Beliefnet Article: "Meeting Philip Pullman: A Magical Experience"

From Beliefnet.com:

I am a bit star struck. Well, more than a little bit.

Philip Pullman, author of "His Dark Materials", the subject of a growing controversy from the religious right, and a man who is about to see his extraordinary novel, "The Golden Compass," turned into a movie by New Line Cinema, is this week on a rare visit to the United States. For the last two days, I've had more than just a glimpse of my literary idol: I had the amazing opportunity to sit down and talk to Mr. Pullman at length about theology and Dust and the imagination, among other wonderful things.

When first I learned I'd be having this conversation with Pullman, my stomach tied up in knots. I felt flushed and nervous. You have to understand: I think Pullman is one of the greatest literary figures of our time, and his trilogy, "His Dark Materials," is one of the greatest literary achievements I've ever come across--the kind of story you come back to again and again at different ages, each time discovering something new, reading it in different ways, asking new questions, and realizing there is always more to find with each encounter, all marks of great literatue.

Meeting Philip Pullman was my equivalent of meeting Brad Pitt, one-on-one. And I told Mr. Pullman as much. He laughed very hard and then responded, "No one has ever likened meeting me to Brad Pitt in my entire life." His wife (who was at the table nearby) chuckled and concurred.

And, I am happy to report: he is wonderful! Gracious, funny, brilliant, open-minded, and perfectly willing to sit down with a Catholic scholar like myself and talk theology. Delighted to, I think.

I am even further convinced that if those Christians who are spreading anger and fear about this man and his work actually paid attention to Pullman--listened to him speak, heard him in conversation with an audience, with children (which I had the fortune of doing last night)--they'd realize that the controversy they have been puffing up has no substance. They'd realize that Pullman, in the most fundamental way, is simply an amazing storyteller, a brilliant man who hasn't ever lost the childlike wonder of youth and has a way of spinning this onto the page in the form of questing children and armored bears and aeronaut Texans, a person who delights in children's questions ("If you had a daemon Mr. Pulllman, what would it be?"), and someone who loves to sit down and talk about Big Questions, Big Ideas.

Why in the world are people villainizing a man who has graced (yes, that kind of grace) us with such a rare and wonderful epic adventure, who is a bit awed and delighted himself (if I may speculate after these last two days) that so many people in the world have taken up our alethiometers and subtle knives and entered into this adventure with him?

Beliefnet Article: "'Golden Compass' Controversy Rolls On"

From Beliefnet.com:

Two weeks ago Christians across the United States were abuzz about accusations that British author Philip Pullman allegedly is selling "atheism for kids" (or so says Bill Donohue of the Catholic League) through his multi-award winning, fantasy trilogy "His Dark Materials", which has already sold over 12 million copies worldwide and is coming to the big screen in December in the form of the movie "The Golden Compass."

Last week, during a visit to New York City, Pullman finally got a chance to respond to these accusations and made big headlines once again--this time for not promoting atheism in the trilogy. On Friday he appeared as a guest on the "Today" show, saying that:

What I was mainly doing, I hope, was telling a story, but not a story like Tolkien’s. (To be honest I don’t much care for "The Lord of the Rings.") As for the atheism, it doesn’t matter to me whether people believe in God or not, so I’m not promoting anything of that sort.

It didn't take long for Pullman fansites like Bridgetothestars.net and HisDarkMaterials.org to pick up this side of the controversy.

As I've argued in recent posts, and as a religion scholar who spent the last two years with my co-author and colleague Jason King working on a book about both Philip Pullman's vision of God and God's major significance to the trilogy, the last thing I'd say about Pullman and his stunning story is that his agenda is to sell atheism to kids--or even that he has an agenda at all!

Pullman has been unfairly treated by religious groups that I highly doubt have even read his trilogy.

Unfortunately, Pullman is not out of the woods yet with Christians here in America. Bill Donohue released a statement saying that "Pullman's deceit is appalling" virtually minutes after Pullman's appearance on "Today." MTV.com reports that "the evangelical-activist group Focus on the Family... plans to release a statement about the film early next week, [and] says it's in agreement with Christian leaders and organizations on the issue [of Pullman]." Adam Holz, associate editor of Focus on the Family's Plugged In magazine, told MTV News he fears the movie would "plant seeds" to "ultimately encourage some fans to reject God."

I suspect that many of these alarmists ranting about Pullman and the forthcoming "Golden Compass" movie have read the trilogy in much the same way they read their Bibles: by skimming the stories in order to extract the verses that serve their own agendas, without paying a bit of attention to the larger context or story in which they find the juicy bits.

On Faith: "St. Anthony, Raise Me Up"

From Newsweek.com:

It is difficult to find satisfaction amid great loss. Death and the terminal illnesses of those I love have come in powerful waves ever since I graduated from college, and in the middle of some of the most wonderful moments of my life—graduating with my Ph.D., getting married, writing my first book. I am still waiting for these waters to calm, wondering if they ever will. Betting that I just need to learn to live with it.

I know that death and difficulty is part and parcel of life, and I know that in the grand scheme of the wider world I am fortunate in more ways than I can count. I also feel that familiar twinge of Catholic guilt my Italian mother and grandmother instilled in me for even admitting that life doesn’t feel all that rosy lately.

Grief is a pit I’ve yet to figure a way out of. I find that in the middle of grief, I internalize the negative far more than the positive, allowing the words of those who do not respect me or care little for me to weigh so heavily, while the words of those who love me flutter away before I can catch them. I do not enjoy my successes as much as I should. I take the little things much harder than I would if there wasn’t this layer of sadness under my skin, and I allow the little tasks to pile up until they seem a mountain I can’t climb.

But I also know to count my blessings.

1. The smile that inevitably crosses my face when Dad tells me about his hilarious, “late in life” rules for dating women, a sign that he not only sees life after the death of his wife, my mother, of forty-five years, but he's going to live it in style.

2. The presence of my grandmother when I slip on the bracelets, the rings, the necklaces from the era of her youth to wear them today.

3. The lingering voice of my “Academic Dad”—my adviser, who was the best cheerleader a budding Ph.D. could hope for.

4. My loving husband and his family.

5. My wonderful friends and colleagues.

6. My opportunities to be a writer, a teacher, a scholar.

Just making these lists brings me a little closer to the surface.

And then, of course, I always have my beloved saints. Thank God my mother and grandmother bequeathed me St. Anthony, St. Jude, St. Ann, and others, who gather round me in the saddest times and, together, raise me up.