Positive views on Harry Potter

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I’m trying to convince someone that Harry Potter has gotten a bad reputation. Are there any web articles that I can point to as evidence?
 
What are you asking for, studies that indicate that Harry Potter draws children toward Christ?
 
Wand past the sorcery & occult incantations then, as some spiritually bored tweens and teenagers do. Then, sit and wait for their sexually active and spiritually confused young adult years.
 
Barbkw said:
Wand past the sorcery & occult incantations then, as some spiritually bored tweens and teenagers do. Then, sit and wait for their sexually active and spiritually confused young adult years.
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How stupid do you think people are that, to you, they all of them seem to draw their spiritual values from fiction and not from fact? :rolleyes: I’ve read Harry Potter. Read fantasy comics. I even have a die-hard preference for any offensive spellcasting class in every online role-playing game I have ever signed up for.

Yet look at me now, a conservative Catholic who riles up all the liberals in his surroundings. :rolleyes:
 
Actually, HP is probably one of the only teenage aimed books that doesn’t have any sex it in whatsoever. The only place you can actually infer that sex happened is when Tonks gets pregnant (and that’s basically all the book says. It’s something like, “Lupin says ‘Tonks is pregnant’”).

Yep. There’s so much sex in HP. :rolleyes:
 
Finding God in Harry Potter by John Granger is a neat book that talks about the positive aspects of the series.
 
There are many reasonable people on moth sides of the the HP debate, i wanted to share some who have great concerns over HP and Twilight. I think It’s always good to look at both sides. I would like to share these links. I don’t want to be a “downer” I just wasn’t sure if you had heard any of these comments about HP and Twilight

blessings

Michael D. O’Brien-Harry Potter and the Paganization of Culture-Introduction by Bishop Julian Porteous, Sydney, Australia ,Published by Fides et Traditio Publishers
studiobrien.com/writings_on_fantasy/michael-d-obrien-book-on-harry-potter.htm

Cardinal Ratzinger Opposes Harry Potter Novels
lifesitenews.com/news/archive/ldn/2005/jul/05071301

ROME’S CHIEF EXCORCIST WARNS PARENTS AGAINST HARRY POTTER
lifesitenews.com/news/archive/ldn/2002/jan/02010202

Fr Thomas Euteneuer
hli.org/index.php?option=com_acajoom&act=mailing&task=view&listid=2&mailingid=720

catholic.org/hf/faith/story.php?id=37447
 
SeekingHisHeart said:
There are many reasonable people on moth sides of the the HP debate, i wanted to share some who have great concerns over HP and Twilight. I think It’s always good to look at both sides. I would like to share these links. I don’t want to be a “downer” I just wasn’t sure if you had heard any of these comments about HP and Twilight

blessings

Michael D. O’Brien-Harry Potter and the Paganization of Culture-Introduction by Bishop Julian Porteous, Sydney, Australia ,Published by Fides et Traditio Publishers
studiobrien.com/writings_on_fantasy/michael-d-obrien-book-on-harry-potter.htm
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I wouldn’t put so much stock in O’Brien after I’ve seen someone do a critique of him here on these very forums. 😛 (God I’ve gotta find a way to link this post more often)
DGDDavidson said:
This weird thing about dragons is the pet idea of Michael O’Brien, and it always amazes me that so many Catholics have paid attention to it. He contradicts himself in his book, misunderstands some of the fantasy works he attempts to analyze, and even abuses Christian theology. His overview of dragon imagery in world mythology is selective, inadequate, and inaccurate. The book is simply terrible, and yet I keep finding people who take it seriously.

