"Comic Con Christianity"

Greetings Warriors and Scholars.

Image provided by author.

I recently got to read a portion of a new book recently released. "Comic Con Christianity" is written by Jen Shlameuss-Perry. She looks at issues of the Christian life both from the perspective of a fan-girl and as a catholic. This caught my attention for a couple of reasons. Firstly is that I have not seen very many ministry resources for nerds and geeks coming out of the Catholic quadrant of the Church. Note, when I say Church with a capital "C," I mean all who follow Jesus as the Son of God, born of a virgin, liver of a sinless life and bringer of redemption through his death and resurrection. I have served in ministry alongside Catholics in a few occasions and have come to respect many of them, even if I disagree with their organization on a few things. Next, this is coming from a contributor to Geekdom House. A Christian/Nerd bridge building organization I have heard about and with which I might have had some small online interactions or perhaps some interactions with at Gen Con at some point.

The portion I got to read is all about villains. What drives them? Why do we sometimes feel for them even in their terrible choices? How are we similar to them? In this chapter she looks at familiar villains like the Joker, Darth Vader, Magneto, and even Loki but she also shares scripture with us. She helps us look at who we are and challenges us to be aware of our own likeliness to make depraved choices. Along with the villains she has us look at Jonah, Job, and even spends some time in Wisdom, a book the Catholics see as canonical but we Protestants do not. I enjoyed reading a portion of it in this chapter and getting a look at it through her eyes.

She explained in a FB message why she chose to send me this portion:

"I picked this one because it's my favorite chapter. My Master's thesis was on Religious Education as a Ministry of Reconciliation, and everything I do as a pastoral minister and a person stems from my belief that that's what I'm supposed to be about."

Reconciliation is indeed the focus of the last portion of the chapter. Forgiveness would also be a good section header for it. After all the disillusionment experienced by the nerd/gamer/geek culture with the Church, should we not be concerned about it? Even as humans, regardless of our hobby preferences, we need it.

I think this book will help some nerds, both Christian and non-Christian, look at who Jesus is and what we can do to follow Him. I think nerds who are not following Jesus will find her work thought provoking and perhaps even fascinating. If you have a follower of Jesus, esp. a catholic, who does not understand our fondness for these stories this book might help them to see how these stories point back to the redemption provided by Christ. Note this is based on one chapter of the book and not a read-through of the entire book.

To learn more about the book, click here.

Gen Con 2018

Greetings Warriors and Scholars!

I just got back from Gen Con a few days ago. What did I see? I saw a lot, and that is putting it mildly. Over the four days of the con I played 13 games I had not played before. I also was privileged to be on the Christianity and Gaming Panel and still had some time to help author Nathan Marchand with his table in Author's Avenue.

Photo courtesy of A'Campbell Consultants

The panel was a great opportunity to join others in a discussion on how gaming interacts with the Christian life. This is held by the Christian Gamers Guild each year and I have been to the panel before but this was my first time on the panel. People asked questions about going deeper to share Christ with other gamers, about worldview issues and concerns over fictional deities in some games. Also on the panel was a cosplayer and literature expert named John Stanifer as well as Abigail A'Kessler and Katelyn Campbell from A'Campbell Consultants, a couple of ladies that love to help people, churches and other organizations use games for building community. You can see their website: https://www.acampbellconsultants.com/

Now to some games! I won't go over all of the games I played, but here are a few I wanted to tell you about.

Doctor Who: Time of the Daleks.

I did not even get a full demo of this coop, but I was still so intrigued and excited for a Doctor Who game that I bought it. Definitely excited to get it to the table! You must get all of the Tardis pieces to Galifrey before the Dalek ship gets there. Along the way you will fight various monsters from the show and gather companions from throughout the history of the show.

5 Minute Marvel

This was a very fun, cooperative game. If you have played 5 Minute Dungeon you know the basic idea of this game as it is a re-theme. That being said, I really enjoyed myself playing this at their demo booth. It was a very fun experience and I plan on purchasing it at some point.

Ghost Fighting Treasure Hunters

I loved the giant, light up board they had for demoing this game!

This was a neat surprise and also cooperative. The game itself has been out for a couple years but they showed a new expansion with this demo. I had not expected Mattel to put out a game I would enjoy so much or that could be so fun for gamers. The game is about kids fighting ghosts and collecting treasure but the new expansion adds a basement and some story for what is causing the ghosts to haunt the place.

The Kings Guild

This is a fun game still taking pre-orders. I like worker placement games but I don't own very many and this was a very fun time. You are building a guild by collecting resources, adding rooms to your guilds hall, and providing items and weapons for heroes in their quests all to get the attention of a council so your guild can the official guild of the kingdom. You win by having the most points.

Agents of Mayhem

Based on the video game of the same name, this is a light miniature based game that does feel like a lot to learn your first time playing. There are quite a few symbols to learn but it is doable and you get to make significant tactical decisions. I did lose, but my team did destroy a building and I kind of destroyed my own Golem trying to destroy another one. In my defense that building only had one hit point left. I think after another time or two playing I could get used to the symbols and enjoy it quite a bit.




Azul

I played this with some guys at the Love Thy Nerd meetup. It is a tile laying game based on laying decorative tiles for a building. You take turns pulling tiles from a supply and putting them on your board. At the end of each round if you have a full row of the same color you then place one of those tiles on your board, gaining points for that tile and tiles in the same row and/or column. Fun puzzle game and worth noting that it won the Spiel Des Jarhes this year. If you have not hung out with Love Thy Nerd yet, check them out.


Star Trek Fluxx

This one I played at another gathering; this time for the Tavern, the FB group for Innroads Ministries. I am in the group but had not met very many members face to face yet. So this was a great opportunity to connect. There were at least 3 tables with games going but I found myself playing a lot of Fluxx, most of it being Star Trek. There are actually 2 different Star Trek Fluxx games: one for the original series and one for TNG. There is also an expansion that lets you put the two together. We played one round with the original series and one round with both decks put together. I had a lot of fun with it, even as the rules changed continuously as we played different rules cards. If you are not familiar with them, visit the Innroads website here or the FB group here.