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A Guide Teaching How To Use Harry Potter To Evangelise

To capitalise over Potter mania that is sweeping across the world, a youth worker from the Church of England has released a guide showing how to evangelise using the Harry Potter novels on Tuesday.

By: Derick Ho
Christian Today Correspondent
Wednesday, 18 July 2007, 17:42 (EST)
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To capitalise over Potter mania that is sweeping across the world, a youth worker from the Church of England has released a guide showing how to evangelise using the Harry Potter novels on Tuesday.

Owen Smith, the author of the guide who works at St Margaret's Church in the U.K. told the Telegraph that the inclusion of magic in the Harry Potter series was also used by other Christian writers.

He also denounced critics of the series, saying that the charge of the book drawing young readers into occult are both maligning the author and underestimating the reader’s ability to distinguish between what is real and imaginary.

"The magic in the books is simply part of the magic that JK Rowling has created, in the same way that magic is part of the world of Christian writers such as CS Lewis,” he said.

"To say, as some have, that these books draw younger readers towards the occult seems to me both to malign JK Rowling and to vastly underestimate the ability of children and young people to separate the real from the imaginary."

Christians are split on whether the Harry Potter novels have a negative influence on their faith. The former Archbishop of Canterbury, Dr George Carey described the series as ‘great fun and a serious examination of good and evil.’

However Pope Benedict XVI took the opposite view and lambasts it instead, describing it as ‘deeply distorting Christianity in the soul before it can grow properly.’

Despite the conflicting opinions within the Christian community, both the Harry Potter novel and the movie have become the fastest-selling franchise attracting both young and old to the story about a boy wizard growing up.



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