O’Brien’s favorite trick is tossing around certain inexplicable words to lead you by the nose. He compares fantasy works with “traditional” fairy tales, but never explains what he means by “traditional.” Dungeons and Dragons is a “cult,” but he never explains why he calls it that. Dragons are positive symbols in China because of “dualistic eastern religions,” but he doesn’t explain why dualism would lead to positive dragon symbols. Nor does he explain why serpents are consistently negative in Zoroastrianism, which is unquestionably dualistic. He mentions Tiamat from the Enuma Elish as a sort of dragon and seems to think that helps his case, but he’s apparently unaware that Tiamat’s vanquisher, Marduk, has serpents and dragons among his sacred symbols. He claims J. R. R. Tolkien is on his side in all this, but he is apparently unaware of Tolkien’s Farmer Giles of Ham, which contains a tamed dragon, the very thing O’Brien claims will drag children into neo-paganism.

When attacking the work of Madeline L’Engle, he criticizes her for describing cherubim as dragon-like, apparently unaware that in ancient iconography, cherubim are winged sphinxes. He is also apparently unaware that seraphim are winged serpents with legs–that’s a positive use of snake imagery right out of the Bible. He also gives no account, that I remember, of John 3.14 or of the good dragon, representing Mordecai, who battles the evil dragon in the additions to Esther. Scripture does not contain a univocal use of serpent imagery, so there can be no basis for a Christian argument that snakes in fiction must always represent only one thing, all the time, unless we’re prepared to condemn the Bible as a confused neo-pagan work.

He trips over his theology on a few occasions. In an attempt to discuss beauty as a property of being and the symbolic use of beauty in fairy stories, he gets confused and ends up–I hope by accident–saying pretty people are inherently better than ugly people. Even though he praises fairy tales for showing evildoers as ugly and do-gooders as beautiful, he turns around in one of his essays on Harry Potter and attacks J. K. Rowling for doing the very same thing.

During that aforementioned criticism of L’Engle, he criticizes her for (correctly) depicting evil as non-being, even though he admits she’s basically right on that point. But though O’Brien himself (correctly) understands demons as beings as wholly dedicated to evil as beings can be, and (correctly) criticizes L’Engle for a universalist bent, he (incorrectly, very incorrectly!) says some living human beings are the same way, “completely ruled by evil.” Sometimes he sounds more like a Lutheran or Calvinist than a Catholic.

He also excuses George MacDonald for his universalism. In Lilith, MacDonald depicts even Satan being saved, and O’Brien gives this a pass, but for some reason, that sort of thing is absolutely condemnable when Madeline L’Engle does it. He also praises MacDonald for depicting Lilith being converted back to good, even though she’s a demonic figure, though he condemns the depiction of the conversion of other demonic figures. The heroic characters in Lilith also use magic, just as Lilith does–yet when discussing Harry Potter and other fantasy works, he condemns books where both heroes and villains employ magic. For some reason, the use of magic by both good and evil is something O’Brien is willing to excuse in works by the authors he favors. O’Brien simply can’t be consistent in his criticism, so how can anyone seriously expect fantasists to use ideas like O’Brien’s as a moral guide for writing their work?

O’Brien may be a fine novelist. I know from experience he’s a competent painter. But in the realms of folklore or literary criticism the man is a sophomore, the Richard Dawkins of Catholic literary moral criticism, making facile arguments based on some master key to interpreting stories that he claims to have discovered, and huffily dismissing anyone who disagrees with him as “illiterate.” I do not understand why anyone treats A Landscape with Dragons or O’Brien’s essays on this subject as anything other than an embarrassment.
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SeekingHisHeart said:
Cardinal Ratzinger Opposes Harry Potter Novels
lifesitenews.com/news/archive/ldn/2005/jul/05071301

ROME’S CHIEF EXCORCIST WARNS PARENTS AGAINST HARRY POTTER
lifesitenews.com/news/archive/ldn/2002/jan/02010202

Fr Thomas Euteneuer
hli.org/index.php?option=com_acajoom&act=mailing&task=view&listid=2&mailingid=720

catholic.org/hf/faith/story.php?id=37447
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Sorry but when it comes literary theory and fiction, I would not consider LifeSiteNews a credible source. Nor do I buy into the hype over Ratzinger’s letter (which he wrote before he even became Pope). Jharek, I hope you don’t mind but could you find what Jimmy Akin had to say about it again? What was it called… Pre-16 on Harry Potter?
 
curlycool89 said:
Actually, HP is probably one of the only teenage aimed books that doesn’t have any sex it in whatsoever. The only place you can actually infer that sex happened is when Tonks gets pregnant (and that’s basically all the book says. It’s something like, “Lupin says ‘Tonks is pregnant’”).

