'Halo' in the pews: Go to church, blow people up?
Violence in video games: Holier than thou?
(Credit: CNET Networks)The New York Times on Monday ran a piece on the use of violent video games in Christian youth ministries. They get the kids into the parish hall by offering Halo 3 sessions, for example, for fun and community-building.
Following this revelation, anyone with an opinion on first-person shooters, God or teenagers took to the keyboard and beat the devil out of it. As a result, there's some pretty broad analysis out there. Whether churches should use violent video games as a recruiting or "outreach" tool is a topic that raises a number of questions.
Is it OK for a church to expose 12-year-olds to rated "M" games? Is this any better or worse than youth fellowship paintball leagues? Is pixellated graphic violence unwholesome? Does violence in entertainment lead young souls to perdition?
Are churches advocating warfare? Are they training soldiers? Do they talk over the ethics of a just war with the youth? Do they talk about whether and when it's OK to kill another human being? Is God on anyone's "side" in an armed conflict?
Or maybe that's just me. In the immortal words of blogger Dan Whisenhunt in AnnistonStar: "What would Master Chief do?"
Below, a few bloggers offer their take on the subject. Anyone else want to weigh in?
Blog community response:
(This comes under the headline: "The Master Chief Loves You and Has a Wonderful Plan for Your Life") And here it is: You sneak around the back of the berm, stay low with your covenant sword, and your youth minister will follow you with frag grenades. He'll start throwing grenades into the building. Bobby will make a tactical error, expose his positions, then you and your pastor slash him. Take a break for a quick study of the Sermon on the Mount, then grab an M90A shotgun--the one with the Soellkraft Hippo 8 gauge magnum rounds--and start wasting all the 7th graders hiding near the Heretic Banshee. Close in prayer.
--Letters from Kamp Krusty
It seems to me that these churches are simply using Halo 3 to draw people into church. They are providing them entertainment, and then hoping to teach them something about God in the meantime. That seems like a bait-and-switch to me, however. Moreover, it sends the message that love isn't enough to keep butts in the pews (or the overstuffed chairs in the youth rec room). God shouldn't be the spinach that you suffer through only because it gives you access to the chocolate cake coming at the end of it all--and I find it more than a little disturbing that churches feel it necessary to treat Him that way.
--LeftFielder.org
Halo 3 is rated "M" which means it cannot be sold to anyone under 17 and yet twelve-year-olds are encouraged by their churches to play on site. Of course the arguments pro include meeting people where they are and the constant need to save souls. However, except for talk about "good and evil"--a tacked-on point accessible to any 3rd rate gamer--it seems pretty clear that mainstream Christianity has sold its soul to the false marketing idea that we judge Christianity by its growth, not by its witness.
Without dipping into questions about virtual life vs."real" life, it seems that Christianity loses its prophetic voice and moral clarity when it fails to distinguish between market-driven entertainment and serious questions about human existence.
--The Spectrum Blog
I think it dispels some of people's pre-conceptions about church that Christians are "holier-than-thou" (most aren't) and they realize that we, just like Jesus, are just normal people at our core who just happen to have a belief and hope in something that can't be found outside of a relationship with God.
Youth groups that lure people in with all this "fun" stuff are preying on youth. I don't blame the groups 100% because the parents of these kids are at fault too. If you want to have a fun youth group try something like camping, fishing, riding bikes, and other "wholesome" activities. Don't bring a kid to a church on Thursday, throw him a controller, let him rip through some blood and guts, then tell him "thou shalt not kill" on Sunday.
Hypocrisy at it's finest.
Did I mention I'd love to see all of these "churches" and "youth groups" get the sh*t taxed out of them? Sorry -- different comment for another topic :-)
battle to see Resistance: Fall of Man banned because it features
Manchester Cathedral in the game.
http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/uk_news/england/manchester/
7030576.stm
At any point if you must ask yourself if what you are doing can be construed as improper, maybe you should not be doing it.
And yes, it is a tough decision on whether or not it is "proper". However, Jesus ate with tax collectors (which, in that day was something that was akin to going to a brothel for Jews) because that's where he found the people who needed him the most. Obviously, there are practical and moral limits to that practice.
In the end, it's a decision that must be arrived at prayerfully and with the utmost care.
For me, when one of my good friends (a professed agnostic who had a bad experience at church) told me "I said I'd never darken the door of a church again, but you guys are pretty cool", I knew it was the right thing to do. It gave me the opportunity to show him that Christians were totally different that his misconception of what "religion" was all about. If that opens the door to something that can change his life in the end, it is all worth it.
At least they aren't using games that have bad language, drugs, heavy violence, and ****** (Saint's Row and GTA). I don't really consider Halo to have ever had enough violence to be M-rated. A little bit of horror (the flood taking over a marine's body in the original), but it's not like anyone's head was severed or you go around killing people because they took your gang's territory.
killing people in the name of thier 'god(s)' since the dawn of
religion. Interesting to offer crusades in cyber space, but certainly
nothing new. It has been a hit in the Muslem world for some time
(jihad-on line).
