Along those lines, would you give your child a rattlesnake to play with so that he could have his health challenged? Then why let your children read these books and expect their faith to be strengthened? What REAL tools are you giving them to be able to tell the difference between truth and falsehood?

mikeycoke: the “Christian principles” you mention (self sacrifice, honor, courage) are not the sole domain of Christianity. A heathen who has never heard of Christ could display these principles or values as well. (Incidentally, Grace is not a principle but a gift from God – His life within our souls. We cannot gain Grace without Him, so the poor heathen – and the atheist for that matter – is out of luck). Anyway, my point is that even people who do evil can have good principles or rules of behavior. Someone who does not believe in Christ can still believe it is wrong to kill another, or that it is right to sacrifice oneself for the good of others. I DO agree with you that it is for us to proclaim the truth, which is why there is a protest to these books/movie.

Educate and equip your children. Most of all point people to Jesus!

About the books…. I’m an atheist and a huge fan of the trilogy, so my opinion is obviously not going to be similar to yours, but I’ve always thought it was sillly to keep your kids away from something just because it presents a viewpoint you don’t agree with. I read the books when I was a child (a Catholic child) and I wasn’t in the least bit offended or disturbed by it. I thought it was interesting that God and religion were presented as oppressers and enemies of free will, but it didn’t for a second occur to me to change my own opinions because of this. In secondary school I hung around with very strongly religious Catholics, nearly all of whom adored Northern Lights (aka The Golden Compass) and the other two books in the trilogy. I never once heard of any of them getting upset over the anti-religious elements, since apparently they, like me, could tell the difference between fact and fiction.

Personally, if I ever have children I’ll never restrict their reading or viewing habits based on religious elements. If someone comes out with a book series maligning atheism there’ll be no question of keeping it away from my kids as if it was some kind of dangerous poison.

Anyway…. got a bit ranty there. That’s just my two cents. I don’t know why people are getting so upset over the movie, since nearly all of the religous elements have been removed from it anyway.