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Vatican Paper Heaps Praise on Harry Potter Film

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By Hilary White, Rome, July 14, 2009

L'Osservatore Romano, the Vatican's quasi-official newspaper, has heaped praise on the latest film adaptation of the Harry Potter series of children's books, criticised previously as spiritually dangerous by Pope Benedict XVI prior to his elevation to the pontificate. The review called the film, "Harry Potter and the Half-Blood Prince," the "most successful of the series" thus far.

In his review in yesterday's Italian edition of the paper, Gaetano Vallini praised the film for promoting "friendship, altruism, loyalty and self-giving" and said that the kind of magic portrayed in the film is the same as magic in fairy tales.

The new film and the books make clear, he said, "the line of demarcation between one who does good and one who does evil, and it is not difficult for the reader or the viewer to identify with the first."  "This is particularly true in the latest film. They know that doing good is the right thing to do. And they also understand that sometimes this involves hard work and sacrifice," Vallini continued.

L'Osservatore Romano's praise for Harry Potter has been widely reported in the mainstream media in English, French, Italian, Spanish and Polish language sources. Making no distinction between official approval by an office of the Vatican and a newspaper movie review, The Daily Telegraph ran the headline, "Harry Potter and the Half-Blood Prince praised by Vatican," and commented, "The Catholic Church has heaped praise on the latest Harry Potter film after previously accusing the books of promoting witchcraft and the occult."

The Telegraph was only one among the many mainstream news sources to observe the unusual praise for Harry Potter by the Vatican's quasi-official newspaper. The Daily Mail ran the headline, "Vatican U-turn as it gives new Harry Potter film its seal of approval." Some reports noted the stark contrast between this week's Vallini review with comments on Harry Potter made in L'Osservatore Romano last year when the paper condemned the books for encouraging an interest in the occult among children.

In January 2008, Edoardo Rialti wrote in L'Osservatore Romano that despite "superficially apparent common points" with such fantasy children's classics as the Lord of the Rings and the Narnia series, Harry Potter presents a "wrong model" for a hero. He referred to the "half truths" the books present on moral issues in which "the moral and spiritual structures are inverted or confused, a world in which evil is good."

"Despite the values that we come across in the narration, at the base of this story, witchcraft is proposed as a positive ideal," Rialti wrote. The film's negative characterisation of ordinary people as "Muggles" who "know nothing other than bad and wicked things is a truly diabolical attitude."

The Vallini review appears to contrast too with the expressed opinion of Pope Benedict XIV on the danger to young people the books represent. In a 2003 letter, then-Joseph Cardinal Ratzinger, as head of the Congregation for the Doctrine of the Faith, wrote that the books presented "subtle seductions" that can "deeply distort Christianity" in children.

Cardinal Ratzinger was responding to the work of German journalist and religious writer Gabriele Kuby who had just published her 2003 book, "Harry Potter - Good or evil?" 

In a letter to Kuby dated March 7, 2003 Cardinal Ratzinger wrote, "It is good, that you enlighten people about Harry Potter, because those are subtle seductions, which act unnoticed and by this deeply distort Christianity in the soul, before it can grow properly."

Advocates of the Catholic teachings on life and family, particularly as they pertain to the public sphere, are becoming increasingly dismayed by the shift in editorial tenor of the Vatican paper.

In comments in late June on another article appearing in L'Osservatore Romano on the occasion of the death of American pop star Michael Jackson, US Catholic commentator Deal Hudson wrote that the paper is undergoing a "downward spiral" under its recently appointed editor-in-chief Giovanni Maria Vian. Hudson has been a vocal critic of the paper's glowing coverage of Barack Obama, presenting the virulently pro-abortion president as acceptable to Catholics.

Also commenting on the Jackson article, American canonist and canon law professor Edward N. Peters, wrote that such anomalies as these in the paper's recent articles and editorials are a result of L'Osservatore Romano having "decided to become relevant. God help us."

Peters, a lecturer at Sacred Heart Major Seminary in Detroit and consultant on canonical issues in the US, wrote the Michael Jackson piece left "little sense that much of Jackson's work was sexually exploitative, at times quasi-obscene."

