Granger, John. Wheaton, IL: Tyndale House/Salt River, 2004. 202 + xxi pp. $16.99 (USD). ISBN: 1-4143-0091-3.

[1] Since the initial American release of Harry Potter and the Philosopher’s Stone in 1998, Harry Potter novels have been at the centre of controversy. Some irate parents have engaged in book-burnings, demanding that Harry Potter be removed from public school libraries, while many parents and teachers have developed elaborate curricula around the books as a means of motivating children to read. Not surprisingly, many observers ascribe the controversy to the ongoing culture wars between conservative Christianity and secularism. The more interesting controversy, however, has been between those Christians who condemn Harry Potter as promoting Wicca and those who see Harry Potter as consistent with, if not supportive of, Christian values. Remarkably, this latter debate is not primarily between conservative and liberal Christians; rather it is a split down the middle of conservative evangelical Christianity.

[2] John Granger has been engaged in this debate among conservative Christians since publishing The Hidden Key to Harry Potter in 2002 (reviewed in the Journal of Religion and Popular Culture 3 [Spring 2003]). He returns to the fray with Looking for God in Harry Potter. This much improved follow-up to Hidden Key represents a thoughtful contribution to Christian argument about Harry Potter.

[3] Granger’s thesis is that Christian parents not only have nothing to fear from the Harry Potter books, they can actually find in the novels profoundly Christian symbols and themes that make them appropriate reading and excellent starting points for theological conversations with their children. He zealously takes on Christians who condemn the books because they are about magic, which he compares to that found in the fantasy books of C.S. Lewis and J.R.R. Tolkien. Granger argues that Rowling, like Lewis and Tolkien, intentionally smuggles in Christian ideas under cover of fantasy literature. Granger is so zealous in his arguments that one would almost conclude that it is not Christian parents who should be afraid of Harry Potter, but rather non-Christian parents who do not recognize the way the novels (in Granger’s oft used quote of C.S. Lewis) “baptize the imagination.”

[4] In response to claims that the Bible condemns positive portrayals of sorcerers and witchcraft, Granger suggests that there is a crucial theological distinction to be made between “invocational” magic and “incantational” magic (4). Invocational magic, which calls upon powers and principalities opposed to God, is what is proscribed by the Bible. Incantational magic is not only “in keeping with a long tradition of English fantasy,” it “shows—in story form—our human thirst for a reality beyond the physical world” (4), a reality that points to Christ. Nowhere in the Harry Potter novels is invocational magic used—even among the evil wizards.

[5] Refining his discussion from Hidden Key, Granger argues that the Harry Potter novels are chock-full of Christian symbols—from the phoenix to the griffin, from Harry’s stag patronus to the unicorn, Rowling uses numerous symbols that have been associated specifically with Christ since medieval literature. This is only natural, Granger says, given that Rowling is not only a member of the Church of Scotland and has a formal education in classical languages and literature, but is a great admirer of C.S. Lewis.

[6] To buttress his argument that the Harry Potter books are Christian, he examines the moral themes that are central to the novels. For example, every novel condemns some form of prejudice—against Muggles, giants, foreigners, the poor, mudbloods, etc. The analogies to our world, he suggests, are obvious. Moreover, like the New Testament, the central theme in each book is that sacrificial love, rather than power, prevails. Love cannot be vanquished by death, and indeed points to a reality beyond death that is efficacious in this life. Even when Harry acts in ways that are morally questionable (e.g., lying to a teacher or acting nasty to a friend), Granger notes that Rowling is realistically depicting Harry in the process of growth in moral identity.

[7] The penultimate chapters of Granger’s book examine in detail each of the first five Harry Potter books to reveal their Christian symbols and themes. These chapters appear to be a direct response to Richard Abanes’ Harry Potter and the Bible: The Menace behind the Magick—a scathing evangelical critique of Rowling’s books. The aim of these chapters is to provide detailed evidence of the Christian elements in the Harry Potter novels and thematic discussion guides for parents and Sunday school teachers who want to use the books to explore theological ideas with children. In keeping with that aim, the final chapter of the book is a practical how-to guide for parents who want to learn how to talk theologically with their children about the books they read.

[8] Granger is chiefly addressing conservative Christians with his arguments. He goes to great lengths to demonstrate his own conservative Christian credentials: he is an ordained Reader in the Orthodox Church; he and his wife home-school seven children; they do not own a television; they are selective in what they allow their children to read; and he did not allow his daughter to read the first Harry Potter novel she had received as a gift from the family pediatrician (whom he knew to be an evangelical Christian) until he read it first.  Of course, that first reading convinced him that this was something that his daughter, and all of his children, should read.

[9] As a Christian trained in Latin and Western classical literature, Granger is able to position himself as a balanced, thoughtful reader of Rowling’s books. He appears to be developing a following among evangelical Christians. His articles on Harry Potter show up regularly in conservative Christian publications such as Touchstone Magazine and his books are being reviewed positively in conservative Christian on-line magazines, including American Daily and Faithfulreader.com. At times, however, one wonders whether Granger loses his balance. For example, his demeaning comments about the “real-world magic” of Wicca appear uninformed, claiming that “this magic depends on . . .  help from demons and believing you can control what these demons will do” (190). One wonders if his own distinction between incantational and invocational magic might, in fact, apply to real “real-world” members of Wicca.

[10] Scholars of religion and culture may be interested in Granger’s book primarily as an example of what I take to be an increasing tendency among conservative Christian thinkers to move away from simple condemnation of all that passes as popular culture toward a more considered engagement with what popular culture has to offer. Put differently, Looking for God in Harry Potter represents a departure from a stance that H. Richard Niebuhr described as "Christ against culture" toward a stance of "Christ transforming culture." As such, Granger's most significant contribution may be his modeling of a constructive way for conservative evangelicals to think about how Christian values might relate to the wider culture.

Paul Custodio Bube
Lyon College
Batesville, Arkansas
pcbube@lyon.edu