Posted on 04/26/2005 7:55:47 AM PDT by gopwinsin04
Ahh yes, the complainers. If you ever get a chance to pour a couple beers in an author and discuss the complainers I highly recommend it, it'll be one of the funniest conversations you ever have.
No, you are not remembering correctly. Good and evil are clearly defined. The only thing you might possibly be thinking of is Professor Snape, he's kind of a grey area. He may just be a huge jackass or he may be an evil double agent. He's not really evil, just a jerk. No one has gone from acting in what would be called an evil manner and turned out to be a on the side of right.
I wonder what he thinks of Chappelle.
Not stretching at all. Assuming you don't have a monty hall or killer GM you do learn creative problem solving in gaming, and you don't have to worry about them getting into the occult from D&D. I never said it was the only way a kid can learn that, I just said that as far as escapist behavior goes at least that type of escapism has an up side.
Well of course Clerics had to pick a patron diety, they're CLERICS. Just like in the real world, if your character wants to devote himself to a god you need to pick the god and flavor of worship, out here in reality you can't become a pastor without picking a religion and denomination. Of course unlike the real world your GM can just decide to blow off that rule and let you be a generic cleric (rhyme purely accidental, but I like it), unless you were playing in an officially sanctioned tournament all rules in D&D are optional, said so in the intro of the DM's Guide. According to the DM's guide "evil" alignment was merely self serving and didn't care about anybody else, "evil" characters didn't really have to be evil just self serving jerks, when I was GMing I always said no evil alignments because good roleplaying of it meant bad team cohesion (nobody ever trusts evil characters to share information or treasure, sharing was vitally important to survival in my campaigns, my motto was "the party that gets along lives"). Of course in the end it's all just roleplaying, what's the functional difference between playing an evil D&D character and playing the Devil in a production of Faust? Finding out how the other half lives can be instructive in why you should be glad you're not part of the other half.
And what happens to that character in the song? They started a summoning and got possessed, now their soul is destroyed and they've become the tool of Satan, a definite warning against the occult.
There's no false dichotomy at all. Yes plenty of artists can write about dark things without praising them, like Scott Harris, Ozzy Osbourne, Eric Bloom, and Ronnie James Dio. None of them praised any of the dark things they sang about (or in Harris' case made others sing about). Wrong wrong wrong, fantasy metal writers are steeped in presenting evil in an unabashed way, taking the covers off and showing its true colors. There's no relativism in fantasy metal, if you play with demons you're hosed, if you open the door to evil forces they will win, the best you can hope for in fantasy if you play with the occult is to merely lose your life.
I chose God and games and music because they are not contradictory. If God is so against fantasy metal then why did he give Dio the perfect voice for it? Dio's God given talent is in making songs about people who do stupid things with evil forces and pay the ultimate price, and to wrap that up with spooky vocal qualities that truly sell how ultimate that price is. But it was people like you that tried to force me to make a choice based on a false dichotomy they inserted, and when given the choice between enjoying the non-sinful pleasures God had placed before me and associating with people that have a knee jerk need to condemn and belittle people I walked away from Christianity until God placed in my life a non-condemning Christian who helped me understand how foolish the condemners are and what a small minority they are. Then I understood, and came back to my faith, and now fight against your kind because I know personally just how damaging you are to people's faith, everything you accuse D&D and fantasy metal and HP of being is what you are, you send people away from the faith, you send people to investigate the occult in search of some alternate way that doesn't have people that condemn others for fun.
I'm not serving two masters, I'm not on a middle path, nothing in my gaming hobbies or music serves Mammon.
And I'm telling you you were at the wrong conventions. Of course with people like you running around condemning people for the music they listen to it's easy to see why those around you would get a false impression of Christianity. I'm against the type of Christianity you represent, Christianity should be about embracing and helping and teaching, not ridiculing and blindly condemning.
if you chose to see reality in the most insulting terms then it is an insult to describe reality as you see it. No it was people like you that drove me from the faith, exactly as you're trying to do now. People creating a false conflict and telling me I need to chose, there is no conflict, and if I truly must chose then I chose to not take the path you took because it obviously leads to a frightening level of narrowmindedness and holier than thou BS.
Weird is a blanket term, depraved people are weird, weirder than most weird people but still weird.
Fandom doesn't hold the status of religion. Merely talking about two demographics of people that have perverts among them, one is fandom, one is Catholics. I do condemn the behavior of these priests, but I don't condemn all Catholics because of them, I understand the difference between the high profile exception to the group and the less news worthy norm. I haven't excused or dismissed anything, if we run into pedophiles in fandom we get rid of them and assist in the investigation, which is something no Catholic will be able to say in total honesty until Cardinal Law is sent back to America to face charges.
To find "legitimate sources" do a google search on
Ratzinger, Gabriele Kuby
Apparently, on March 7, 2003 then-Cardinal Ratzinger praised Bavarian author Gabriele Kuby's anti-Harry Potter book.
http://www.gabriele-kuby.de/resonanz.html
Kubys Warnungen folgte sogleich hoher Beistand aus Rom. Joseph Kardinal Ratzinger, Präfekt der katholischen Glaubenskongregation, verdammte die" Potter"-Geschichten als "subtile Verführungen, die unmerklich das Christentum in der Seele zersetzen, ehe es überhaupt recht wachsen" könne.