"If the Vatican wants a newspaper to provide a Catholic perspective on the world, fine. Item Number One on the to-do list, though, should be to find Catholics who can write and edit such a paper coherently. Anyone can lurch from gaff to gaff." 

Harry Potter and Dumbledore Used to Entice Fans into Activism for Maine Gay “Marriage” Push

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By Peter J. Smith, Portland, Maine, October 16, 2009

(LifeSiteNews.com) - "What would Dumbledore do?" is the slogan of the popular Harry Potter fansite called the Harry Potter Alliance, which aims to turn fans into activists for a better world. However, the fansite is now directing tweens, teens, and young adults into a new kind of activism: pushing same-sex "marriage" and it has now set its sights on Maine.

The Alliance has scheduled October 24 in Portland as a day of training in door-to-door activism to urge Maine voters to reject Prop. 1, which would overturn the law legalizing same-sex "marriage" by way of a "people's veto."  The event includes five hours of Potter-fans canvassing Maine voters with Maine Equality, a homosexual activist group. The event is called "Wrock 4 Equality" and begins and ends with concerts from the indie rock bands known as "Harry and the Potters" and "Draco and the Malfoys."

The Massachusetts-based Alliance has also contracted with MassEquality to recruit its Potter fan base into Potter telephone activists, who will call up Maine voters asking them to vote "No" on the people's veto of the state's same-sex "marriage" law.

The Alliance intends to have its activist fans take part in a one-day House Cup Competition and register in one of the four Hogwarts Houses: Ravenclaw, Gryffindor, Slytherin and Hufflepuff. The event employs a point-system - 5 points per call, 15 points for knocking on a door, and 20 points for speaking directly with an individual.

The effort also features Irish actress Evanna Lynch, 18, who plays the character Luna Lovegood in the Potter Films.

The Harry Potter Alliance is the brain-child of 29-year-old Andrew Slack. The site urges fan to interpret current events in light of the lessons of Harry Potter and sets up Potter's mentor, the wizard Albus Dumbledore, as a moral teacher. Interestingly, the author of the Harry Potter books, J.K. Rowling, had stated in response to a question from a fan in October, 2007, that Dumbledore was homosexual.

Andrew Slack makes clear that the Alliance intends to be "Dumbledore's army in the real world" and the fight against the "Dark Arts in the real world" includes not only poverty, genocide, and disease - but traditional marriage as well.

For over the past nine months, Andrew Slack has used the star-power of Harry Potter to attempt to motivate Potter fans to lobby against ballot measures designed to preserve the traditional institution of marriage as the union of a man and a woman and the natural environment for the rearing of children.

The Alliance did not succeed in its efforts to overturn Prop 8 in California, but with the electorate so sharply divided in Maine, it tells its members that their involvement can have a decisive influence in that state.

In November, Maine voters will vote either "yes" or "no" on Prop. 1, which reads: "Do you want to reject the new law that lets same-sex couples marry and allows individuals and religious groups to refuse to perform these marriages?"

The latest poll results from the Portland-based Pan Atlantic SMS Group shows that 51.8 percent of voters would vote "no" on Prop. 1, while 42.9 percent would vote "yes".  5.2 percent report they are "undecided." The poll carries a margin of error of plus or minus 4.9 percent.

Harry Potter expert criticizes Vatican newspaper’s glowing review of Deathly Hallows 2

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By John-Henry Westen, Vatican City, July 18, 2011

“The positive review of the latest Harry Potter film in L’Osservatore Romano is symptomatic of serious problems in the condition of many modern Catholics,” Michael D. O’Brien, author of “Harry Potter and the Paganization of Culture,” told LifeSiteNews last week. 

In its review, the Vatican newspaper had called the film an “epic,” a “saga of unequalled planetary success,” and “another blockbuster.” The review is being reported by other Catholic services such as Catholic News Service and Canada’s Catholic Register, among many others - minus the balance of concerns that have been expressed about the Potter series by Christian critics.

While prior to becoming pope, then-Cardinal Joseph Ratzinger had expressed concern over the Potter books, the unsigned review in the Vatican newspaper says of the new film: “As for the content, evil is never presented as fascinating or attractive in the saga, but the values of friendship and of sacrifice are highlighted.”

