Posted on 04/02/2002 10:21:37 AM PST by Exigence
Sunday Times of London
March 31, 2002
Pope gives blessing to a patron saint of Harry Potters
BLESS you, Harry Potter. Thanks to Pope John Paul II, Harry will soon have a patron saint to turn to when spells threaten to go horribly wrong, writes John Follain.
The Pope is planning to name Saint Don Bosco, a 19th-century Italian priest with a passion for magic, as the patron saint of conjurers, magicians and wizards.
The idea is the brainchild of Father Silvio Mantelli, a bespectacled priest and magician who boasts the stage name Mago Sales and has devoured all of J K Rowling’s Harry Potter books. He likes to celebrate mass wearing a clown’s plastic red nose.
During a papal audience in January, Mantelli gave the Pope a magic wand from India. “I asked whether he would be willing to name a patron saint for magicians and wizards and I suggested Don Bosco. The Pope told me this would be a way of spreading peace and wonder in the world,” Mantelli said.
A month later the Vatican wrote to him confirming that the Pope had given his seal of approval.
Don Bosco was born near Turin in 1815. As a child he watched visiting performers in his village piazza and developed an interest in magic from them. His repertoire included making rabbits disappear and finding coins in a loaf of bread.
Not all Catholic officials are convinced of the benefits of magic. Last December Father Gabriele Amorth, the church’s best-known exorcist, said Harry Potter was inspired by the devil.
Mantelli has few doubts that the saint would watch over the fortunes of the young wizard. “Harry is a force for good, there’s no satanism in there at all,” he said. “The books inspire me, although Potter’s is a world of fantasy. I have to use a trick or two in my line of work, but I can’t perform miracles.”
Why would this debunk it? Harry Potter is not satanic, or "voodoo," to use your terms. So, equating the fiction to "stage illusionists" is entirely appropriate.
I agree 100%. You would think he would have been smart enough to figure out what kind of a controversy this would create... no matter how good the intentions. His timing is waaaaay off!!
A cached copy of the story from EWTN (via Zenit)
I can't find anything substantiating Bosco's actually becoming patron saint of magicians "(excluding occultists)".
With all due respect to this priest by virtue of his ordination, saluting the uniform, not the man, and all of that ... reading this makes me want to slap him soundly so his cheeks would be the same color as his fake nose.
Forgive me for my lack of Christian charity, if that's truly what it is. God help us.
He has no notion of sacerdotal dignity or the necessity for the clergy to avoid even the appearance of impropriety.
Ah, but many Christian illusionists have fine ministries. As do Christian karate experts, etc., etc., etc.
Surely you are not restricting the expression of religion to staid and traditional approaches? There's a reason why many churches with contemporary music services are growing and finding they appeal to a younger audience who wants to do more with their faith than just take it to church on Sunday.
Why couldn't have the Fathers of Vatican II lived by their own document Sacrosanctum Concilium? Why couldn't they follow their own advice?
I used the wrong word "debunk" ...I had another around here somewhere, but I've misplaced it.
kidd: Your welcome... (I hope "welcome" is the right word this time....I've misplaced my "Thank you" as well... course that's probably an illusion on my part.) :o)
I don't know what denomination (if any) you belong to - but among Catholics attendance at Mass has declined more than 40% since "staid and traditional" liturgies were abandoned.
The most vibrant and fastest-growing Catholic communities in the US are the ones which have returned to dignified, solemn liturgy and the use of Latin.
If young people need contemporary music more than they need the Sacraments, they've already made their choice of which master they will serve.
Your Scriptural citation gives a more realistic perspective.
Agreed. And he has no sense of the ridicule he heaps upon all the many fine, dillegent and devoted Priests and Catholics through his "clown-act."
That's fine by me. My problem is with a priest of God offering the unbloody re-presentation of the Sacrifice of Calvary while wearing a clown's nose. It's a profanation and a blasphemy. What he wears on his nose outside of the sanctuary is his business.
Violence solves nothing. Pray for his peaceful death. Soon.
Not yet. Someday, though, when I have that power...
There's a reason why many churches with contemporary music services are growing and finding they appeal to a younger audience...
Yes -- because many kids (and people today in general) are shallow, superficial, and entertainment-oriented to the point where they cannot comprehend true worship. In other words, they find real worship to be boring.
Unfortunately, those who go to church seeking entertainment, emotional experiences, and fun are fooling themselves. Worship has nothing to do with entertainment, fun, or good vibrations. Worship consists of abandoning ourselves and our needs, feelings, and wants and offering ourselves up for total communion with Christ. Comparing the joy that comes from true liturgical worship to the "fun", entertaining Rock-and-Roll Jesus Show down at Rev. Krayzee M. Pheelgood's PrayzeChyrch Xtreem on the freeway is like comparing the joy of married love to the cheap thrill of a quickie one-night stand. Is a one-night stand with Jesus really what people need?
Screw the "younger audience" -- and the "older audience", too. Any church that has an "audience" isn't a church at all -- it's an entertainment venue, not a house of worship. A true church has a congregation of believers eager to commune with God, not an audience of spectators hungry for the latest sounds.
If people want entertainment, let them go to a nightclub. Staid and traditional approaches to worship are the only true approaches.
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