I don’t have kids, so I am somewhat isolated from the cultural swim. Hence, I had not given much thought to the Halo video game craze.

That is until I read this column by Paul Proctor on News with Views. Mr. Proctor has been rattling cages for several years about contemporary methods of “doing church”. I have not always agreed with him, but he has had my attention. While I am personally okay with contemporary worship, I have recently gotten concerned about the church becoming too relevant, too seeker-friendly and too much like the secular world.

Mr. Proctor discusses some of the more outlandish ways churches are recruiting new people nowadays. The one that caught my eye was a church here in Metro Denver that I have attended on and off for several years. He refers to a New York Times article on the use of this Halo game to attract teenagers.

I watched a few Halo videos on YouTube. This is violent stuff! What is it doing in church? Christians are famous for crusading against excessive sex and violence in entertainment. They remind us time and again that life imitates art. (After Columbine -- 10 miles from Colorado Community Church -- much was made of the killers’ penchant for violent video games.) However, if violent material gets kids into church, who cares?

Pravda-on-the-Hudson stated “those buying (Halo) must be 17 years old, given it is rated M for mature audiences.” I stopped by Circuit City and, sure enough, all the Halo games were locked in a special cabinet and marked with a big honking letter M.

Christ told His followers to be light in a world of darkness and salt in a world of decay. (Matthew 5:13-16) What better way to do this than to pander to teens with gratuitous violence?

“Witness the basement on a recent Sunday at the Colorado Community Church in the Englewood area of Denver, where Tim Foster, 12, and Chris Graham, 14, sat in front of three TVs, locked in violent virtual combat as they navigated on-screen characters through lethal gun bursts. Tim explained the game’s allure: ’It’s just fun blowing people up.’”

What’s next? Free bottles of Jack Daniels to the first 100 high school students through the door? Howard Stern as a guest speaker? (1) Again, what should it matter as long as it gets kids into church?

I once heard a pastor say he would rather have a congregation of 200 people firmly committed to the inerrancy of Scripture than 5000 people warming pews and writing checks. Romans 12:2 tells us not to be conformed to the world. I used to walk into church and feel that, however imperfect, I was walking into a true refuge from the world outside. This has changed over the years – especially the last three.

Christians need to stop their frivolous top-down moralizing and political campaigning and have a good hard look at what is going on in their own houses of worship. Way too many churches have become little more than elaborate tax shelters and Sunday morning social clubs. Forget whether or not people are growing spiritually; forget whether or not people hunger for righteousness and thirst for a deeper relationship with Jesus; forget what people do during the other166 hours every week. This new time religion is all about the numbers, baby!

Jesus kicked the money changers out of the temple because they had defiled it. (Matthew 21:12) How many pastors have defiled their houses of worship because they sold their souls in the name of church growth? It don't mean a thing if your church ain't got the bling.

There is nothing wrong with a big congregation. If God wants 30,000 people in a church, He will make it happen. That is His Will not ours. People became Christians for centuries on the strength of His Word and the example set by His People. It was not necessary to "package" Christianity.

I have even graver concerns above and beyond these cheap appeals to teen thrill-seeking. Namely, what happens a few years down the road after Beavis and Butthead have graduated from high school?

Bloodlust is all over the contemporary American evangelical church. The most rabid support for the Iraq War comes from evangelicals. What says Christian love like invading a country that has done absolutely nothing to you and killing God knows how many thousands of innocent people? What part of Proverbs 6:16-18 don’t people understand? God HATES hands that shed innocent blood! But millions of evangelicals love such hands!

The same scenario will play out again in Iran. Evangelicals will be the biggest cheerleaders. The Prince of Peace has been morphed into the prince of war.

Concerning domestic affairs, most evangelicals I talk to have no problem whatsoever with:

It’s just fun tasering people. It’s just fun locking people up for victimless offenses. It’s just fun doing warrantless searches. It's just fun kicking down doors on no-knock raids. It’s just fun arbitrarily arresting people and imprisoning them indefinitely without due process. It’s just fun torturing people.

The only time Jesus ever initiated force was when He kicked the money changers out of the temple. His purpose was to purify His Father's House, not to rule His society from the top down. With this in mind, why do so many Christians support this reckless use of force?

In 2004, Pastor Gregory Boyd of St. Paul, Minnesota, delivered a series of sermons entitled the Cross and the Sword in which he discussed, in great detail, the relationship between the Kingdom of God and the kingdoms of man. As Christians, he teaches, we belong first to a Kingdom that is “not of this world”. (John 18:36) And the more we become involved in the kingdoms of the world, the more we become like the world in the very worst way.

Today, a neighborhood church lures you in with M-rated video games. Six years from now, you spray bullets into a crowd of innocent civilians in a place you had never heard of when you were chasing pixels around a computer screen in a church basement. And all the while you thought you were doing the Christian thing.