I'm not even sure it's THAT!
If Emily Snyder is the person I'm thinking of, she used to teach music to my kids at a local Catholic School before we began homeschooling! I'll have to look for this book! She lives a couple of towns over from me.
Ignatius Press has the rights to sell several of the Pope's books. They were just inundated with orders last week!
I doubt she takes "Harry Potter" very seriously.
Hmmmm...read Harry Potter or risk eternal damnation... uhm... Can I think about this?
Huhn???
The same way their parents and grandparents did. Ouija boards have been around for years, and for the most part are harmless. There are some very easily influenced teens, usually girls, who are affected by them, but they are a tiny minority. And if it wasn't the Ouija Board messing with their minds, it would be something else.
Give it a rest. There ARE no charges against Cardinal Law nor will there EVER be charges against Cardinal Law because he broke NO LAWS! Even the Attorney General of the State of Massachusetts had to admit that!!
There are laws NOW that state someone has to report to the state if there is an accusation or any evidence of abuse. At the time Geoghan and Shanley were abusing kids, there were no such laws. The Cardinal was guilty of not doing something about the situation earlier than he did, and has admitted so, but he broke no laws, nor did he ever abuse any children. Almost every one of the cases in the news took place before he ever arrived in Boston. He was left with the aftermath, and he even put policies in place in the Diocese to make sure it never happened again. No one seems to ever mention that.
Are you implying that Gabriele Kuby is lying when she says then-Card. Ratzinger endorsed her book?
Excerpt from ZENIT interview with Gabriele Kuby:
http://www.zenit.org/german/visualizza.phtml?sid=45441
Gabriele Kuby: Harry Potter – „Mein Wille geschehe“ gegen „Dein Wille geschehe“?
Interview mit der Soziologin Gabriele Kuby, die in den Potter-Büchern viele Gefahren für Kinder und Jugendliche sieht
Erfreulicherweise hat mir Kardinal Ratzinger den Rücken gestärkt. Er schrieb mir: "Es ist gut, dass Sie in Sachen Harry Potter aufklären, denn dies sind subtile Verführungen, die unmerklich und gerade dadurch tief wirken und das Christentum in der Seele zersetzen, ehe es überhaupt recht wachsen konnte."
Right that's why he left under the cover of dark and hasn't even come close to stepping foot in any country that would extradite him.
Yeah I always have lots of respect for guys that do reprehensible things then institute policies to make sure nobody else does them. Ranks Law right up there with McCain and CFR in my book.
BTW, I forgot to say in #157 that the ZENIT interview is from Nov. 30, 2003. (But Kuby says Card. Ratzinger's letter was dated Mar. 7, 2003.)
http://www.heiliggeist-seminar.de/Harry.htm
Resonanz von Joseph Kardinal Ratzinger, Präfekt der Glaubenskongregation an Frau Kuby:
"Vielen Dank für das lehrreiche Buch. Es ist gut, daß Sie in Sachen Harry Potter aufklären, denn dies sind subtile Verführungen, die unmerklich und gerade dadurch tief wirken und das Christentum in der Seele zersetzen, ehe es überhaupt recht wachsen konnte." weitere Bücher von Gabriele Kuby
Brief vom 7. März 2003
I'll repeat, Give it a rest. He was in the United States for a full year after he left Boston. He was available every time he was called for a deposition or for the Grand Jury. He fulfilled all the requirements of the State of Massachusetts in the case, and I repeat, was never charged with any crime. After being in Maryland for that time, the Pope called him to Rome to be the head of the Basilica of St. Mary Major. It is not unusual for an American Cardinal to work out of Rome. Justin Cardinal Rigali has done it, as have others. from other countries. Joseph Cardinal Ratzinger was from Germany, but has worked in Rome for years, too. There are no charges pending against Cardinal Law that would cause him to have to be be extradited from any country in the world, and he can come and go as he pleases.
If you want to hate him, go ahead, but at least you'll have the FACTS in front of you as you continue. The most reprehensible thing the Cardinal did was to follow the suggestions of the 'experts' and psychologists who told the Diocese that these priests were 'healed' of their problems and that it was ok to have them back in ministry. Of course, we now know that this is not true, but it was the 'conventional wisdom' until a few years ago. The Cardinal and many Bishops didn't do anything differently than many other institutions in this country faced with the same problem of people in authority abusing the children in their charge. It was not right, and looking back on it, the Cardinal has admitted that, but at the time, it was what was being done across the board.
In my opinion, when the priests were found to be back to their old ways, they should have been de-frocked immediately and turned over to the cops. In some cases, the parents were the ones who made the choice not to prosecute because they didn't want their children's plight to be publicized. When the children grew up they began pressing for the justice they deserved. By the way, it was Josef Cardinal Ratzinger who wrote the most recent rules making it easier now for Dioceses to de-frock abusive priests.
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