Fantasy, the occult, and you

[Albertosaurus Rex]

Guys, I want to thank you for your well-considered posts. Religion is a topic fraught with danger and I want once again to implore everyone to keep a cool head.

Thinking this over myself, I was reminded of a topic that came up some weeks ago during one of my university courses concerning "cosmic warfare". This dealt with religious terrorism: how can people justify the bombing of innocent civilians? The argumenys goes that these people see themselves as warriors in a cosmic war. There is a dark and shadowy enemy (say, the devil) who has accomplices in this world, like other faiths, other denominations of their own faith or the government. This construction of cosmic war gives the people who believe in it the feeling that their own lives are more meaningful.

Obviously, the anti-fantasy christians do not go around assassinating fantasy novelists, but the mechanic seems vaguely similar to me. There are shadowy demonic forces at work in the world and these have accomplices in people like wiccans and fantasy novelists. The invention of this enemy allows them to engage in a (to them) meaninful battle.

These people who deny fear would not be able to accept such an acknowledgement of fear because, in doing so, they would then have to acknowledge the other factors of fear used within their organisation and this would, in turn, shake and shatter the very foundations of their faith. Fear is the driving force behind all that this "category of Christians" holds dear...not the love that is preached or often portrayed for the benefit of the wider public.

I am so very reminded of those tracts by Jack Chick, which often end with unbelievers being thrown into the fires of Hell.