Matthew 5:16 commands us to “let your light shine before men, that they may see your good deeds and praise your Father in heaven.” I became a Christian in 1986 because of friends who set a godly example with their lives. While they certainly were not perfect, they had a peace and a joy about them that other people did not. They just seemed like they knew something that I desperately needed to know. They had fruit on their tree that I wanted.

I am profoundly grateful that I came into the Kingdom of God this way. It sure beats going to church for years because it was "marketed" to me oh so slickly, and then realizing years down the road that I had missed Christianity altogether.

(1) Lest you think I am exaggerating, look at this link and this link about churches in Tennessee.

(2) I saw this on a bumper sticker one time. I can't help thinking a lot of people actually believe this.

The church needs to get back to basics and what it is called to do, to make disciples of all people. The calling to this Great Commission has never changed. It is not just making converts, but disciples of the True and Living God. -- RB in Colorado

Halo is fun, but using it as a tool to draw in teenagers for Christian fellowship is wrong.

Halo is rated "M" for mature. It is intended for audiences 17 and up. Retailers have to ask customers wishing to buy the game for an I.D. and if they are under 17, they must refuse sale to the minor or risk being fined. How is it okay for a so-called Christian group to undermine these laws?
Halo is decidedly NOT Christian. Coming from a Christian background, I can tell you there is nothing in Halo that can be relayed to the Holy Scriptures. Nothing. You tell me how getting a head-shot for an instant kill is Christian.
It is deceptive to "lure" young boys with the promise of video games just to get them to listen to your message. If your message is worth listening to, people will listen to it. Using a bait to lure them in, and then pulling a switcheroo to send a message of everlasting peace after you just fragged your friends in virtual combat is confusing. In the end, the kids will come out to play Halo, pretend to listen, but all they'll remember is Halo.

Halo by itself is fine, but using it as bait, regardless of how noble your intentions, is wrong. -- RB's 22-year-old son in Colorado

Good grief! This is the first I've heard of such insane tactics, though I've been estranged from organized religion for over a year now. There was plenty in the ordinary teaching that violated the Spirit of God in Christ, without any hint of such horrible things as this video!! But I can't say I'm surprised... -- SC in Wyoming

This is a GREAT line: "What's next? Free bottles of Jack Daniels to the first 100 high school students through the door? Howard Stern as a guest speaker?"

I would have laughed out loud if the tragedy of the modern church institution wasn't so sad. -- TH in Oregon

Halo videos in Church? While we're on the subject, perhaps Quenten Tarantino should give the sermon. Aww, heck, let's have Britney Spears do a performance -- at least it will get people to attend Sunday services.

I read something written by a minister that suprised me -- he said he would prefer the company of atheists to half of the so-called "Christian" members of his Church. As he put it, at least atheists have made a decision; he had a point, interestingly enough. -- JM in Nevada

A very good article; let's compromise the Gospel to make it more palatable to the world. Let's be more like the world so they will like us. Being different from an increasingly wicked world makes it more difficult to get people to come to our church. The goof balls need to remember that the word "Church" means called out. As the world becomes more evil, the differences between us and them should get bigger and bigger. -- DP in Colorado

(One) Sunday I asked for prayer that this unlawful war in Iraq be ended soon. WRONG THING, DOUG! After the service, this boy gave me the coldest brushoff -- it was nothing but SATANIC; the intense destruction I felt directed at my soul from this young person, since I was completely surprised, was withering. After that day, no one would talk to me; his girlfriend laughed and laughed directly AT ME. (And that's the kind of fellowship and intelligent conversation I went there for, ya know.) -- TH in Washington

We've forgotten what church is and what it's for. We leave happy, but that's not the same as having joy. I've come to the conclusion that if a church has more than about 100 members, then it's probably doing something wrong. To put it another way, if you leave church on Sunday morning feeling positive about the human condition, then someone's pulling a fast one on you...

Anyway, your article on the violent video games got me off on this tangent. I guess the point is that very few churches today are teaching the Gospel, about the human condition, about what a Christian should be to and act toward the lost world. Church has become a business. Market it correctly, get as many bodies as possible to open their checkbooks and to Hell with their eternal condition. That's their problem, not mine.

Thanks for another unfortunately true article. -- BM in Florida

Keep in mind that the world is not as it seems. For example, if a "Christian" church congregates on Sunday, and not on the Sabbath, are they true Christians? In this case, the members have been misled. They are following the traditions of man, which the Bible warns us not to do, and not following the laws of God. Knowing this, nothing those "Christians" do should surprise any of us. My suggestion is to find a church that obeys ALL Ten Commandments. In this church, you will not likely find the degree of hypocrisy you find in so many other churches. If each of us does this, and shares our knowledge, it will get us all on the right path. -- JM in California

BLOWING PEOPLE UP:THE FUN, COOL CHRISTIAN THING TO DO

BLOWING PEOPLE UP:
THE FUN, COOL CHRISTIAN THING TO DO