Don't Take Your Kids to see Golden Compass

On the recent e-letter sent out by Plugged In Online, the following words were quoted by the creator of the fantasy series His Dark Materials, Philip Pullman:

QUOTE: "Atheism suggests a degree of certainty that I'm not quite willing to accede. I suppose, technically, you'd have to put me down as an agnostic. But if there is a God, and he is as the Christians describe him, then he deserves to be put down and rebelled against.

As you look back over the history of the Christian church, it's a record of terrible infamy and cruelty and persecution and tyranny. How they have the bloody nerve to go on Thought for the Day and tell us all to be good when, given the slightest chance, they'd be hanging the rest of us and flogging the homosexuals and persecuting the witches." —Philip Pullman, author of the fantasy series His Dark Materials (the first installment of which, The Golden Compass, hits the big screen on Dec. 7).

On his writing desk, Pullman has a note he wrote that says, "So: There is a God, but he is a liar and he's mortal," a sentence which does an excellent job of summarizing the spiritual message of his series. Pullman has not been reticent about whom he's targeting with that message: kids. "I wanted to reach everyone," he said, "and the best way I could do that was to write for children." [telegraph.co.uk, 1/29/02]

QUOTE: "'My books are about killing God.' So said Philip Pullman, author of The Golden Compass, the movie version of which is soon to be released.

One expects that religious parents will keep their children away from the film. 'But why?' the question arises from liberals. 'What are you afraid of?' My children losing God, especially before they have a firm hold on Him, that's what. At some point they will question the existence of God. I did. It's normal to do so. I want more than anything else I want for my children, even their own happiness in this life, for them to believe in God, who is their salvation.

If you believe in God, and that the loss of God is the worst thing that can happen to a person, then you would sooner give your child a rattlesnake to play with than expose him or her at an early age to the work of a man who openly says he wishes to destroy God in the minds of his audience." —beliefnet.com contributor Rod Dreher [beliefnet.com, 11/2/07]