If you haven’t read George Barna’s research summary for the year, he has some interesting conclusions. And by interesting, I mean wacky.*
Take this one: New Research Explores Teenage Views and Behavior Regarding the Supernatural.Reminds me of my old days at the Church of Christ. In mid 1980s, I suffered through a series on defeating Satan. They told us we were surrounded by Satan. Papa Smurf? SATANIC. Alf? SATANIC. Heavy Metal Christian Music? SATANIC! We spent months learning the list of infected cultural icons.
Now Barna’s taking us back to that whacky logic.
He starts with this startling and unbelievable lead.
“Three out of every four teenagers have engaged in at least one type of psychic or witchcraft-related activity.”
It’s a call to action. Protect the children! Lock the doors. Bring in your dogs at night so the roaming Satanists and Wiccans won’t gather them up for ritual sacrifice.
Don’t worry too much. Just keep reading–between the lines that is. “Among the most common of those endeavors [the psychic or witchcraft-related activity] are using a Ouija board, reading books about witchcraft or Wicca, playing games involving sorcery or witchcraft, having a ‘professional’ do a palm reading or having their fortune told.”
The study later admits that they may consider reading your horoscope to fit the bill, but it isn’t entirely clear.
So did you catch how Barna’s inflating the statistic? It makes me seethe.
“Reading books about witchcraft.”
He’s talking about Harry Potter. Dude, aren’t we passed this? Haven’t Christians moved on? Can’t we agree about the glorious gift of sanctified imagination? How many Christians still can’t recognize the difference between fantasy wish-fulfillment and dangerous Satan worship?
Well David Kinnaman, tha author of the study resolves that question for us. It’s subtle, but he effectively condemns the imagination for a whole new generation of Christians.
“The supernatural world represents the epicenter of the spiritual struggle for their hearts and minds,†Kinnaman continued. “When teenagers settle for cheap alternatives instead of choosing intimacy with God – and relying upon His care and His power – it can lead to years, even decades, of spiritual entrapment in their lives. But with appropriate choices come spiritual rewards. After Jesus rejected Satan’s temptations, His ministry flourished. If Mosaics [Barna's catch phrase for teenagers today] reject spiritual deception and stop tinkering with contemptible imitations of God’s power, it could spell the difference between a generation fulfilling its spiritual destiny and one that turns from God during adulthood.â€
Now I understand why Christian presses shy away from fantasy.
They don’t want to “tinker with contemptible imitations of God’s power.”
If you are a fan of Lewis or Tolkein, don’t worry. They’ve been canonized. Lewis also wrote Mere Christianity, see? And Tolkein, well he was Catholic, but he helped convert Lewis so he must be okay.
But my goodness, don’t presume to tinker with that genre. Fantasy is a spiritual deception, just a few steps away from Hell itself. Certainly it could never be sold to a Christian market.
The Christian market wants the truth wrapped up in easy, literal platitudes. After all, don’t you think the Bible works best when we use it to write social survey’s and guess at society’s salvation rate?
I think I am beginning to understand my friend’s objections to Barna.
*I’m no statistician, but I have a friend who is one. He’s a high-powered consultant in the Christian publishing industry, so he has some expertise. A few months ago, I was going on about Barna’s site, and my friend stopped me.
“What do you think of Barna?” he asked. My friend is the kind of man who understands numbers and how human behavior aggregates into numbers. Needless to say, he predicts very accurate numbers.
I stopped. Um, he’s famous. Barna stirred up some interesting ideas with Revolution.
My friend thinks that mainly what Barna does. He stirs people up–with conclusions that sound flashy.
{ 4 comments }
Mark, I agree. We need far more sanctified imagination that is free to roam the world of fantasy. Even Scripture, to some extent, arguably (and I think it does) does the same. In the apocalyptic stuff from Zehariah, etc.
I am afraid also that this obsession can blind us to the real dangers of occultism, that though not common place, are nevertheless present and indulged.
Ted, thanks for the comment. After I posted this I worried that it was too, um, snarky or something.
Interesting idea to think about apocalyptic literature as a kind of fantasy. It’s a dangerous way to talk in CBA circles though. Most people misunderstand what we mean by fantasy. (I have to be careful when I’m talking about C. S. Lewis’s take on myth, too.)
As for occultism… I had many students that dabbled in the occult with disastrous results–because heavy drug use was often involved.
This is why I’m often wary of surveys–even those done by Christian groups. It’s too easy to slant the results and use them to bolster up a preconceived idea! And for the record, we do read Harry Potter, although I felt a few twinges of uncertainty at times, trying to explain to my daughter why I thought it was ok.
Thanks for your comment on my “First Lines” post. I just saw it tonight.
Laurie, thanks for the comment. I still wish I had bought that game I mentioned on your blog. Oh well.
I read Harry Potter too. I even went to see Eragon (Never got the memo that it isn’t so good.) I read Neil Gaiman, but I wouldn’t read that to my kids.
My daughter and I enjoy the Magic Tree House books–and they have all sorts of “good magic” vs. “evil magic” stuff. She knows it isn’t real.
I think fantasy is very important to some kids, as long as they know that kind of magic isn’t real. Neither are superheroes. Neither are talking animals. Neither are the technological edens we find in science fiction.
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