This is Faith in Play #86: Tempters, for January 2025.
We received a question via our Facebook page. The page exists mostly to alert people to this site and to our e-mail discussion group, but we often interact with people who post or message us there. This was a particularly good question; I shall leave the name of the questioner out of it, although if he wishes to identify himself in the comments that would be welcome.
The questioner wrote (formatted and slightly edited for form):
I have a question regarding the ethic of roleplaying. Consider the following: real life people exist in game worlds–like Satan for example. As a game master I am supposed to play such a being. That means I must try to corrupt a player. The skills required to do such are based in reality as Satan is real. Since I am a sinner and therefore subject to falling, what stops me from being evil, corruptor, non-righteous person like any one I might create in a game? People are predictable by nature and characters are supposed to be real; the skills used are transferable. What’s the difference spiritually between me trying to corrupt someone and my character trying to corrupt someone, as a game master? It’s a spiritual scenario. Salesmen, politicians, etc. use skills to change the minds of others. What’s the difference between me as a game master doing it and anyone like that?
I knew a few Chistians who were against satanism who turned anyway. I know that I’ve been told that when i confess that I sin a sin I am a sinner, that I am lukewarm and therefore my faith is weak and I am subject to losing salvation.
I wrote a brief (O.K., I have a doctorate in law) response, promised to cover it more fully, and then posted the question and my response to the guild discussion list. I received several suggestions there, focusing on two issues I had not addressed–and I’ll admit that I did not mention them because I am not certain even everyone in the guild would agree. However, the question and the answers are worth discussing.
The first point is whether you can lose your salvation. This is a bit controversial. Many believers will point out that our salvation is dependent entirely on God, and nothing we can do will change that. I even know a pastor of a Free Will Baptist Convention church who had to explain to the denomination why he was persuaded that on this point they were mistaken, that our salvation was certain because it relied not on us but on Jesus. I am so persuaded. However, I am fully aware that not all Christians hold this doctrine, even within our guild, and the questioner clearly believes he knows people who fell away. I want to assure him, and you, that God is not going to let you fall so easily. Peter denied ever having known Jesus, and God brought him back.
The second significant point involves character identification. The questioner asserts, “I must try to corrupt a player.” The objection to this is that the reality is that your character is trying to corrupt the player’s character. There is a distinction there, and in most games in which something like this is expected to occur there is a mechanic for it–a die roll, a point score, a way to determine whether the character stands or falls. Of course, not all games have this, and not all players easily grasp a player/character distinction, so that aspect of character identification is not negligible.
Some would ask why you would be playing Satan anyway. If the role makes you uncomfortable, don’t play it. That doesn’t mean it’s wrong to include Satan as a character–in our Spooky New Orleans setting my collaborator and I used in the Multiverser novel Con Version, the central characters go head-to-head with the Devil in a fight for the soul of the city. As I have written elsewhere, we all have limits, some in one thing, some in another. If for you playing the devil would play to your weakness, don’t do it. That doesn’t mean that doing so is bad for everyone, or even that it could never be beneficial for some. We are to be as wise as serpents. There is a degree to which we are instructed to understand the ways of the devil. The value of C. S. Lewis’ book The Screwtape Letters lies in elucidating how the tempter works. Learning that helps us recognize and resist it when we face it.
Admittedly, Lewis commented that writing the series (originally serialized in a newspaper) was not always pleasurable, as getting into the mindset of the devil was easier than getting out of it again. Certainly that is a danger. On the other hand, the benefits of perceiving that mindset may outweigh the hazards.
The questioner cites salesmen and politicians using techniques to change people’s minds, as if that were a bad thing. Let me add evangelists and pastors to the list. Learning how to change people’s minds is not a bad thing in itself; it is a tool which can be used for bad, but also for good.
I am going to list a few more articles which I think might be helpful in this regard:
- Faith and Gaming: Bad Guys, suggesting how playing the villain can glorify God by displaying the nature of evil.
- Faith and Gaming: Bad Things, talking about the benefits of dark settings.
- Faith and Gaming: Characters, exploring the benefits of understanding how others think.
- Faith and Gaming: Devil’s Game, showing how even the most innocuous activities can be tools of Satan if we allow them.
- Faith and Gaming: Deals, discussing how the Faustian story of temptation can be a Christian game.
- Faith in Play #12: Fiction and Lies, distinguishing role play from deception.
- Faith in Play #13: The Evils of Monopoly®, looking at the temptations of another game.
- Faith in Play #21: Villainy, considering the motivations of players who prefer to play evil characters.
- Faith and Gaming: Rogues, looking at positive lessons we can learn from the thieves and similar characters.
- RPG-ology #33: Flirting, examining the aspect of exploring who we might be.
- Faith in Play #52: Pirates, considering the good we can learn from playing brigands.
I hope this helps.
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