Harry Potter, you see, is the wrong kind of magician

Competition indeed (as if psychology wasn't enough). It's terrible if some "chosen ones" use violence even for a good end. He should wait for someone Qualified (no "chosen ones" here) to ban demons from epileptic victims or burn healers as witches.

"...the intellectuals know how to control the dark powers..." I guess "dark powers" here describes all the writer fails to understand. Also, comparing wizards to "intellectuals" shows the level of ignorance involved. Some vandal sprayed the following line on the fence of my neighbourhood's church: "The church needs the deepest darkness to be a lighthouse in". So, if others start explaining the darkness away, even in HP fiction, it's really bad business.

I think the author is a victim of his own unspoken assumptions.
The church believes that "magic" in itself is evil
because the power must be lend by an evil being;
God does not approve magic. So mages are
automatically equalled with conjurers, a wizard
which sacrifices something for the devil to fulfil
his heinous deeds. A normal human who can "learn"
magic by Dark Arts.

The concept of an independent supernatural force is
totally foreign for the church. In Potters world
Magic cannot be learned by everyone, it is ingrained
since birth. No seduction possible.
What we have learned is the shortsightedness and
the prejudices of the church.

-----------------------------------------------
"But the main characters of the great fables never become magicians, and the seductive power of magic has always had grave and destructive consequences: the stories of Tolkien and Lewis describe the rejection of magic and power, not of a certain magic and a certain power, but of power and magic as such."
------------------------------------------------

Uh yeah, so why Gandalf and the Elves are working
on the good side and why did Gandalf return after
the Balrog fight and saves the day if J.R.R Tolkien
rejects "magic" as such ?
And what was Frodo using in Shelob's lair ? Let me
think....wasn't it a phiole with trapped light ?
Something *magic* ?!
(In fact, JRR isn't telling anything Christian in
LOTR. It's plain and simple mythological.)

-------------------------------------------
In Rowling's stories "we are told that, at the end, some things are not bad in themselves, if used for a good purpose: violence becomes good, if in the right hands and [used by] the right people, and maybe in the right dose."
---------------------------------------

I'll compare that to the several hundred Orcs who have
been slained by Aragorn, Gimli and Legolas. I have only
seen the movie "LWW" based on Lewis and I can say that
there is pretty much violence on the good side in
the film.

The problem this Catholic author has with Harry Potter is not a heresy, but competition.

I am currently reading Keith Thomas� Religion and the Decline of Magic (a great work of scholarship and superbly written) and he documents the fact that the Puritans were opposed to astrology in the 17th century not because they thought that it was bogus but because they saw it as competition. They regarded themselves as having a monopoly on revealed truth and frowned on the astrologers� claims of access to similar knowledge. Interestingly they also regarded astrology as being akin to what they regarded as the magical mumbo-jumbo of the Catholic Church.

Thony C.:
------------
I am currently reading Keith Thomas� Religion and the Decline of Magic (a great work of scholarship and superbly written) and he documents the fact that the Puritans were opposed to astrology in the 17th century not because they thought that it was bogus but because they saw it as competition.
-------------

Now that's interesting. Does the author mentions other instances when Christians confronted the use of "magic"
because it was seen as competition ?

...the violent manipulation of things and people thanks to the knowledge of the occult, an advantage of a select few...

Words that would make Pastor Ray ("We've been attacked by the intelligent, educated segment of the culture") Mummert proud.

The article reflects the complexity of Catholicism's evolving compromise with the normal paganism of the laity. Officially the enemy of superstition, the Church has harbored for centuries a barely disguised polytheism in the form of the cult of the saints. The Protestants have been much more hardassed about this sort of thing, but there is a limit to how far you can succeed in suppressing the Will to Believe. What gets expelled through the front door with a pitchfork climbs back in through the window as witnessed in our time by the endless proliferation of alternative therapies, TV gurus, spiritual interpretations of quantum mechanics, astrologers, conspiracy theories, alien abduction tales, apocalyptic fantasies, and all the rest. The enormous popularity of Harry Potter is a form of the same phenomenon. Most of us think it's harmless. To the church, it's unlicensed competition.

John. Just out of interest do you consider yourself agnostic and/or atheist?

With respect to which claims? One is atheist relative to a particular claim. I am a Zeus atheist, for example. I am a biblical literalist deity atheist. But overall, I am an agnostic.

TSK:

The European intellectual milieu in the period between 1400 and about 1650 was dominated by an occupation with Astrologia or celestial influence that is the theory of microcosmos/macrocosmos or as above so below. This translates into three principle areas of activity astrology, alchemy and natural magic and although many church members up to and including various Popes were involved in these activities they were a constant theological problem for the church. A central point in Christian theology is the wonders or miracles, these are a sign or proof of God's ability to set the laws of nature out of craft. If magic works then it is possible for others without the assistance of God to defy the laws of nature and that is naturally for the church a no no they having the exclusive rights on such things! Either natural magic is direct competition for the church or it is not natural magic but rather demonic magic. The supporters of celestial influence tried to solve the problem by proving that celestial influence does not conflict with the laws of nature but is itself a science. These efforts to provide a scientific basis for Astrologia were in fact the major driving force behind the evolution of the "new" astronomy in this period as well as providing the empirical foundations for the science of meteorology. Within this period all forms of magic, divination etc. were very definitely considered as competition by the established church.

