WRITTEN, PRODUCED AND DIRECTED BY Stanley Nelson Based in part on the book: Freedom Riders: 1961 and the Struggle for Racial Justice By Raymond Arsenault. Engaging, entertaining, empowering superhero adventure. Read Common Sense Media's Wonder Woman review, age rating, and parents guide. Offers news, comment and features about the British arts scene with sections on books, films, music, theatre, art and architecture. Requires free registration. 1 Yes, Minister. 1.1 Series One (1980) 1.1.1 Episode One: Open Government; 1.1.2 Episode Two: The Official Visit; 1.1.3 Episode Three: The Economy Drive; 1.1.4. This is the song that Miranda and Auggie used to love to sing together when Auggie was little. It's also the opening part of Via's chapter because the theme of the.

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Is "The Shack" Heresy? Part 1“Before you are tempted to burn us at the stake, will you at least do me the favor of allowing me to stand in front of the firing squad and answer any questions that they might have.”  That’s what I said to one of the head executives of  Lifeway Christian Bookstores when he called to say that “he” might be in need of a job. In short order, we had become wonderful friends, but in the latest brouhaha, his head was on the chopping block as well.

Over a month or so prior, he called one afternoon to introduce himself and congratulate us on our success with The Shack. Sales had begun to snowball, and it seemed like over night, everyone was talking about The Shack. Our little book that had been turned down by 2. So much so, “they” were calling us. After the brief exchange of pleasantries, here came the opportunity: “We’d like to make The Shack our Lifeway presents ‘Book of the Month’.”  Sounded great to me, so I said: “Fantastic, you go right ahead.”  That’s when I was informed, “That’s not exactly how this works…” Supposedly this honor is something that publishers normally pay thousands of dollars to enjoy as the bookstore chain mounts a big, front of store, promotional campaign to drive sales.

I said, “That’s great, but you called me. If that’s something Lifeway would like to do, I’m happy to sell you some books.”   That wasn’t the kind of response they were used to. But hey, when you don’t know what the rules are, it’s not like you can be guilty of intentionally trying to break them. Just seemed goofy that if it was their idea, why did I have to pay for it.

Right?)After a couple more calls, and I wouldn’t budge—I guess they liked the book enough on its own, to go through with their desire. They made The Shack their celebrated “Lifeway Presents ‘Book of the Month’.”  How cool is that! It was UNTIL…Lifeway proudly championed The Shack throughout their bookstore chain. Sales continued to soar, but as with all things that garner a measure of success, it soon attracts its own set of detractors as well. Little did we suspect that we would become the center of a raging controversy taken before the Southern Baptist National Convention. Accusations of “heresy” surfaced; suspicions of deception and error were being whispered abroad.

When such things were voiced by one of their respected seminary presidents and complaints made by other prominent pastors, orders were handed down and The Shack was pulled from their shelves. Though it was by Lifeway’s own initiative to make us their “Book of the Month,” the promotional campaign was abruptly ended. The charges of potential heresy would be discussed and ruled upon at the national convention. It didn’t take long for the rumor mill to kick into full gear, and my phone lit up. At first, I couldn’t believe any of it could possibly be true. But, when I got a call from the Lifeway — sure enough, it was for real!

It came as a total shock to him as well, along with the very unsettling realization that he could well be out of a job. Afterall, this was all his idea—to put such contraband on full display at the front of the store, nationwide! I thought he was kidding—he wasn’t. Really?  This is a work of fiction.

It’s a novel for goodness sake. Yes, it’s about God, about how God can meet us in the middle of the most horrible tragedy, and love us to a place of healing—able to bring forth good even out of the most despicable evil. For two weeks, they met, discussed, debated, scrutinized. The one request that I voiced was that before they concluded their deliberations that I be allowed to speak on our behalf, to answer any questions or accusations they might have, and have a chance to explain and/or defend, if necessary, what we had written. I knew The Shack was edgy and provocative—that was on purpose. But we were profoundly careful about what was said and what words, be it dialogue or questions, were put in whose mouth.

As a fully trained seminarian, a passionate junior theologian in my own right, I was well aware how close to edge on some subjects we were traveling. But as a committed, Bible- believing Christian who absolutely cares about the nature and character of God—I also know exactly what we were trying to reveal and why. Asking provocative questions that we know would cause people to think and force them to go search out the answers for themselves, we knew would go much farther than would our doctrinal treatises or sermonizing at them. For nearly sixteen months, undergoing four major rewrites, we chiseled and hammered on this boulder of a story, and fashioned with God’s incredible help, what we thought was an endearing story whose primary mission was to unveil God’s incredible heart of love—the heart of the One, each one of us had come to know in our darkest moments of pain and adversity, the God who will never abandon us. But, this wasn’t a “PR” effort. None of us had the patience for a religious sales pitch. We wanted to wrestle with real pain, the real conundrums of life for which there are no easy answers.