O’Brien argues that the Vatican newspaper’s review springs from a “habit of making a split between faith and culture, and most strangely by straining to praise fundamentally disordered cultural material.”

The L’Osservatore Romano review, said O’Brien, begs the questions “Who is behind the editorial policies at the Vatican’s newspaper? Why would they posit as good a tale about a violent, morally confused sorcerer as a Christ-figure? Why, moreover, have they simply ignored Pope Benedict’s critical insight into the Potter series?”

In two letters first translated and published online by LifeSiteNews.com, Cardinal Ratzinger wrote to a German writer of a book critically analyzing the Potter series. “It is good, that you enlighten people about Harry Potter, because those are subtle seductions, which act unnoticed and by this deeply distort Christianity in the soul, before it can grow properly,” he wrote.

However, praise for the latest Potter film also came from the National Catholic Register which characterized it as “something approaching greatness.”

Cardinal Ratzinger’s was not the only Vatican voice to express grave concern over Potter.  The Vatican’s chief exorcist, Rev. Gabriele Amorth, has repeatedly condemned the Harry Potter novels.  In 2006 he said, “You start off with Harry Potter, who comes across as a likeable wizard, but you end up with the Devil … By reading Harry Potter a young child will be drawn into magic and from there it is a simple step to Satanism and the Devil.”

O’Brien, regarded around the world as an expert on children’s fantasy literature, explained the tendency for confusion. “All too often, when cultural material arrives in intense pleasure-inducing forms, and contains some positive ‘values’ mixed with highly toxic messages in its role modeling and its anti-values, we are easily seduced. To believe that the Potter message is about fighting evil is superficial. On practically every page of the series, and in its spin-off films, evil is presented as ‘bad’, and yet the evil means by which the evil is resisted are presented as good.”

O’Brien warns, “As charming as Harry may be (and in the films he is much more charming due to the persona of the actor who plays the role), he is a type or metaphor of Antichrist, mutating Christian symbols and then absorbing them into a more dangerous worldview — moral relativism saturated in the symbology of evil and various manifestations of the occult.”

“In the novels,” says O’Brien, “Harry is called ‘the Chosen One.’ He chooses to rise from the dead. He defeats evil with the instruments and gnostic powers of sorcery, wielding the ultimate instrument with which he saves the world because he has become ‘Master over Death.’ At the climax of the seven-volume Potter epic, having saved the world from evil, the resurrected Harry is treated with reverent awe, various characters pressing forward to touch him, ‘their leader and symbol, their saviour and their guide.’”

Michael O’Brien responds to his critics on Harry Potter - Preview

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By Steve Jalsevac, July 26, 2011

Exclusive LifeSiteNews Interview on July 20, 2011

Editor’s Note: The July 18 LifeSiteNews story, Harry Potter expert criticizes Vatican newspaper’s glowing review of Deathly Hallows 2, was widely read and elicited many comments both pro and con, especially regarding the statements of Potter critic Michael O’Brien. In response to this, LifeSiteNews conducted an additional, in-depth interview with O’Brien to allow him to expand on his views and respond to some of the many comments readers posted beneath the story.

In the interview O’Brien explains why he became involved in critiquing the Harry Potter series, his views on why the series has become so popular and the astonishing and at times hateful criticism that Potter critics have received, such as O’Brien himself being called “the anti-Christ” by a Potter fan. O’Brien also answers the question of what he means by “the evil means” used by Harry to defeat Voldemort, why Harry Potter is not just “entertainment”, why it is appropriate for LifeSiteNews to cover the Harry Potter issue, how Rowling’s pro-homosexual views may be reflected in the novels, and more:
LIFESITENEWS: How did you become involved in critiquing Harry Potter in the first place? What sparked that interest?

O’BRIEN: As the editor of a Catholic family magazine in the early 1990s I began to receive letters from parents asking my opinion on a new phenomenon that was appearing in children’s literature, with greater frequency. I really had no opinion on it, and then well-meaning people began to give such books to our children for birthday presents, or urged them upon our family, and I thought, “Well, thank you, but I think I’ll take a closer look at the material first.”

