Left-Behind: Eternal Forces
The religio-political branch of the web is all a buzz with controversy over a soon-to-be released PC video game Left-Behind: Eternal Forces. This desktop software is a "real-time strategy" game based upon the multi-million dollar Left-Behind book series by Tim LaHaye and Jerry Jenkins. The leftward anti-theocrats at talk2action (or "moretalkthanaction") are garnering significant web traffic -- along with laying considerable PR pressure on Christian conversatives -- by placing consistent focus on the issue... Choose ye this day, what game shall ye play? Doom, or Left-Behind: Eternal Forces?
The game is as idiotic as the books, but with a difference. Since a video game is interactive players can participate in a violent campaign of Tribulation violence for the cause of Christ! (I know, it's hilariously ridiculous, but stay with me.) It's being proffered as the "ultimate fight of good against evil" as a player, or players, can head up the Tribulation Force or the Anti-Christ's Global Community Peacekeepers in a combination of both spiritual and physical warfare.
The setting for the game is New York City where a group of "left-behind" Christians are left to contend with a U.N.-like international force of peacekeepers loyal to the regime of the Anti-christ. According to one analyst, "the dialogue is pretty lame -- people saying, 'Praise the Lord' after they blow away the bad guys." This is typical for most violent video games. This is not typical for a game that espouses to be Christian.
The problems for the more secular critics are what they refer to as the embedded themes of "Christian supremacy" and "eliminationist rhetoric." Of course, it's Christian and violent, how else is it supposed to turn out? The trouble comes when this game is lobbed on top of the compounded conspiracy theorizing of the soon-coming theocracy.
In all honesty, I do harbor a genuine concern for the less informed readers of the secular laity -- those who'll never turn a page of a Christian book. They only have these left-wing conspiracy bloggers to rely on; and this cadre is web-spinners are daily serving the ill-informed a frightening vision of the theocratic future. I wonder who will take to the streets first: the Christian zealots or the frightened secularists?
The debate over the political future of America is equally ridiculous. It's not only the left-wing alarmists, it's also the sensationalists on the Religious Right that are causing an unnecessary public crisis. Millions of Christians are buying into a "War on Christians" while millions of secularists are trembling over a gay-stoning theocracy. While Christian protest of the DaVinci Code is improving the box office sales for Ron Howard, the left-wing boycott of Left-Behind: Eternal Forces is providing the game-makers with more PR and guaranteed sales then they'd ever achieve themselves.
Political pressure will soon be leveled at the conservative Christian community to renounce the game. I'm sure a good many of them will. But, I'll remain astonished that grown men and women could spend so much time critiquing movies and video games. This will all pan out to be meaningless in the end. But, in the meanwhile, it's a mountain out of a mole hill. I didn't want to spend ANY blog time on it, but I'd rather go down on the record lest my silence be construed as "guilt by association."
Here's all I have to say: much of the Christian popular media industry (books, video, gaming, paraphernalia, movies, and television) is a horrible affront to the Lord Jesus Christ. It's nonsensical. The cancer of materialism and a watered-down Christian message are signs of a great decline in Christendom. For the first time I can finally see that there will be an end to modern evangelicalism as it splinters off into a multiplicity of factions. All the while, the faithful continue to imbibe sound doctrine, build solid churches, and raise their children in the faith. The way is narrow and few there be that find it.
Rushdoony was a man of letters. He didn't care for book covers and disliked paperbacks. He consumed a book a day for his entire adult life. He accumulated 40,000+ volumes in his personal library by the time he died in 2001.
We at Chalcedon have walked with great thinkers over the years. But, judging by the size of our mailing list in comparison with the multi-billion dollar Christian media industry, we are far from the vision of a theocratic nation. The fictional world of LaHaye and Jenkins is just that -- a fiction. It is a ridiculous portrayal of the future derived from a ridiculous eschatology. It is being packaged by compromised Christian capitalists who easily dispense with ethics when it comes to making a buck.
