I think it can be a very good thing to strive to be above reproach. Seriously. Now, I frequently fail. In no uncertain terms, I am not above reproach. What struck me today is that that may well include my reading selections.
I was actually a rather morbid child. I listened to all the sermons about heaven and was asking why we have to live on this earth at all even in preschool. Ha ha, my poor parents. Anyway, we all survived that.
My morbid tendencies that remain include 1) praying for the end of the world with apparently far less hesitation than some, 2) a mindfulness of death (and admittedly woe), and 3) sometimes I just really want to read a dark book or watch a zombie or dystopian movie.
I don’t believe in zombies, and the only Ghost who gets my attention is prefaced “Holy.” I don’t like smutty books. I don’t like cussing, read or spoken, although I’m not particularly shocked by either. But why in the world do I waste my time reading some of the books I do?
I don’t entirely know. Sometimes I am drawn to flawed characters. Others maybe just because the writing might intrigue. Or all those mythic tales from the past . . . I often revisit the different mythologies.
It’s a funny thing, though. Am I supposed to apologize for reading less than stellar stuff? I don’t tend to think so. But then there’s the additional level (see, this is more a psychological question for me than really thinking I need to repent to my fair audience here), why start books I fundamentally disagree with?
I avoid things that will tempt my flesh. Why read mythologies that depict what I know to be false? Well, it’s not quite so simple. One can learn a lot from fiction and, ahem, fiction is not non-fiction.
The latest book I picked up will depict death as a good thing. Death is not my friend. I don’t care if its a mouse or a snake: death jars me and I give thanks to God that it is truly conquered, vanquished, utterly undone. Why am I going so far as to open up my schedule for this thing?
Some people read end of the world books. Why? Will the world end apart from God’s will? Or horsemen of the apocalypse: aren’t they actually on the good side?
Anyway. 🙂 Just thinking about it. For now, I suspect I seek catharsis. Too few authors deliver it. And, I want to read humanizing books, which oddly can draw in strange metaphoric bedfellows.
I wish you well, readers. May our reading choices be good ones and may our tendencies seeking release seek the true release in Jesus Christ, our Lord. 🙂
