power? Mostly not; even for those people who do believe in the reality of spiritual forces, angels, demons, and whatnot, witches are largely seen as would-be magic users, with only rare occasions being demon-possessed people. So it is with these fantasy universes; they are just that, a fantasy, a made-up world in which we pretend to immerse ourselves for entertainment purposes. As long as we are capable of separating our reality from the fantasy world, they hold no power here. (As an aside, this appears to be the problem with the pious folk and these fantasy worlds: As we have seen in politics, they have trouble separating fantasy from reality.)
There is an additional hurdle to overcome: Christian theology dictates that we should “set our mind on things above, and not on things below.” Paul seemingly commands us in Philippians 4:8:
Finally, brothers and sisters, whatever is true, whatever is noble, whatever is right, whatever is pure, whatever is lovely, whatever is admirable - if anything is excellent or praiseworthy - think about such things.
Christians who want to ban books are going to point to this verse, saying that our kids should be thinking only on spiritual things, and not earthly desires, so this passage is quite relevant to today’s political climate. But let us look at the larger context: Paul has just concluded exhorting the Philippians not to be anxious about anything, and that through prayer and petition, the peace of God will be with them. In other words, in addition to praying about their anxieties, they should think about things that uplift them, to help their mental state. It’s not a directive that we should only think about “pure” holy things, but that when we find ourselves in times of trouble, we should reject negative thoughts and focus on God and the things that are positive around us. That’s it!
I’m not sure if this is a series the Lizardim might want to continue on, but I wanted a place to put all this as it was in my head. If it’s well-received, perhaps there will be more of them later.