Yep. There’s so much sex in HP. :rolleyes:
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And for that matter–it seems to be restricted to married sex (I’d have to re-scan the pages, but I’m fairly certain that Tonks & Lupin had married before she became pregnant) with a pretty strong sex=babies linkage. Yes, there is kissing and a lot of interest in the opposite sex, but as far as actual sexual activity you have to go delve into the fanfic morass.

And as far as the “being fair and balanced” by bringing in the links to the negative articles … my problem with those articles is that they tend to use fallacies like appealing to an authority (when the authority is speaking outside his area of expertise), straw man arguments, etc. as well as outright factual errors (one such attributed a speech of Voldemort’s to Harry and used the erroneous attribution as a reason to condemn the novel). Worse yet, those who cling to these negative critiques do not care about the basis in fallacy and falsehood.

Instead, one can carry away from a reading of the novels a message that doing what is right may be neither easy nor popular (and may in the end prove quite dangerous). But as Edmund Burke once wrote, “All that is necessary for the triumph of evil is that good men do nothing.” In Harry Potter, those good men certainly do have their flaws and foibles, but they do not quit standing up to oppose evil.
 
Lost_Wanderer said:
Sorry but when it comes literary theory and fiction, I would not consider LifeSiteNews a credible source. Nor do I buy into the hype over Ratzinger’s letter (which he wrote before he even became Pope). Jharek, I hope you don’t mind but could you find what Jimmy Akin had to say about it again? What was it called… Pre-16 on Harry Potter?
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… I’m new to the forums, didn’t know this was discussed so much and I don’t want to hijack y’alls particular thread so I’ll leave it be.

blessings
 
Exorcist pestocist, Evanesco Papal squeak, duro Potter Harry lovers here.
 
While it isn’t an article, SQPN’s Secrets of Harry Potter (available on itunes) does have a lot to say in favor of the books, their symbolism and their themes. One thing that comes up in nearly every episode is the importance of love as a theme on the books. This is the focus of an entire episode (Valentine’s day 2007). As far as anything “official” is concerned, episode three is a Vatican radio broadcast about HP. The '07 Christmas episode might also be good to listen to, considering the season. These are the best recommendations I can think of off the top of my head, but they are by no means the only ones that support this viewpoint. The format of the episodes has changed a lot over the years, but everyone has found something positive to say about the chapter or subject matter being examined.
 
Sheesh, the OP asks for positive and everyone trots out the same four negative articles we’ve seen dozens of time already. 😛 😉

As someone else mentioned, John Granger has written several books about the compatibility of HP and Christianity. He also maintains the website HogwartsProfessor.com which no doubt has loads of articles that would fit the bill of what you’re looking for. Note, Granger is Christian, but not Catholic.

OSV has a book The Mystery of Harry Potter by Nancy Carpentier Brown, which is great for a positive, specifically Catholic point of view. I’ve read that one and I thought it was really well done. She doesn’t approach the book as some sort of glossy-eyed fangirl, but rather she takes an honest look at the series’ strengths and weaknesses from our faith perspective. It’s a great resource.
 
Joe_5859 said:
Just a note, this article does not address the OP’s request for positive views of Harry Potter.
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I thought he amended that by saying he was interested in both views.

I’m in the anti-Potter camp. 👍
 
Mickey said:
I thought he amended that by saying he was interested in both views.

I’m in the anti-Potter camp. 👍
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I could be mistaken, but I think the “both views” that the OP was interested in were:
Barbkw said:
What are you asking for, studies that indicate that Harry Potter draws children toward Christ?
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In other words, he was interested in material that either articulated the positive aspects of HP or defended against the negative accusations made by HP critics. That was how I interpreted the request anyway.
 
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