This is Faith in Play #28: Vampires, for March 2020. When Tim Brown suggested I explore the subject of the undead, I was, I think the word is, nonplussed. Maybe that’s too strong a word–but I’ve never really been a fan of the undead generally, and I find that they are very popular in popular … [Read more…]
This is Faith in Play #27: Believing Balance, for February 2020. Over a year ago we began a series on the notion that in the Original Advanced Dungeons & Dragons® game system alignment was the True Religion, what characters actually believed. We have since examined those beliefs in Goodness, Wickedness, Order, and Individualism, the four … [Read more…]
This is Faith in Play #22: Individualism, for September 2019. Quite a few years ago now I was playing a character in an experimental Attorney class in a game largely based on original Advanced Dungeons and Dragons™. I had just successfully defended a player character (an Antipaladin) on a murder and robbery charge, and the … [Read more…]
This is Faith in Play #21: Villainy, for August 2019. It was a year ago, but I had a stack of articles in the queue when it happened, and decided not to disrupt the plan by answering what appeared to be a question from a Troll posted to our Facebook page (I managed to lose the … [Read more…]
This is Faith in Play #18: Order, for May 2019. A lot of people think that lawful (and specifically lawful good) is The Christian alignment in Dungeons & Dragons™. They think this because they associate it with keeping the rules, and they think that Christianity is about keeping the rules. I would disagree on two … [Read more…]
This is Faith in Play #14: Wickedness, for January 2019. In discussing Dungeons & Dragons® alignment, as we began last May with True Religion and continued looking at that which the game calls “good” in Goodness, it is important to remember that each alignment is something in which people actually believe. That becomes a problem … [Read more…]
This is Faith in Play #6: True Religion, for May 2018. In the earliest versions of Dungeons & Dragons™, the original role playing game from which all others (including those electronic games that call themselves “RPGs”) are descended, there was a rules section known as alignment. Many players did not understand it; many gamers did … [Read more…]
Therefore do not let what is for you a good thing be spoken of as evil. These words of the Apostle Paul in Romans 14:16 are cause enough for us to tell the world that role playing games such as Dungeons & Dragons™ are a good thing which Christians can and perhaps should embrace, enjoy, … [Read more…]
There are ultimately two views of the universe. It is not quite so simple as the Christian view versus everyone else; that which Christians believe about the universe is shared by many other people. But the prevailing view of the age is not the Christian view; and if we are to bring our faith to … [Read more…]
Last month as we explored ways to express our faith in our gaming, we suggested that it could be done by playing the Good Guys. But we also insisted that this was not the only way it could be done. In fact, quite unexpectedly, we can often bring our faith to bear on a game … [Read more…]