And having all suffered the trite, ridiculous, albeit perhaps well- intentioned empty platitudes others trafficked in, we longed to steer clear of seeking to tie the messy parts of life off with a fake, perfect, little bow. That’s not the world we live in. There are no easy answers to deep pain and suffering. There is no magic wand or some miraculous “formula” to employ. Life takes a bit of time and a lot of relationship.

And if you are going to love deeply, you are going to be hurt badly – but it’s worth it! That’s the kind of story we could crawl inside and feel at home within. Something honest. Something messy.  But real, and yearning for truth. Do we have all the answers? Nope – not even close!

Do we know pain and hurt? Yep! – who doesn’t? Have we met God … in spite of all that? In the midst of all that? Yep, and that’s where we each found the strength and the desire to get back up, flap our wings, and give it another shot at learning how to live as someone deeply loved by an incredible God! It isn’t so much our trying to trust, as it is our being won to a place of trust by learning just how much God loves us.

Trust is the fruit of a relationship wherein you know that you are loved. Something most people don’t know very well. In a world steeped in pain and hurt, that so often feels rejected and abandoned, knowing that it doesn’t measure up very well to the impossible standards of perfection that only Pharisees strive to master—we figured it might be helpful to dethrone the notions of that “mean ol’ Angry God” that so many people have been pickled in. That seems to be the only character of God so many have known—the awful terrifying Judge ready to hurl lightning bolts at them.

God is a Righteous Judge! There are not “many” ways to heaven—only one, and that’s found in the finished work of Jesus Christ on the cross. Watch Awaken The Shadowman Online. But when all the world can see, looking through the knothole of their pain, is a very disfigured charicature of God, how might we help clear away some of the dirt from off the lens, and enable people to catch a glimpse of the God who really is?

A God, “the” God, who is knowable, but not fully able to be grasped by any of us. Could we pose the “possibility”—not impose the demand or the agenda to believe—just pose the possibility:  “what if there was a God who really does love you?”  What if … ? Could we wrap all that up in an engaging story, a mystery, thriller of sorts, that asks the questions of life that we all struggle with and wonder about? And offer that as a gift for others to enjoy? Wrap it up in a story that they could keep at a distance if they needed to, or be able to crawl into as close as they might want, if they dared—one that might just allow them to feel something before they were asked to “believe it.”  Could we give people a “taste and see” approach to the things of God, and sidestep the often contentious argued about things of dogma or doctrine, that seem to be best left to the so- called expert swordsmen of religion?

Harry Potter, Catholics and Our Children“Always the innocent are the first victims . So it has been for ages past, so it is now.”Ronan (Yr 1, 2. Father Jim Costigan, CPMI love Harry. I admire him for his courage, for his fight against evil, and for his love of and loyalty to his family and friends. I love Hermione and I respect her scholarly industry and her concern to play (and fight) by the rules.

Even Ron – who annoys me most of the time with his many little acts of meanness and cheapness – I love when he generously sacrifices himself at clutch moments, as he did on that giant chessboard (Yr 1, 2. I love Dumbledore for protecting young Harry, for his wisdom and magnanimity, his patience and tolerance.

I love Severus for the hidden love and goodness in him that no one (except Dumbledore) has any inkling of. I love Remus and Tonks, Mc. Gonagall and Moody. I especially love Luna and Neville and Molly Weasley. And so, naturally, I love Joanne Kathleen Rowling for her masterful telling of a story that thrills me and scares me, that makes me laugh and makes me cry; I love her for describing villains I wish I could stab and heroes I wish I could hug. And therein lurks the trouble. It’s proverbial : the best lies have the most truth; the most seductive evil appears as beautiful good.

And if intelligent Christian parents who are careful about what they allow their children to read and who know, however dimly, that magic means sorcery – a grave evil, a violation of the First Commandment, a direct offense against God Himself – if these parents are not on their guard with the Harry Potter stories, then there are reasons they’re in the dark. What reasons? Well, perhaps we enjoy the novels ourselves, we get caught up in the adventure, we come to love Harry and his friends, and our critical faculty gets lulled to sleep. Or, confronted with the unprecedented success of the series, their garnering of nearly every literary laurel for children’s books, their endorsement by educators, publishers, critics, media stars, clergymen – that smiling mass of experts – we may doubt that our fears can be right, our objections valid; we wonder if we are not overreacting.“Lighten up,” we’re told. It’s just fantasy, make- believe, like Grimm’s Fairy Tales. You let your kids read Tolkien and Lewis, right?

