October 7, 2007
Religious leaders often involve themselves in the video game violence debate - but not usually on the side of games.So it may come as a surprise that a number of churches are capitalizing on the popularity of Halo 3 to attract youthful congregants. From the NY Times:
Across the country, hundreds of ministers and pastors desperate to reach young congregants have drawn concern and criticism through their use of an unusual recruiting tool: the immersive and violent video game Halo...
Those buying it must be 17 years old... But that has not prevented leaders at churches and youth centers across Protestant denominations, including evangelical churches that have cautioned against violent entertainment, from holding heavily attended Halo nights...
Far from being defensive, church leaders who support Halo — despite its “thou shalt kill” credo — celebrate it as a modern and sometimes singularly effective tool... But the question arises: What price to appear relevant?
There are those who disagree with the use of Halo as a recruitment tool. James Tonkowich, president of the Institute on Religion and Democracy was not supportive of the idea:
If you want to connect with young teenage boys and drag them into church, free alcohol and pornographic movies would do it. My own take is you can do better than that.
The Times checked in with Halo supporters among the religious community as well. David Drexler of the Country Bible Church in Ashby, Minnesota said:
[Using Halo is] the most effective thing we’ve done. We have to find something that these kids are interested in doing that doesn’t involve drugs or alcohol or premarital sex.
At the Colorado Community Church, youth pastor Gregg Barbour wrote in a letter to parents:
[Jesus called us to be] fishers of men. Teens are our ‘fish.' So we’ve become creative in baiting our hooks.
What You Won't Find in the NY Times: Jane Dratz advises young people on How to Share Your Faith Using Halo 3 in the Christian Post:
Let's take a look at how you can take this videogame buzz and turn it into an opportunity to talk about spiritual things with your friends...
Master Chief John 117... has been described as the man who "gave the world faith, gave humanity a future, and made mankind believe again." Does that have echoes of someone else you know?
...What role are you being called to play in the battle for your friends' souls? Are you actively engaged in efforts to 'rescue them' from the clutches of the evil one? If not, step up and use the buzz surrounding Halo 3 to introduce some God-talk into your conversations.
At his Mining Grace blog, Joe Holland writes about his use of Halo 2 to connect with kids in his youth ministry, as well as his impressions of Halo 3:
I discovered some implicit biblical themes. The enemy aliens are called The Covenant... I figured that Halo was just another Matrix knock off, a product of a Christianized culture, picking up Christian themes haphazardly like stepping in bubble gum on the pavement.
...What fascinated me [about Halo 3] was the overtly Messianic themes applied to Master Chief... Each commercial ends with the word, “Believe”. Gospel parallels anyone?
I don’t mean to say by this that Halo 3 is a Christian video game... this is yet another example of what JRR Tolkien used to call “the one story.”
Comments
I can already see another bible fight brewing and the main instigator hasnt even fired his rhetoric off yet. I mean im all for people defending their belifs but its not gonna work over the internet. You can't convince another who does not wish to belive what he is told after all.
Will the kids stay in church once halo is taken away and replaced with bible study? who knows.
Im not fond of the language they use though. Makes them sound a bit evil to be honest withrefering to teenagers as fish and how they're being creative in baiting their hooks. If the teens were really interested in faith the whole jesus malarky would have gotten them through the door in the first place.
You can see parallels in more works of fiction sure sometimes they are random but then so is life, hatign is over rated let everyone start finding things we can enjoy together, and sometimes if not at least in separate rooms.
Oh I jsut recalled I was part of a chruch based scout like group when I was young we had acouple outings one was a sleep over and we of 13-15 watched some R based action and martial arts flicks and and played on my NES with 12 games LOL.
(I am 30ish now BTW :P)
So again its not the chruch is evil its sometimes it trumps itself up to be, some staffers are so anal some are normal and care about fun and stuff,gota remember people the media hates US gamers and the chruch goers as well we both get the bad light put on us!
I think, in terms of gaming history, Jesus would probably be Mario. I would see Master Chief as Peter, given how iconic he is with the Xbox platform, but I could also see Samus, Link, and Gordon Freeman at the table. I would personally assign Judas as Kane of the Brotherhood of Nod, mostly because he is such an iconic character for a major RTS franchise and he is thoroughly a villain.