I think an unsophisticated reading of Tolkien might lead to this. What Tolkien was, in fact, against, was the use of power (whether "magical" or otherwise) to dominate other beings. Aragorn, one of the major heroes, comes from a lineage that had not only long-lives, but a good deal of power in their own right (so much so that Sauron simply assumed that Aragorn would use the Ring as a means of domination).

What, I suspect, makes so many Christians willing to accept Tolkien was the fact that he was a staunch, faithful Catholic, and that in many respects his mythical creation was very Catholic, although its roots are just as much in the pre-Christian Germanic religion; the gods become angels with God, or as He is called in the mythology, Eru, as the big banana.

While there certainly is the taint of Catholic authoritarianism in Tolkien's mythos, one of the core message of the Lord of the Rings, at least, is that people have the right to choose their own destinies, and that the mighty should not, whether out of greed or some sort of enlightened sense of duty, attempt to dominate lesser peoples.

I like both authors. I think Tolkien had a certain majesty to his work that is truly unparalleled. At the same time, I think Harry Potter sends a message of being independent, questioning authority and having the courage to do the right thing. The wizard world aspect is more the background than the central theme of the story, at least the way I read it.

And, quite frankly, anything that kids away from the TV and the computer and gets them reading a living, breathing book is a good thing to me.

I'm going to stop visiting this site, not because I'm particularly offended, but because I thought that its author was a bit more critically minded and balanced in his views.

See http://jimmyakin.typepad.com/defensor_fidei/2008/01/harry-potter-wr.html and http://www.catholicnews.com/data/stories/cns/0800250.htm for an alternative view of the CNA article.

I had written a series of responses to the misrepresentations of not only Roman Catholicism but of Gnosticism but I've deleted them as I'm not sure that it would do any good. I do not believe in a god or gods, but I do believe in fairly and charitably representing the views of others, something you seem unwilling to do. I know it's 'just a blog' and I'm probably being unduly harsh in my response, it's just that I'm a little disappointed that the blog I thought I'd discovered is in reality not too different from the ones I try to avoid.

Instead of relying on the authorities to employ their magic spells in the sacraments, Harry uses his own magic spells.

Hm... did Harry ever actually invent any spells of his own? He does rely on the authority of whoever wrote them. But, at least the kids take time to test the spells and see what works, which is an improvement over popish magic...

Tysen, I can only respond to what I see. I didn't see, nor did I find any easy way to, the original material. So I responded to the claims made in the link. And this is "just a blog" so you are free to agree or disagree with me. Many people do disagree with me. And you know what? I cope.

Windy: the problem is that Harry's using his own power. That's a Protestant heresy, right?

Tysen,

Kardinal Ratzinger was well-known here in Germany for being extremely conservative a long time. It is naturally that the members Catholic church is more or less divided in their opinion, e.g. Eugen Drewermann, a Catholic priest, is a well-known critic of the Catholic Church and especially of Ratzinger.
But John has clearly mentioned "the author and those Catholics who dislike Pottery". And worse, the Popes position is unanimous - Gabriele Kuby wrote the book "Harry Potter - gut oder böse (good or evil)" and states:

http://www.gabriele-kuby.de/harry_potter.html#stellungnahme
(under "Beschreibung")

Harry Potter - a global long time project - demolishes the ability to discern between good and evil. He breaks down the inhibition threshold to magic - in the reader and in society. You will find here a precise analysis how that will happen. This book provides food of thought for all people who don't want to be manipulated by a mass hysteria and who want to share responsibility for the next generation - for parents, teachers and educators.

Kardinal Ratzinger wrote in the letter below:

Dear, good Mrs. Kuby,

Many thanks for your friendly letter from the 20. February
and for the instructive book you have attached. It is good that you elucidate in questions of Harry Potter because these are subtile seductions affecting imperceptibly and therefore very deep. These disintegrate Christianity in the soul before it was able to grow rightly at all.

I suppose that you write directly to Mr. Peter Fletwood and send him your book.

With kind regards and blessings,

Yours,
Kardinal Ratzinger

Addition:
Ratzingers response does not refer to Kubys translation above; I translated it to show Kuby's point of view. One part of the actual letter Kuby wrote and which Ratzinger answered is:

"That there is confusion about Harry Potter in the Church and that these books can be found in most pastor libraries is worse enough because they depict curses, perverse magic practices and a satanic blood ritual which is portrayed on thirty pages as normal course of life. But that it can claimed: "The Vatican gives green light for Harry Potter",
is staggering.

Windy: the problem is that Harry's using his own power. That's a Protestant heresy, right?

IANAT(=theologian), but I don't get the impression that Catholicism is particularly strict about limiting magical powers to members of the church hierarchy. What about the saints? Canonize St. Harry and the church has an easy answer as to where his power is coming from, right? ;)

Hi Thony,

thanks for your information. I didn't know that the renewed
interest in astrology did in fact helped to create and
expand astronomical knowledge.
As you mentioned alchemy I have found an old book from Allison Coudert "Alchemy: the Philosopher's stone". It is
an interesting read because it gives an insight into the metaphysics on which the old knowledge bases.
Concerning christianity, Rosicrucianism tried a synthesis between alchemy and christianity and was even a leading group of enlightenment during the 17th century.