Where’s the harm?”Here’s the harm. Our heroes are sorcerers. The characters we admire spend seven years studying, and a lifetime becoming proficient in, something that is intrinsically and gravely evil – sorcery. No room for doubt here. Magic is good, Dark Magic bad. This is a false dichotomy.

In the real world, in God’s Eyes, all sorcery, the manipulation of preternatural powers – which means, yes, demons – is dark, is evil. White magic/black magic opposition is propaganda sold us by the occultists themselves. The end justifies the means.

This should be a bright red flag for American Christians. As we contracept for the good of our marriages and kill babies and old people for wonderful long- range goals, so Harry, Ron, and Hermione lie, cheat, steal, and harm others so that someday Voldemort will be defeated. Muggles are pathetic and/or despicable fools. Perfectly normal,” “boring,” “law- abiding,” “square owners” of “square houses” —Muggles (non- magical people), as exemplified by the narrow- minded, hideous Dursleys and the timid, inept Prime Minister, are nuisances or burdens to Harry and company, pawns or targets to Voldemort. As a Christian is by definition a Muggle, the message to our children is : “Magic is fun, hip, exciting, and powerful; your old religion is dull, dumb, dorky, and dead.” Break the rules and win; disobey and be rewarded.

Instead of being expelled from Hogwarts for disobeying Madam Hooch’s order not to fly on his broom, Harry is made Seeker for the Gryffindor Quidditch team. This sets a pattern for the whole series – repeated reinforcement of the principle The end justifies the means. Our heroes constantly gain victories, and even the approbation of authority, by bending rules and breaking laws.“Babies” may be chopped up and stewed – or just left to suffer. Check the treatment a Mandrake (a magical plant described as “a small, muddy, extremely ugly baby . Professor Sprout’s herbology class (Yr 2, 9.

Harry, safe and secure in the limbo of King’s Cross, responds first with a desire to comfort, then with revulsion, then, finally, with cold indifference to the sufferings of (what is apparently all that is left of Voldemort after the final duel) “ . Yr 7, ch 3. 5).” This is horrific stuff, even in the Culture of Death. Especially in the Culture of Death. How about : Harry sites link to Satanism sites on the Net? Is that scary enough? There’s more. I haven’t gotten into the vulgar language, the gross conversations, and the sexual innuendo; there are the erotically suggestive scenes (Myrtle visiting Harry in the bath); there is the total absence of God (except as a name in casual oaths); there’s the approval of euthanasia (Snape dispatching the ailing Dumbledore); there’s the brutality of magical pranks – and this by the good guys; there, in superabundance, are sick jokes about death and torture; there’s the scatological humor – toilets and bathrooms feature as the locales of a tediously disproportionate share of the action; there’s the blending of solid ethical principles with amoral sophistries; there is, throughout the entire saga, the constant utilitarian rationalization for immoral acts – and that out of the mouths not just of Deatheaters and quislings but of Mc. Gonagall and Dumbledore; there is for these children the relatively easy access to “restricted books” – volumes in the Hogwarts Library with detailed instructions on how to conjure murder, mayhem, and worse through “forbidden” curses; Harry’s world is an environment of pervasive child abuse, from careless negligence to sadistic torture, and beyond.

There’s more. And then there’s more yet. But isn’t this already more than enough for us to say, “I do not want my child reading Harry Potter.” Yeah, Harry’s fun. Yeah, Harry’s unwholesome. I do love Joanne Kathleen. But her books are pernicious.

I have no reason to suspect her of malice. Well, her outing of Dumbledore was particularly creepy.) But, malicious or not, her stories are corrupting children. The Harry Potter novels are presented to us as an epic tale of the triumph of good over evil. Against impossible odds, by prodigious labors and self- sacrifice, the courageous young wizard conquers the evil dark lord.

What actually happens is the defeat of blatant, ugly, darker- than- black evil by subtle, attractive, snow- white- looking evil. This is the snare : grave and intolerable evil, sorcery, is at the core of the entire saga. Evil and error are in the hearts, not just of Voldemort, Bellatrix, and Grayback, but also, however unwittingly, of Dumbledore, Molly, and Harry.

Joanne Kathleen herself may be an innocent (because of invincible ignorance), but the worldview in her works is hardcore neopagan and exuberantly, aggressively Wiccan – and is therefore, whether she intends it or not, anti- Christian. It’s not just the fun – it’s the good, the virtue in Rowling and in her heroes, shining out and obscuring all that evil and error underneath, that moves our children to gobble down this fare with such gusto and delight. Unhappily, they swallow the poison too.______________So, what are you thinking? Do you agree or disagree? What is your stance on Harry Potter? Why. Be sure to leave a comment below. P. S. – Would you do Courageous Priest a favor and share this info with your friends on Facebook, Twitter or Email right now?

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