Ben Crowder

The Church recently released a new booklet called “Let Virtue Garnish Thy Thoughts” (they have a PDF version available online), and there’s a paragraph I really like:

Some materials that are not explicitly pornographic can still fill your life with darkness and deprive you of spiritual strength. Television programs, pictures, movies, songs, and books often treat unchastity and infidelity as common, appealing, and humorous. Avoid anything that drives the Holy Ghost from your life.

Amen! I see too many people willingly consuming entertainment (in whatever form) that treats the sacred as “common, appealing, and humorous.” Many will say that it’s “not that bad,” that it’s not explicit or what have you. But it’s the philosophy behind it that bothers me. If we imbibe the philosophies of men, we will be affected, and our worldview will change. Period. Especially if we do so on a regular basis. I’ve seen it happen in some of my friends who treat unchastity as a joke, who think of procreation as something common. They wouldn’t say that outright, of course, but it comes through very clearly in the things they say.

While I don’t watch TV, my roommates do, and so I’ve overheard various sitcoms over the past few months. Beyond the vacuous stupidity that runs rampant in this mindless entertainment, inevitably there’s a casual attitude toward sex. Almost every show! It bothered me, but I don’t think it bothered them. They’ve been immunized, I suppose. Actually, desensitized is a more accurate word, and that is precisely what the adversary wants us to be. If we can’t tell that evil is evil, we’re fair game for his twisted and perverse pleasures, enveloping us in a blackening darkness. And from there it isn’t hard to be sucked into the black hole of pornography and fornication and all the rest.

Returning to the topic of TV and movies with said philosophies, it seems like everyone’s watching them. But I’m not a lemming. Sure, at times I feel somewhat out-of-the-circle because everybody’s talking about the latest movie or episode of whatever (I’m tempted to name names but I won’t), but frankly, I’d rather have the Spirit. And yes, by implication that does indeed mean that I feel watching those types of movies and TV shows will drive the Holy Ghost from our lives. And reading through that booklet above implies that the First Presidency agrees. I think I’m in good company here. :)

(Thank heavens for my iPod, by the way. I crank Beethoven’s Ninth up loud enough and soon I can’t hear the TV anymore. :))

[tags]LDS, Mormon, pornography[/tags]