Amey's Blog

I planned for this to be about homemaking and homeschooling, but now it's just a chaotic jumble of news and ideas about animals, kids, food, and other random thoughts.

Tuesday, July 26, 2005

Reading Material

With all of the Harry Potter hysteria in the culture at large, I just thought I would share a link to this excellent article by Doug Phillips at Vision Forum. I thought it was very logical, well-thought-out reasoning as to why Christians should steer clear of such reading. In my view, when there are so many other great books to read, why read something that is unarguably of a debateable value at best, and possibly evil at the worst?

My latest read: Adam and His Kin, by Ruth Beechik. I am having trouble putting this book down. It is very interesting. It's similar to an historical novel, yet almost everything in the book is from the Bible and/or inferred from the Bible. The author admits that we don't know for sure some of the things that she puts in her story (dialogue and such), but they are very intelligent guesses. I'm only about 1/3 of the way through, but already I would highly recommend it.

5 Comments:

Anonymous Anonymous said...

Yes we all know the 12th commandment: Thouse shalt not fly on a broom.

10:18 AM  
Blogger Amey said...

Huh?

6:40 PM  
Anonymous Anonymous said...

I loved the Vision Forum article and copied it for s friend...But is not a popular view...

10:47 PM  
Blogger Toledotastic said...

I'm not opposed to the notion of wizardry books being evil, at least in terms of comprehending the thought process behind it. I don't agree with it but I understand where the notion fits in a certain viewpoint of fundamentalist Christianity.

What I don't understand is why these books are completely banned by some parents. Aren't you setting your kids up to desire the forbidden fruit? It seems to me that the best way to instill in children the idea that something is wrong is to let the children see the wrong thing, then to point out its flaws.

11:54 PM  
Blogger Amey said...

I think that probably everyone can agree that there are some things that children should not view or read (pornography or extreme violence, for example). Keeping them from these things is not "setting them up", but protecting them from evils that could harm them. If we expose our children to evil simply to point out its flaws, it actually sets them up to sin. In my opinion, there are better ways to teach critical thinking to older children (mine are still young - 2,4, & 6) than reading fiction that glorifies something that God calls an abomination.

Personally, I don't feel that I ban books at all. I choose what my young children will read, and with as much good material as there is out there, I can afford to be VERY PARTICULAR about what they do read.

I do understand that my view is not "mainstream", but that's what being "weird" is all about, right? :-)

11:09 PM  

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