The more I read, and the more I researched, the more I realized there was a radical change happening in the literature, and culture in general, and especially in material aimed at young people. Certainly, the themes were increasingly violent, although to some degree children’s literature has always had an element of violence.

More worrisome was the corrupting of Western civilization’s traditional symbols of good and evil, and also the growing presentation of occult powers as the way to defeat evil, as though occult powers were morally neutral.
LIFESITENEWS: So this is more than just about Harry Potter. There were a number of other book series as well.


O’BRIEN: Yes, this has been going on for quite a long time. Some influential writers have promoted these themes, beginning in the 1950s and accelerating, until with the appearance of Harry Potter we have a worldwide phenomenon of unprecedented power and grip on the imagination of a generation.

Potter is unique in the history of literature; nothing like it has ever happened before.

LIFESITENEWS: How do you account for it? What has made it so popular?
O’BRIEN: Part of it is due to the fact that J.K. Rowling is a talented storyteller, but she has also used the style and technique of modern television and cinema media, which seizes the imagination by pummelling it, bombarding it with powerful stimuli, in a rapid pace, with plenty of emotional rewards. So, in the matter of style alone she has made a major change in the way stories are told, and how they are read.

Most important, she has taken the paganization of children’s culture to the next step, in which sorcery and witchcraft—traditionally allied with supernatural evil—is now presented as morally neutral. In the hands of “nice” people it’s an instrument for good. In the hands of not-nice people it’s an instrument for evil. She has shifted the battle lines between good and evil, which can have a disorienting effect, especially on the young who are in the stage of formation.

Regardless of how wildly imaginative it may be, good fantasy points us towards ultimate reality, “the moral order of the universe” as J.R.R. Tolkien called it. Corrupt fantasy points us, or forms us, in a consciousness that can lead to thinking that evil is good and good is evil. In the worst case, this may have long range effects, prompting the reader intuitively, subconsciously, to do evil while thinking they’re doing good.

All my critique is about the potential. Nobody whom I know is saying that those who read Potter are destined to plunge into actual witchcraft or sorcery. However, studies conducted by the Barna research group revealed a twelve percent increase in occult activities among Christian students in the U.S.A. after reading the Potter series, and which the students themselves attributed to the books. Serious critics also raise concerns about other effects of saturating the mind in symbols of evil and adventures in which evil and good are redefined.

LIFESITENEWS: Regarding the various types of children’s literature that you’ve critiqued, I gather the strongest reaction by far that you have received has been in response to your writings and comments on the Potter series. Is that correct?

O’BRIEN: Overwhelmingly.

See the Complete, in-depth interview here

Review of Michael O’Brien’s Harry Potter and the Paganization of Culture

http://www.theotokos.org.uk/pages/breviews/dfoley/potter.html

Donal Anthony Foley reviews Michael O’Brien’s Harry Potter and the Paganization of Culture (Fides et Traditio Press, 2010, 278 pages)

This review appeared in the 29 July 2010 edition of the Wanderer

The False Romance of the New Paganism

The Canadian author and artist, Michael O’Brien, in his Harry Potter and the Paganization of Culture, has written a forceful condemnation of the whole Harry Potter phenomenon, but without rancor or polemics, and in a reasoned and objective manner.

He begins by giving the reader a synopsis of all seven of the Potter books, noting that many pro-Potter commentators, including Christians, have seen the series as essentially healthy with entertaining plots and charming characters. But as he notes, these details are mixed with repulsive aspects at every turn: disgusting spells and bodily functions are described in detail, while rudeness abounds. And as the series progresses, sexual content becomes more explicit, as the general tone becomes darker. He argues, though, that regarding Rowling’s work, “The most serious problem is the use of the symbol world of the occult as her primary metaphor, and occultic activities as the dramatic engine of the plots.”

Harry Potter himself is no paragon – indeed he is consistently guilty of objectively immoral acts, including habitual rule-breaking, indulging a violent temper, lying and deceiving others, brooding about revenge, and actual deeds of vengeance. O’Brien points to the paradox that most readers are drawn to Harry despite these serious character flaws.

