Educators Offer Critical Review of Pullman’s Trilogy

The following is a review of Pullman’s trilogy by two Catholic educators, Susan Tenbusch and Mary Teresa Tenbusch, posted here with their permission. The authors encourage readers, if they so wish, to copy and spread their review.

The His Dark Materials trilogy by Philip Pullman is an award-winning fantasy series (theo-fiction, a genre mixing theology and fiction) for grade-school children, has been made into a movie, which was released on December 7. (A question apparently remains as to whether or not God will be mentioned in the movie version, even though he is central to the theme of the books.)

In the His Dark Materials trilogy, the girl, Lyra (raised as an orphan), leaves the Oxford of her universe on a journey to reach her father and to locate kidnapped children. In another universe, inhabited by consciousness-eating beings (SK, p. 215) (Editor’s Note 1), she meets Will (raised by his mother who suffers from mental illness), a boy from our universe, who is intent on finding his missing father. At this point, Lyra is interested in "Dust," which is identified, among other things, with dark matter (SK, p. 91) or elementary particles (GC, p. 371-372) (Editor’s Note 2), but which is also described as matter that is "conscious" (AS, pp. 31-32, 222) (Editor’s Note 3) and able to communicate with human beings (AS, pp. 370, 440), and even portrayed as associated with original sin (AS, p. 223).

In contrast to the Catholic belief that children are afflicted with original sin at the moment they come into existence (Rom 5:12) and that they are able to commit personal sins as soon they reach the age of reason, in this trilogy, original sin appears to be linked to puberty and sexuality. At puberty, "dæmons" (the concretizations of souls, generally as the opposite sex (GC, p. 77)) bring impure thoughts (GC, p. 284), a state of experience replaces one of innocence (GC, p. 373), and "Dust," proof of original sin that can be perceived by the senses (GC, p. 371), settles on people in a significant amount (GC, p. 375). By dividing souls from bodies, "Dust" (in this context, seemingly synonymous with original sin) can no longer dominate human life (GC, p. 375).

After various adventures, separations and reunions, the two children set out for a realm reminiscent of the underworld of Greek mythology, from which they free all the ghosts of those who have died by leading them out to where they will blend with the rest of the universe (AS, p. 364). In the trilogy, Lyra, in fact, is touted as another Eve, in that she will be tempted (AS, p. 68) and be responsible for a choice with definitive and universal ramifications (AS, p. 66). Apparently the temptation Lyra must overcome is that of remaining with Will to the detriment of the various universes, whose passages to other worlds must be closed for their proper restoration (AS, pp. 484, 491-492).

Meanwhile, a great war is being waged. Lyra’s mother, Mrs. Coulter, for motives of power, is connected with a Church (caricatured) organization engaged in cutting souls (dæmons) away from bodies (GC, pp. 282-284, 374-375), ostensibly to prevent sin. (Although, in the trilogy, souls can be killed (AS, p. 467), this procedure only results in creatures that can only be described as the living dead (GC, p. 375).) Lyra’s father, Lord Asriel, is interested in this procedure on account of the tremendous amount of energy released in the process, which he uses to transport himself into another universe (GC, pp. 375-376, 393). He is busy preparing a revolt against God (AS, pp. 210-211), the first being to coalesce from "Dust" (AS, pp. 31-32), and against his "regent" (AS, pp. 31-32, 399), who, in turn is seeking to acquire Will’s ability to create openings between universes. To add to the suspense, in this story, the Church sends out a priest to murder Lyra before she is tempted (AS, p. 71).

At the end of the trilogy, Lord Asriel and Mrs. Coulter throw themselves into a pit taking the "regent" with them (AS, p. 409), the priest determined to kill Lyra falls fatally into a small canyon trying to kill an angel (AS, p. 469), and Lyra and Will return to their own worlds, leaving angels to close all the passages to other worlds except the one to that of the dead (AS, p. 494).

A fictitious version of the Church plays a central and negative role in this trilogy. In Lyra’s world (a universe parallel to our own), the Church has a different history: in the past, a character called Pope John Calvin moved to Geneva to establish a totalitarian regime. The papacy died with him, only to be replaced by a magisterium composed of "councils," "courts," and "colleges" (GC, p. 30). It is even possible that the Church may disappear altogether in its fight against what it perceives as evil (AS, 71).

