Of Games and God

Of Games and God

For any of you interested in a Christian take on the current Video Game culture, I just came across this recently published book by Brazos. It is written by Kevin Schut, a communications expert and an enthusiastic gamer himself, offers a lively, balanced, and informed Christian evaluation of video games and video game culture. He expertly engages a variety of issues, encouraging readers to consider both the perils and the promise of this major cultural phenomenon. The book includes a foreword by Quentin J. Schultze.

Of Games and God

It’s cheaper to buy it on Amazon.com if you actually want to purchase it. But the above link gives a good deal of easy access to information about the book. Here is the Amazon.com link.

Kevin has also written a good article over on Relevant Magazine’s site called Do Video Games Cause Violence?

Here’s a concluding excerpt that I think we can all agree with:

Do bloodthirsty games encourage me to be bloodthirsty? Am I less sympathetic to the oppressed after playing video games? Am I buying into attitudes and ideologies that I should not, attitudes that glorify destructive acts, inflicting pain and causing death?

The answer may not always be yes, and so the violent video games may be simply OK or even possibly beneficial. But we should always be prepared to think through our game-playing. Unexamined ideas, actions, beliefs and mind-sets can impact us; conscious engagement makes a difference. War, pain, danger, suffering and excitement will always be part of the human condition while we still live. Many video games reflect that reality. Will we use those games to grapple with or to glorify violence?