Moreover, he argues that Rowling has created a world where the boundary between good and evil has been shifted, given that Harry and many of the other “good” characters use the same powers - although on a lesser scale - as the really evil characters such as Voldemort.

But the stance of the Church and the Bible has always been that such powers are essentially evil and that there is no justification for their use.

O’Brien then deals with other critical responses from those who have investigated the Potter phenomenon, including people who have been involved in occult activities, and who realize from bitter experience just how dangerous the Potter books are. He also points to the explosion in interest in witchcraft and sorcery over recent years, and the easy accessibility of such material in bookstores and on the internet. And these criticisms have not come just from Christian sources – secular reviewers have also taken Rowling to task for, amongst other things, her undemanding, cliché ridden style, and for the way the Potter books psychologically manipulate their readers to accept witchcraft and sorcery as wholesome.

In traditional fairy tales, magical elements have always been present, but within an overall world-view which clearly separated good and evil – for example, traditionally witches were always regarded as abhorrent.

The same has been true of works by J. R. Tolkien or C. S. Lewis; but in the Potter series, the problem is “not the presence of magic … but how the magic is represented.”

O’Brien also looks at the way ancient Gnostic ideas have been revived in our own society, and sees the Potter books as a vehicle for this type of thinking, given their rich symbolism which echoes that of ancient Gnosticism. And by redefining ancient symbols such as dragons, casting them not as essentially evil, but as morally neutral, O’Brien argues that Rowling’s series of books has had the cumulative effect of dissolving “the parameters of our traditional symbol world, with the resulting shift of our moral judgments into a zone dominated by feelings.”

Likewise he looks at the powerful subliminal effect which modern cinema and TV can have on our perceptions, noting that the screen persona of Harry Potter has been portrayed in a much more wholesome way than the much darker picture found in the books. And these are also very much subversive of traditional authority, including the authority of Father figures. O’Brien sees Harry as a hybrid of “hero and anti-hero,” and contrasts him with Tolkien’s Frodo, who is a genuine hero, albeit one not without flaws.

For O’Brien, the Potter series presents a warning sign that our culture is being undermined and that a new paganism, far more potent and powerful than its ancient counterpart, is being ushered into the modern world. Gradually, standards have been lowered, and material which would once have been seen as highly objectionable is meekly accepted as “just the way things are.” And if anyone does object, they are labeled as old fashioned or, worse, a “fundamentalist.”

In the second half of the book, O’Brien discusses other contemporary works which have followed in the wake of Harry Potter, including some films, and also the Twilight series of vampire novels written by Stephenie Meyer, which he characterizes as: “poorly written teen romances, pulp fiction with a twist of supernatural horror combined with racing hormones and high school boy-girl relationships.” As with some of the symbolism in the Potter books, in this series, which posits “good” and “bad” vampires, he argues that we have a “cultural work that converts a traditional archetype of evil into a morally neutral one.”

And this blurring of the lines between good and evil has been taken a step further by Philip Pullman, in his fantasy trilogy, His Dark Materials, which is also analyzed by O’Brien. Pullman has quite explicitly set out to undermine the Christian moral order, and has described himself as “of the devil’s party.” He has created an imaginary world governed by the “Magisterium,” an authoritarian religious organization, and thus it is clear that his main target is the Catholic Church.

As O’Brien says: “Pullman has his tens of millions of young readers. Rowling has her hundreds of millions. But Rowling has played a major role in paving the way for Pullman. Both have pushed and warped the poles in men’s minds. They exercise complementary functions in the deformation of the contemporary imagination, and their differences are only in degree, not in kind.”

The essentially negative effect of the Potter books is also shown by their excessive focus on death and dying, with many of these deaths being violent and gratuitous, a fact acknowledged by Rowling herself: “My books are largely about death. They open with the death of Harry’s parents … [and] there is Voldemort’s obsession with conquering death and his quest for immortality at any price, the goal of anyone with magic.”

Harry Potter and the Paganization of Culture work is a cogent and convincing criticism of Rowling’s creation, and any parent who is concerned about the spiritual welfare of their children would be well advised to take note of Michael O’Brien’s persuasive and timely arguments.