Now if the religions of the world would embrace love and whole-
heartedly reject violence/slaying of 'non-believers'...that would be
something NEW!
Christianity by reading the new testament. JC had it down and
He's still doing it for those who believe and follow.
ed
web/gadget guru
Instead, it's more of a bribe. If that's ALL a church ever offers youth, then I would agree with critics of this tactic. However, there's nothing intrinsically wrong with bribes of this sort. Human beings are infamous for not doing what's good for them, and so we "bribe" people all the time. The hope is that the bribe will get people started doing the right thing, and that subsequently the benefits of doing the right thing will provide the motivation for a long-term behavior change.
Another point is that the "bribe activities" can be good things themselves. Churches run all sorts of social welfare programs (e.g., schools, day-care, soup kitchens, clothes closets, sports leagues, etc.). These are dual purpose. They are "bribes" to get people involved with the church who might otherwise never listen, and they also help people in various (temporal) ways. Getting kids together to play group video games in a safe place under adult supervision does provide some positive benefits to a community. The question is, does Halo have drawbacks that outweigh the benefits?
Being a children's pastor and loving gaming, my church would freak if I put that out for the kids to play, and rightfully so, it's a violent and bloody game.
As to the hypocrisy statement, I understand where your coming from, but I've seen a lot more than you have read about. I've known and worked with multi-millionaire pastors before, I've worked in 5000 and 3000 member churches (which are small compared to some churches). What you don't see is that those pastors have been extremely financially smart in their investments, some running their own companies on the side. Anyone with 45k a year can be a millionaire in 20 years. It's sad that people think Pastors should be poor as dirt, and if they are smart with their money they should give it all away instead of using it to make more money, which lets them give more away. If you looked at their financial records, you'd know they give tons of cash to needy organizations.
In the end, Halo 3 is not a game 12 year olds should be playing by my opinion. The church uses a lot of military analogy's, but Christianity should never back violence as a means to an end.
Are you kidding me?
This is such an outrageous statement. Who cares if they want to play Halo at a youth function? It's something current and hot right now - kids will play regardless of being there or at home. While I agree that people under the age for the game shouldn't play, you're reaching awful far to find a problem with these events.
Not that the playing of a video game constitutes relevance, but providing the opportunity to play video games or other activities that perhaps many of the youth in a youth group would like (e.g. skateboarding) could help stop a huge phenomenon among today's youth: fragmented lifestyles. A youth could be the same person they are AT CHURCH as who they are OUT OF CHURCH. And with the average age of a youth pastor dropping in the low to mid 20's, it would also allow the youth pastor to do the same.
Many people are talking about the hypocrisy of allowing games like Halo to be played at church, but I think the bigger hypocrisy is behind the scenes: people acting like they wouldn't play Halo when they're at church, but playing it with their friends at home.
Violence: played or practiced has no place in a Christians life. Would you take your youth group (middle school or high school) to a rated R movie, then neither should you play a rated M game.
Where ever you are coming from Christian, Non-Christian, Christian Hater it does not matter, logically, you can't deny that whatever you play sports, role-playing games, music, or video games have an affect on your thoughts and actions. Kids are impressionable and playing violent games at an early age de-sensitizes their thoughts to what they see in real life. Soon the kid sees a car accident and says cool -- does he care about the people involved or is it real? To a kid the line between imagination and real often is confusing. Just talk to a war vet and see how a war changed their thoughts about life.
Final Point: God demonstrates his own love for us in this: While we were still sinners Christ died for us. Romans 5:8
God loves you now and will accept you however you are. God loves everyone, he doesn't like the sin, but he loves the sinner. He wants to be with you and wants to help you through any problem. Just talk to Him.
thanks
maczen
- Blogma, Now that's a new term!
- by waiakead2 March 10, 2008 11:03 PM PDT
- I have much to say in response to this posting. Basically in a nutshell, since I will let you readers view the video I made below, my view on this topic is that video games are temporary and utilizing it to only get numbers into the church as opposed to having them come for the right reason is like shooting yourself in the foot. Eventually they will leave, if that's what everything is based on.
- Like this Reply to this comment
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- The link
- by waiakead2 March 10, 2008 11:08 PM PDT
- Sorry about that. Here is the link:
- Like this
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(29 Comments)<embed width="416" height="340" flashvars="autoplay=false&viewcount=true" src="http://ustream.tv/r1mfqLj,tI6pLilglNn1i5.VBYK3cgTY.usc" type="application/x-shockwave-flash" allowfullscreen="true" />
http://www.ustream.tv/recorded/61.2eevylVrpX9H2n8k5Zg