I have a lot of different friends. Some are Christian and some are not. I watch popular TV and read fiction. I will, at times, tune into religious programming or read a book about religion. I catch a lot of flak for my entertainment choices from most of my Christian friends and especially my Wife. Not all of it is judgmental, quite a few of my friends will just tell me that a certain book or movie probably isn't best for my spiritual growth. In all actuality, they are probably right. But, I don't read or watch these things to grow as a Christian; I watch them for entertainment value. Some of the things I watch make me feel really guilty and dirty (Clerks 2 anyone). Most of what I watch/read, I can find the positive message, thought provoking question, or, at the very least, funny one-liner.
I don't think all the "filth" that I watch/read impacts me as much as most people. Although seemingly contradictory, I can watch a Resident Evil movie on Saturday and go to Church on Sunday. I can watch a movie loaded with cuss words and still never cuss. This all comes from the way I developed psychologically, in my opinion. I didn't have a lot of positive role models growing up. I did have a whole bunch of negative ones. I can remember laying in bed at night going over the bad things I had seen or heard and promising myself that I would never be like that. I was able at an early age to learn from the mistakes of others and apply those mistakes to my life, so I didn't have to make them myself. Sure I still did stupid things and made mistakes, but a lot of the big stuff was avoided.
I don't cuss, I don't drink (I have been drunk once), I don't smoke (had a cigar once), have never tried illegal drugs, I don't gamble. I am far from perfect. I have my faults and vices but the things listed above, I learned from other's mistakes. I saw the roads that alcholism and drug abuse take you down. I saw the hole in the throat that came from smoking. I saw people lose lots of money on trivial bets and then not have money for bills. I have seen people laughed at because they couldn't string a sentence together without having an expletive every other word. I saw a lack of education amongst these people and swore I would go to collge.
So when people say that watching/reading "filth" will corrupt my mind, I just have to laugh because I have lived in environments far worse (minus the sensless violence) than most of what I see or read. Real life experiences as a child and adolesent didn't corrupt me, I doubt a movie/book can now*.
*This is exactly what the Devil wants me to think, so I am unsure I should believe it.
7 comments:
hey, i think you're right. then again, maybe the devil's talking to me, too. :P
I totally know where you're coming from. I'll also hazard a guess to say that, on paper, you're probably a better person than i am. I do drink, i do swear (like a m*****f***er) and I do read horror books and watch Cheaters (with Joey Greco) Too-hot-for-TV. I do all kinds of terrible, horrible things my uber-christian mother and her fanatical friends warned me about growing up. But even when I was trying hard to live that life, I saw a lot of hypocrisy in the ranks of my fellow Christians. I saw a lot of desperate people, doing desperate things. One of those things was Jesus, but a lot of it wasn't quite so godly.
At the same time, I met a lot of really great, true, honest people with a real faith and I believed them. And I met a lot of great, honest, giving people without faith, and I believed them too.
At the end of it all, I just decided to be as good as I could be, while still seeking happiness and goodness in my own way. That's probably not a very Christian attitude, but it means I can love my family, support rights for civil liberties, and question things that I think are wrong, without it conflicting with the position of a church. I think I'm doing ok in spite of it. I hope at the end of my life, my actions speak for me.
Exactly, I mean the world is corrupt and full of temptation, I guess TV makes some people think that it is okay to give in. I give intelligent people much more credit than that.
Oh, he is. He is telling you to change your last name. Don't listen to him! Wait, or is he telling you to keep your last name? I can't tell!
GAH! he's a tricky one...
I really see your point of view on this one. It's really, in my opinion, a matter of choices. You can either choose to let a certain mentality or environment negatively affect you or you can choose not to. It's not nearly as difficult as people make it out to be. It's really a matter of who you want to be, as you said - if you see something you don't like, you can decide not to become that person.
I think that if a silly movie or an "unclean" book can sway your faith...then maybe you need to think about how strong that faith is in the first place.
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