this really knocked me for a loop

[fpb]

And it throws an interesting light on JK Rowling's own understanding of Christianity. In this article, she claims that the HP series is basically Christian. But she also claims - read the last three paragraphs - that the current Pope belongs to "the lunatic fringe" of Christianity. I'm afraid that what we have here, however incredible it may seem, is a survival, in the twenty-first century, of that English pathology that led nineteenth-century religious writers to call Catholicism "sectarian"; the ecclesiastical version of the "Fog in the Channel, Continent cut off" mentality.

Comments

[fpb.livejournal.com]

An American audience does not necessarily mean an Evangelical audience. And JK Rowling is not American. And given that the article mentions the Pope - and the Pope alone, personally - all the other nay-sayers are passed over as one nameless massa damnata - the burden of arguing that he was not mentioned in the interview lies on you. I just have to assume that the journalist is not lying. (True, that is quite an assumption where journalists are concerned.) Anyway, without further evidence, it remains a matter of opinion. You say potayto and I say potutto, you say tomayto and I say tomutto, tomayto tomutto, let;s call the whole thing off.

But I stand by my published view that the imaginative world of HP is not Christian. Unfortunately, because of FictionAlley's ongoing troubles, the most recent version of my essay on the issue is not accessible, but you can read the first draft here.

[eliskimo.livejournal.com]

Perhaps you should upload the finished article to LJ as well.