Harry Potter and the Fleetwood Approbation

I must admit, I am a Harry Potter fan. I know that doesn’t sit well in some circles. Some see in Harry Potter the epitome of the glorification of the occult in modern society. I don’t, and apparently I am not alone.

At a recent press conference, Catholic priest Peter Fleetwood responded to questions about the Potter series by saying:

“Harry Potter does not represent a problem,” Mr. Fleetwood, of the secretariat of the Council of European Episcopal Conferences, also said that “In each one’s childhood there have been fairy godmothers, magicians, angels and witches, which are not bad things but a help for children to understand the conflict between good and evil.”

This has always been my take. The lines between good and evil are clearly drawn. At the center of the ‘good’ in the books has always been love. Not the sentimental gushy type of love, rather a love expressed in self sacrifice. In fact, the reason for Harry’s specialness is because his parents made the ultimate sacrifice for love of him. The books have never been about the magic for me, always the love.

Many times I have detected some very ‘Christian’ elements in her writing. Father Fleetwood says it well:

Mr. Fleetwood believed that the author of the Harry Potter series “is a Christian, perhaps not in the sense that every bishop would like, but she lives like a Christian and writes as such.”

Well, I am not exactly a poster-child for christianity either.

I ordered my copy of the 7th and final book yesterday and will have no qualms about spending all of July 21st reading it.