Look out Frodo...we aren't in Narnia anymore....

Received this email again today and wanted to share. I recently saw a preview for this movie on TV. The book is on the shelves at Wal-Mart. Checked out snopes.com (thanks Chandra) and this article appears legit. Makes me nervous for our children.....

The Golden Compass, a fantasy film starring Nicole Kidman that is scheduled to be released into theatres on 7 December 2007, has been drawing fire from concerned Christians. The film is based on Northern Lights (released in the U.S. as The Golden Compass), the first offering in Phillip Pullman’s His Dark Materials trilogy of children’s books, a series that follows the adventures of a streetwise girl who travels through multiple worlds populated by witches, armor-plated bears and sinister ecclesiastical assassins to defeat oppressive forces of a senile God. Books of the trilogy have sold more than 15 million copies around the world, with Northern Lights winning the Carnegie Medal for Children’s Literature in 1995 and in 2007 being awarded the ‘Carnegie of Carnegies’ for the best children’s book of the past 70 years. The Amber Spyglass, the final book of the series, won the Whitbread Prize in 2001, making it the first children’s book to do so.

The series’ author, Phillip Pullman, is an avowed atheist who has averred that “I don’t profess any religion; I don’t think it’s possible that there is a God; I have the greatest difficulty in understanding what is meant by the words ‘spiritual’ or ‘spirituality’.” Critics of Pullman’s books point to the strong anti-religion and anti-God themes they incorporate, and although literary works are subject to a variety of interpretations, Pullman left little doubt about his intentions when he said in a 2003 interview that “My books are about killing God.” (Conservative British columnist Peter Hitchens labeled Pullman “The Most Dangerous Author in Britain” and described his as the writer “the atheists would have been praying for, if atheists prayed.”)

Bill Donohue, president of the Catholic Leagues, has condemned The Golden Compass as a “pernicious” effort to indoctrinate children into Anti-Christian beliefs and has produced a 23-page pamphlet title The Golden Compass: Unmasked in which he maintains that Pullman “sells atheism for kids.” Donahue told interviewer John Gibson on 9 October 2007 why be believes Christians should stay away from the film:

Look, the movie is based on the least offensive of the three books. And they have dumbed down the worst elements in the movie because they don’t want to make Christians angry and they want to make money. Our concern is this, unsuspecting Christian parents may want to take their kid to the movie, it opens up December 7th and say, this wasn’t troubling, then we’ll buy the books. So the movie is the bait for the books which are profoundly anti-Christian and at the same time selling atheism.

Other critics, however, have described Pullman’s works as being more generally anti-religion rather that specifically anti-Christian or anti-Catholic:

In “His Dark Materials,” Pullman’s criticisms of organized religion come across as anti-authoritarian and anti-ascetic rather than anti-doctrinal. (Jesus isn’t mentioned in any of the books, although Pullman has hinted that He might figure in a forthcoming sequel, “The Book of Dust.”) His fundamental objection is to ideological tyranny and the rejection of this world in favor of an idealized afterlife, regardless of creed. As one of the novel’s pagan characters puts it, “Every church is the same: control, destroy, obliterate every good feeling.”

To summarize, It appears that Pullman hates C.S. Lewis’s Chronicle’s of Narnia and has written a trilogy to show the other side. The movie appears to be done in such a way that kids and their parents will buy his trilogy where in the end, the children kill God and everyone can do as they please. Nicole Kidman stars in the movie so undoubtedly it will be advertised a lot.

Something like this is shared so parents may use wisdom and discernment in sorting through the various options available for reading or viewing. A caution light while driving is just that, a light which cause you to exercise caution.

If you've heard something different let me know!