Present and accounted for, in the His Dark Materials trilogy, and presented with the prevalent inattention to the full range of historical facts available to the serious student of history, are the "usual suspects" that occupy such a prominent place in much anti-Catholic literature. The Inquisition is mentioned (GC, p. 127), and the Church in Lyra’s world practices torture (SK, pp. 38-39; AS, pp. 70-74), sentences people to death (SK, p. 46), considers unproved scientific claims (in the context of this trilogy) to be heresy (GC, pp. 30-31), and rewards scientific discovery with excommunication (GC, p. 376). It would appear that the Galileo case, in which theologians, philosophers and a scientist all overstepped the bounds of their respective fields, and which was definitively put to rest by Pope John Paul II in 1992 (1), has been disinterred yet again. Likewise, it would seem that the Black Legend which exaggerated the facts and figures of the Spanish Inquisition, and was so often embellished in the past for motives either political (denouncing Spanish rule) or religious (promoting novel ideas by positing an imaginary underground church apart from the Catholic Church in earlier centuries), has been exploited again. It is worth recalling that on March 12, 2000, John Paul II asked, among others, Cardinal Ratzinger, then Prefect of the Congregation for the Doctrine of the Faith (what was formerly called the Holy Office and in charge of the Roman phase of the Inquisition), to apologize during a Lenten penitential ceremony for past sins committed in the name of faith and morals, which he, in fact, did (2).

The Church in the trilogy not only appears in an evil light, it acts in a manner directly opposed to authentic Catholic teaching (GC, p. 373; SK, p. 38; AS, pp. 68-69), practices divination (AS, p. 69), and teaches erroneous doctrines (GC, p. 373; AS, pp. 71-72, 464, 469, 491). Among the latter are found, for example, the novel concepts of "preemptive penance" and "preemptive absolution," involving doing a certain amount of mortification (e.g. flagellation) and receiving pardon in advance for the purpose of committing a sin later in good conscience (AS, pp. 71-72).

The Church is further portrayed as obsessed with sin, to the point of sanctioning an operation to separate people’s souls (dæmons) from their bodies to prevent original sin (GC, p. 375), and as antagonistic to human sexuality, to the extent of promoting the mutilation of children (SK, p. 50). In the parallel world, the clergy are willing to sacrifice the existence of the Church to rid the world of sin (AS, p. 71). An ex-nun of the Catholic Church is, in fact, presented in a positive light for turning her back on her faith and rejecting her vow of chastity (SK, pp. 91, 249; AS, pp. 441-447).

The trilogy not only presents the Church in an unfavorable light, it is based on a doctrine which is not Christian. Many of the concepts in the His Dark Materials trilogy by Philip Pullman are shared with the "New Age" movement. According to the Vatican document, Jesus Christ, The Bearer of the Water of Life, explicitly addressing the New Age Movement, some features of this movement are the rejection of a personal God (3) and the acceptance, at least implicitly, of pantheism (4); a focus on mediating spirits apart from God (5); the discarding of institutional religion (6) in favor of Gnosticism (7) and Eastern religions (8); and a "spirituality" encompassing elements from all religions (9). The document warns that many of the movements behind the New Age Movement are frankly anti-Christian (10), and that the idea of the philosopher, Nietzsche, namely, that Christianity stunts human development, has gained credence (11). The Vatican adds that the New Age Movement seeks to overcome what it calls "dualism," ignoring the real distinction between the Creator and creation, between man and nature, between spirit and matter (12), and also speaking of an androgyny both in the entirety of creation (13) and within every person (14). The universe is composed of interrelated entities (15) and is replete with cosmic energies (16).

