"You spin me right round baby, right round"

I will post a bit more later. We've been super busy. First, I am going to copy the "letter to the editor" that I just wrote to our local newspaper. There is a big debate going on here because the Catholic school board (the Catholic schools here are free and funded by Catholic tax dollars) - anyway - the board is "reviewing" the books of "The Golden Compass." Many of of you sent emails regarding these books and I have to warn anyone who doesn't know about these books that they are very anti-Catholic and generally anti-Christian. Not "intellectual discussion" anti-Catholic/Christian - but "introduce our kids to anti-Catholic/Christian concepts" in a fantasy book where they are influenced to think negatively of the Church and ultimately, God.

Now, all of you who have read my blog know that I am a Harry Potter fan. I also love fantasy and science fiction. I wouldn't blog about works of fiction unless I had done a lot of research into them. I am not for burning or banning books. But I do believe that parents have the responsibility to know what their kids are reading and should make the decsion as to how their media intake will affect their thinking. Some kids can watch "Finding Nemo" and not think that they are keeping their family fish prisoner. Some kids will immediately want to flush all of the fish down the toilet so that they can be "free." Parents need to decide what their own children will do with information they take in.

But I do have a pretty strong opinion about the books for personal reasons (which are probably pretty obvious). So I wrote a letter about the controversy to the Calgary Herald:

Seriously, give me a break about all of this discussion regarding whether or not children will become Atheists by reading three books or watching a movie. This is not the issue regarding "The Golden Compass" books. The issue is that they are offensive to a large religious group and that this group has the right to remove offensive materials from their schools which are payed for by the tax dollars of people belonging to this group.

How are these books/this movie offensive? Here are just two examples: The villains of the story are called the "Magisterium" which even Pullman has admitted is a direct stab at the governing body of the Catholic church. Also, every character in the story has a "best friend" which is the manifestation of each person's soul known as a "daemon." While the word "Daemon" may be defined as a "supernatural being of a nature between God and humans," it doesn't seem a small coincidence that the proudly (read some of his interviews) Atheistic Pullman is also playing with the archaic spelling of "demon." The Catholic school board should not have to explain a choice to remove books which vilify its leaders nor paints pictures of children with daemons following them around.

Nobody would chide a Jewish school for removing a book celebrating the holocaust nor a Muslim school for removing Rushdie's "Satanic Verses." Whether or not the books will affect the faith of children seems a personal issue. I mean, reading a book has never changed anyone's mind, right? It's great that there is not a long list of literature which has changed the culture of the world. Oh....wait...

Thanks for reading,