Those who take them all seriously are in danger of a stomach ulcer. I suggest our far-left critics relax like Rushdoony did, and be confident that the righteous Lord of the Universe will fulfill His will, and discipline His own children for their frivolity. I don't recommend "dignifying" a video game with serious discussion. I know you're worried that young impressionable teenagers will take it all seriously and start shooting unbelievers. Rest assured that will not happen. All you've done at this point is increase the projected sales and inspired investors. Not a smart move.
The game is as idiotic as the books, but with a difference. Since a video game is interactive players can participate in a violent campaign of Tribulation violence for the cause of Christ! (I know, it's hilariously ridiculous, but stay with me.) It's being proffered as the "ultimate fight of good against evil" as a player, or players, can head up the Tribulation Force or the Anti-Christ's Global Community Peacekeepers in a combination of both spiritual and physical warfare.
The setting for the game is New York City where a group of "left-behind" Christians are left to contend with a U.N.-like international force of peacekeepers loyal to the regime of the Anti-christ. According to one analyst, "the dialogue is pretty lame -- people saying, 'Praise the Lord' after they blow away the bad guys." This is typical for most violent video games. This is not typical for a game that espouses to be Christian.
The problems for the more secular critics are what they refer to as the embedded themes of "Christian supremacy" and "eliminationist rhetoric." Of course, it's Christian and violent, how else is it supposed to turn out? The trouble comes when this game is lobbed on top of the compounded conspiracy theorizing of the soon-coming theocracy.
In all honesty, I do harbor a genuine concern for the less informed readers of the secular laity -- those who'll never turn a page of a Christian book. They only have these left-wing conspiracy bloggers to rely on; and this cadre is web-spinners are daily serving the ill-informed a frightening vision of the theocratic future. I wonder who will take to the streets first: the Christian zealots or the frightened secularists?
The debate over the political future of America is equally ridiculous. It's not only the left-wing alarmists, it's also the sensationalists on the Religious Right that are causing an unnecessary public crisis. Millions of Christians are buying into a "War on Christians" while millions of secularists are trembling over a gay-stoning theocracy. While Christian protest of the DaVinci Code is improving the box office sales for Ron Howard, the left-wing boycott of Left-Behind: Eternal Forces is providing the game-makers with more PR and guaranteed sales then they'd ever achieve themselves.
Political pressure will soon be leveled at the conservative Christian community to renounce the game. I'm sure a good many of them will. But, I'll remain astonished that grown men and women could spend so much time critiquing movies and video games. This will all pan out to be meaningless in the end. But, in the meanwhile, it's a mountain out of a mole hill. I didn't want to spend ANY blog time on it, but I'd rather go down on the record lest my silence be construed as "guilt by association."
Here's all I have to say: much of the Christian popular media industry (books, video, gaming, paraphernalia, movies, and television) is a horrible affront to the Lord Jesus Christ. It's nonsensical. The cancer of materialism and a watered-down Christian message are signs of a great decline in Christendom. For the first time I can finally see that there will be an end to modern evangelicalism as it splinters off into a multiplicity of factions. All the while, the faithful continue to imbibe sound doctrine, build solid churches, and raise their children in the faith. The way is narrow and few there be that find it.
Rushdoony was a man of letters. He didn't care for book covers and disliked paperbacks. He consumed a book a day for his entire adult life. He accumulated 40,000+ volumes in his personal library by the time he died in 2001.
We at Chalcedon have walked with great thinkers over the years. But, judging by the size of our mailing list in comparison with the multi-billion dollar Christian media industry, we are far from the vision of a theocratic nation. The fictional world of LaHaye and Jenkins is just that -- a fiction. It is a ridiculous portrayal of the future derived from a ridiculous eschatology. It is being packaged by compromised Christian capitalists who easily dispense with ethics when it comes to making a buck.
Those who take them all seriously are in danger of a stomach ulcer. I suggest our far-left critics relax like Rushdoony did, and be confident that the righteous Lord of the Universe will fulfill His will, and discipline His own children for their frivolity. I don't recommend "dignifying" a video game with serious discussion. I know you're worried that young impressionable teenagers will take it all seriously and start shooting unbelievers. Rest assured that will not happen. All you've done at this point is increase the projected sales and inspired investors. Not a smart move.
