Discerning Teens

My friend, Kim, and I have been sharing and praying for each other’s families for almost ten years now.  She recently wrote to share her concern about a current film.  I haven’t seen this film myself, but I value Kim’s discernment.


She writes:

I am writing to you today about something very important that God has put in my heart and the Holy Spirit has urged me to share with as many people as possible. My husband and I just went and saw the movie "Gamers." We like sci-fi, adventure shows, and the previews for this one looked great (future where death-row inmates have the option of becoming a "Gamer," virtually wired and "played" by someone else, and if they survive, they're free.) What the commercials didn't show is what happened before that, how this technology became available and "society" was formed (kind of like facebook), so people chose to let themselves be controlled by "players", people who sat in their house all day, making them do anything and everything, choosing their outfits (most half-naked), so as you walk down the street all you see are these people being controlled, having sex on the sidewalks, girls with girls, guys with guys, violence so disturbing I actually had to cover my eyes more than o nce. As we walked out of the theater, 5 barely 17-year-olds were behind us. I was so disturbed I felt overwhelmed that I had to do something, write a letter to the producer, email all my prayer teams. And I said afterwards to my husband, we are in the midst of a spiritual battle so strong, we have to teach our kids to be discerning, look at the big picture and think about such things. The movie previews were so deceiving, they looked very cool, especially for video gamers and techno teens. Paul (13) knew all about the movie and had watched the trailer online more than once. I left more determined than ever to warn kids to be discerning in how technology is subtly infiltrating their lives. I've had talks about this with my own kids when we gave up cable, but still we've got people having sex in commercials.

I truly believe our children and teenagers are much stronger, smarter and deeper than people give them credit for. We're in a war, and we need to teach our children discernment and equip them to go out there and be warriors for Jesus Christ!

Cross-cultural in the USA

In case you haven’t noticed from this blog or my books, I am interested in different cultures—another time (Glastonbury Tor), another place (The Wooden Ox, Beads and Braids), another world in the midst of the familiar mainstream culture (Crossovers, my unpublished skating novel.) This weekend I plunged into yet another cross-cultural experience when I went with my daughter and family to Convergence—a convention of four thousand (4000!) science fiction and fantasy fans at the Sheridan South hotel in Bloomington, Minnesota. I was there primarily as nanny to watch my grandchildren when my daughter and her husband were otherwise involved, and to attend some of the panels on writing for this genre.

From Thursday night until Sunday, geeks and gamers, many in full costume, transformed the hotel into one giant party. There were role-playing games, computer and board games, discussion panels, mock battles with nerf swords, and two 24-hour movie rooms, not to mention three floors of themed parties around the pool area at night. I wasn’t surprised to see Klingons and members of the Star Ship Enterprise crew walking around. The samarai and kimona-clad tea servers came out of the Japanese anime tradition. There were gray-haired women in long wizard cloaks or butterfly wings, and a whole classroom of Hogwart’s students and professors. I hadn’t expected the large number in costumes from the Industrial Revolution, most with tears, burns or dirt smeared on them.

“It’s called ‘Steam Punk’,” my daughter explained. “The idea is the innovative experiment gone wrong.” (Think Sean Connery and The League of Extraordinary Gentlemen.)

My daughter and her friends run an election campaign of candidates you don’t want to see in office. Last year Batman’s archenemy the Joker won over Vizzini (Princess Bride) and Senator Palpatine (Star Wars) in a race that would have had Al Franken and Norm Coleman in court for months. This year it was Dr. Evil (Austen Powers film series), Dr. Strangelove (Stanley Kubrick’s Dr. Strangelove, or: How I Learned to Stop Worrying and Love the Bomb) and Dr. Horrible. If you have heard of the last, you are officially a geek. Forget TV and movies. Dr. Horrible is the beloved villain of three fifteen-minute internet segments of singing video blog (known as 'vlog' to initiates, and yes, I said SINGING video blog.) There were at least five versions of Dr. Horrible walking around ‘Con’, and he won in a landslide. Next year the committee plans to go with at least two female candidates. How about Cruela deVille, the Wicked Witch of the West and Sarah Palin?

Sunday morning I attended a panel called “Using Spiritual Gifts in Writing.” I had a feeling it would not be based on Saint Paul. The panelists were a pagan, a Scientologist, an Orthodox Jew who wrote a book of horror stories from the Bible (think Jael and the tent peg in Judges 4), and Taylor Kent, aka the Fandom Snark. When he introduced himself as someone who had converted to Christianity a few years ago, I had something specific to pray for.

For three days I ate bagels, raw broccoli and M&Ms and stood in line like a homeless person for an inch or so of soup in the bottom of a Styrofoam cup. (Geeks don’t eat; they graze.) I saw way more tattoos and boobs than I needed. But I had some good conversations with my daughter’s friends, and even prayed with a woman who had just lost her job. I do not feel “called” to a new ministry with the sci-fi/fantasy community, but I haven’t felt more culturally stretched since attending a rural Mozambican wedding. And I am very glad that God has his people there like Taylor Kent.