In the His Dark Materials trilogy, "Dust," of which all things are said to be composed, describes itself both as spirit and as matter, because there is no real distinction between the two (SK, p. 249). Everything is living (AS, p. 449). This identification of matter and spirit, the inert and the living, is a feature of pantheism, the philosophical system mentioned above as characteristic of the New Age movement. In the pantheistic system of thought, the universe and God (an uncreated but, obviously, an impersonal being) are one, existing and acting by necessity (being unable to do otherwise), and constantly evolving (from unconsciousness toward consciousness). In the pantheistic system, in fact, all is one: truth is the same as falsity, good is the same as evil. The dictates of conscience, beliefs that certain things are true, perceptions of freedom, and impressions of individuality or personality are declared illusory (a statement, however, that cannot legitimately be made within this system of thought, since it invokes the distinction between truth and falsity).

As can be expected in an essentially pantheistic worldview (or even a completely materialistic one), the universes of the trilogy are subject to fate (GC, p. 310). If things are the way there are of necessity, or if all can be reduced to matter and material (physical, chemical, etc.) processes, there is no place for free will, no reward of goodness and no punishment of evil. Furthermore, there is no room for an afterlife, because nothing spiritual survives the body.

As a result, in the trilogy, although, incomprehensible as it may be, the dead have congregated in a sort of netherworld, or "prison camp" created by God (AS, p. 33), this situation is only temporary. Heaven is an illusion (AS, p. 33), and Lyra and Will meet a number of disillusioned ghosts in the netherworld including a martyr who considers it unfair that both the good, who have foregone the pleasures of this world or even given up their lives, and the evil end up in the same place (AS, p. 320). This martyr believes blending with the material universe is her true destiny and looks forward to it (AS, p. 320). The ghosts that Lyra and Will lead out of the netherworld also literally become one with nature in a cosmic form of recycling (AS, p. 364). There is no room in these books for the immaterial, and, therefore, incorruptible, soul wished by a loving God to be reunited with its resurrected body in eternal life with him, in whom it finds its own fulfillment (17) (Gen 2:7, Jas 2:26, Gal 5:17, Job 19:26, 1 Cor 15:12-58, Jn 6:40, 14:2-3, 1 Cor 13:10). Likewise, there is no room for a just God (Rev 15:3), who, because of his own goodness and mercy (Ps 79:9, 107:1), respects human freedom (Sir 17:1-15, Dt 30:15-20, Ezek 18:21-32), without which there is no sense in reward or punishment, and binds himself both to treat those in this life with forbearance (2 Pet 3:9) and to reward goodness and punish evil in the next (Heb 11:6).

St. Thomas Aquinas holds that to have knowledge of a material thing is to possess the thing in an immaterial way, for to possess it in a material way would be in some way to become it (18). Since the activity of the intellect, a faculty of the soul, is immaterial, Aquinas holds that the soul itself must be immaterial, therefore incorruptible, and therefore immortal (19). The fact that the intellect can comprehend things that are not material (e.g. imaginary numbers in mathematics, abstract and universal concepts, necessarily true judgments, etc.) further indicates that its nature is itself immaterial. Likewise, the intellect’s capacity to be present to itself (unimpeded by extension and quantity) in reflection, awareness of itself as knowing, also gives evidence of its immateriality. Although the senses supply a physical brain with their sensations and sensual representations, out of which the intellect forms ideas, the senses and brain are conditions, not the causes of thought (20). (Indeed, brain cells do not function if deprived of a life principle.) After denying the existence of an immaterial intellect, and identifying thought with only the mechanical processes of sensation and the physical changes within the brain, a person cannot logically pass beyond the realm of the sensual, either to posit an external world or to form concepts, make judgments, and perform reasoning, all of which require abstraction (the passage from the particular data of the senses to a universal idea, e.g. the eye’s perception of an object’s being red to the mind’s idea of redness).

Aquinas, furthermore, writes that man acts freely (not through instinct or fate). Human reason is able to follow opposite courses in contingent (able to be or not to be or to be otherwise) matters, and the human will may, thus, be inclined to various things. Man can be said to judge freely, through a mental act of comparison, what should be sought or avoided in particular instances, and in following this judgment can be described as acting freely (21). Free will is, thus, a capacity of the immaterial soul, and of the spiritual order, and is, therefore, not governed by physical laws. It is valuable to realize that by simultaneously acknowledging that individuals have an awareness of personal free will and declaring that this awareness is an illusion, pantheism makes a distinction between the world of thought and the world of actual existence, a distinction that cannot be made by a philosophy holding that all is one and the same.