You assume all these churches did that in the first place. The number of churches that are independent and not affiliated with any specific sect of Christianity are increasing.
Few of them bother to do things like condemn harry potter as satanic, and most of them couldn't give a flying fuck about what the pope thinks.
The Chronicles of Narnia
In this book series, parallels between the lion and Jesus, not to mention the crucifiction, are inherently obvious.
But then again, if you look at a wide variety of media, from top best sellers to TV shows to movies to music, you'll find a number have religious REFERENCES scattered about in them.
In a sense, for churches to understand that moden media and it's religious references can be used to help young people understand the bible better is a step FORWARD for them. Sure some could just be throwing references around willy-nilly, like the Matrix series, but ones that make closer parallels and actually have some story elements directly influenced from the bible can be an excellent teaching tool for churches.
Now you may say that this all flying bull crap and chips, but think about this for a moment:
The SHIN MEGAMI TENSEI and it's spin off the PERSONA series are ALSO heavily influenced by religion. Just NOT Christianity. They are instead influenced by Shintoism, the traditional Japanese religion (even pre-dating Buddhism which other Japanese games also pull things from), and throw in a mixing pot of other mythical and religious creatures. Shin Megami Tensei: Nocturne, can actually teach you about the mythical Christian hierarchy of angels through the fact that you have to FIGHT them in a world gone mad, and every religion and myth under the sun is battling for control.
In my eye, this would be no different from churches in the 70's using "Jesus Christ: Superstar" to reach out to new churchgoers. Even an episode of All in the Family when Archie Bunker is put in a holding cell with a bunch of hippies, where one of them is playing a tape cassette player with the "Jesus Christ: Superstar" soundtrack on it could be used.
I guess it boils down to this:
If churches treat the religious references in games as a book club would treat a book's story, to discuss the meaning and significance of the characters and the story, then it's a good thing. That can inform, educate, and get people interested in the religion.
On the flipside, using the "HEY KIDS! WE GOT TEH HALOZ!" method, then locking the doors and going, "Now to talk about Jesus!", would be the WRONG way.
Lastly, if they want people under 17, I think getting a permission slip would be the final cherry on top to make sure it's all good and reasonable.
And that's my two cents.
~Otaku-Man
Be that as is may, it only reinforces my point, in that most religions have fallen prey to the same illogical fallacies as portrayed by the Covenant- killing those who don't believe simply because they don't.
More and more kids are starting to wake up and realize the lie that is Christian superstition. This is why we see ministries utilizing highly secular forms of entertainment -- even when the entertainment contradicts revelation -- to keep children in the Church. Indoctrinating a child in Christian lies a young age is vital: once the mind is sharp and free of parental authority, wise individuals (who were not indoctrinated) will seek the truth. Christianity cannot stand by the merit of its own claims; so, I'm not surprised to see Churches doing everything they can to violate the mental agency of children while they are still young.
@Coravin
You were a smart kidd. That's great. But most children can hardly name a single gospel, or understand a full episode of spongebob. Even then, you're asking a child to abstract from a level of philosophical inquiry that is among the most challenging, difficult, and theoretical in all knowledge. And, on top of this, the child is usually guided under the presumption that all other religions are false and under the threat of eternal torture.
And, yes, Christ is modeled off a vidictive bronze age war god (I will NOT stop using this perfectly descrptive term). I suggest you re-read the book of Mark; Christ does not object the OT, his validity is derived from such superstition.
Supported by real life? Lol, okay. Sure! People see individuals walk on water, rise from the dead, commune with burning bushes, construct arks large enough to hold 23 billion species, and evoke the other insane supernatural claims of superstition every single day. Again, Christians seem to be so deluded in their indocrination that they are simply devoid of fact, inquiry, and reason.
As a literay work, the tomb of superstition is rife with contradictions, messages of hate, and is clearly the work of dozens, completely different, authors. As such, your religion does not stand up to unbias critcism, amounting to little more than a pile of functionless superstition. The text is hardly worth consideration as a work of fiction. Assuming it contain any fraction of the truth is absolutely insane.
Again, Christians are sometimes so deluded in their religion that they see a critique of their religion as a critique on themselves. I am not saying that Christians are insane, genocidal, child killers. I AM saying -- and using their own religious texts -- to say that their "God" is an insane, genocidal, child killer.
Ha ha, you are funny. Religion's base principle is free will. We choose to believe, you don't. We're okay with you not believing, but you aren't okay with us believing. S'okay. Be cool, man. You are free to believe what you want.
See, our God even has you covered there... He already gave you free will whether you want it or not.
Too funny.
well at least it's fun.
I guess MC has only avoided the Gary Stu tag for so long really.
Christians not condemning video games like the biggoted sheep you claim they are. Even the violent ones.
Like communion perhaps?
Now, see, not ALL Christians are like Jack Thompson, I promise! ;p
Also, we should try and guess at what new things he will accuse God of being this time, claiming that the Bible backs it up.
I'm going for 'Hooker', 'Racist' and 'rapist'.
The bait comment was interesting.
well, he did always tell stories that the people could relate to, so in a way he did.
I think it is more about the images. Take Spider-Man 2. When he stops the train from crashing into the river, he is carried on his back, in the position of Christ on the cross back inside. Basic images like this are used all the time. Now this doesn't mean that Master Chief is the second coming of Christ (My god I'm laughing as I write this) but it is kind of like the saying. "There are only 7 different types of stories to tell and every story since those 7 has been a rip off of those originals."
Not that I necessarily believe that, but still the thought of a pastor saying "Master Chief died for your sins." is pretty amusing.
Halo 3 is meant to be a fun multiplayer. It has its competitive moments, but every game with a multiplayer does. The church sees fun and a good way to connect, so why not?
It's like those stories where you hear older men trying to lure kids with candy. Same effect but an extremely much better outcome for everyone.
I didn't see this coming.
And forgive me for being ignorent but who's Pandralisk?
I guess that would have been popular culture of the day.
I guess my point was, that Jesus never advertised story telling sessions as a disguise to share a gospel message.
In the end, I guess anything can be used for whatever you want to use it for.
and the parables of Jesus (just like the fables of Aesop, etc etc) were storytelling sessions disguising a message. whether you believe in the tale itself isn't the issue, it's getting the moral that matters.
He's the Jack Thompson of religion here. He usually can't go a post without bashing Christianity and thinking up new words to bash god with. I think it started with 'Bronze-age Wargod' and grew from there.
JC is obviously 3 days.
;)
Pandralisk is one of the commentators on the iste, he is respected by . . . absolutely no one. He is very annoying and he goes on and on about Chrisitianity worships a bronze age God and is full of hate mongerers, freaks and is the source of all the worlds problems. Basically he is the type of person that gives atheists a bad name. Oh and he never listens to reason but keeps repeating the same stuff over and over.
Anyway as long as these guys don't get upset if they don't get as many converts as they thought then this is fine.
"REPENT SINNERS!!! MASTER CHIEF IS THE SECOND COMING OF CHRIST!!! FOR HE WIELDS A FLAMING ENERGY SWORD OF BLUE AND RIDES THE WARTHOG OF DEATH!!! REPENT YOUR n00b WAYS!!!
I'm having way to much fun with this. I'm probably going to hell now.
Not everything is an allegory to the Bible. Not even going to mention how pathetic the story of Halo 3 was, though it was presented amazingly.
I don't have much problem with a 16-17 year old playing Halo3 and I don't even have a problem with the Church or the military exploiting its popularity for their own agendas, but I DO have a problem in that it's outrageously hypocritical of those who speak out against this behavior and then don't when it's their 'buddies' doing it.
the 1st amendment is in grave danger, people!
When I was a teenager I would go to my church's CCD/bible classes and later the Confirmation classes for two reasons; 1. My parents made me : ) and 2. The ultimate lure for a teenage boy: Girls. I'll be damned if there weren't always a dozen hot catholic school girls at those things. Weekend retreat to a summer camp in the woods = makeout sessions guaranteed! Oh yeah there was something about God in there too I believe.
Cheers