No Muggles- Nobody Left Behind (On How Harry Potter Got Me to Wheatstone This Summer) Part III/III

Last updated on: June 18, 2015 at 8:50 pm by John Mark N. Reynolds

No Muggles- Nobody Left Behind (On How Harry Potter Got Me to Wheatstone This Summer) Part III/III 2015-06-18T20:50:29-04:00 John Mark N. Reynolds

LOGO Patheos Explore the world's faith through different perspectives on religion and spirituality! Patheos has the views of the prevalent religions and spiritualities of the world.

Mr. Weasley is more important than you might think if you read the Harry Potter series without care. Mr. Weasley is brave enough and a good enough employee at the Ministry of Magic, which turns out to be rare, but that is not what taught me something so important that I have to go to Wheatstone Academy this summer. Mr Weasley is fascinated by Muggles, the wizarding name for the not magical we that live with no hope of ever going to Hogwarts.He loves toying with our stuff and is always shocked at the clever devices we invent to make do without magic.

We built the trains. Magic did something with else with it.

It isn’t much, but it shows that J.K. Rowling grasps something very important, even if most of her readers forget it. A world only looks exotic if you are outside of it. In CS Lewis’ Narnia books, Prince Caspian makes this point to the children from our own Earth. Caspian tells them that Narnia is much less interesting, though a more pleasant place to live, when the children are not called to save it. The King of Narnia is also fascinated by the notion of living on a spherical world. The children have to disappoint him by saying it is much less interesting than it sounds. People do not know when they are walking “upside down.”

“Exotic” can, in fact, become a way of marginalizing something different. What we do is “normal” and what somebody else does it cool because it is weird. This is acceptable in the shock of newness, especially in children, but troubling in adults who have more than a second to think. Contrary to what a student once asked me in class, English is not “real” while everyone else speaks something exotic.

And yet Mr. Weasley dimly recognizes that Muggles are not people without magic, they are people with science. Wizards and witches still use owls to get the mail . . . we use email and do not force any owls to serve us. By developing a culture around magic (that actually works!), the magical community has made a choice and the choice has stunted their development in other areas.

Just as one cannot spend four hours after work in the gym and four hours after that learning Latin, so wizards and witches could not develop the arts, history, and culture taught at Hogwarts and produce the art of the Renaissance or jazz or Disney animation.

So what? Is there nothing more here than everyone has a gift, but developing that gift precludes something else? That every culture under God’s heaven has a calling, but fulfilling that calling takes up time from other things? If there was, that would be something.

We all choose or have choices made for us by our heritage. Nor is the message of Mr. Weasley merely that one man’s fascination is another man’s normal work day. A computer is (evidently) as magical to a wizard as a working wand would be to me. Everyone is exotic to somebody else and every exotic thing becomes routine when done enough times.

As CS Lewis pointed out, if Arthur Conan Doyle had captured fairies in photographs they would be like elephants in the zoo: cool at first, nice to look at, but you would not want to own one. Jurrasic World shows how quickly awe and wonder can become boredom and I never met a soul who like being bored.

So here is the deeper truth Mr. Weasley has grasped: nothing is routine. If I wake up to my world, this moment, this ability to capture this text on this Surface is remarkable. I dreamed of such devices as a child . . . and tried to make computers like those I saw on Star Trek and now I own a better one. It sends a shiver down my spine. The wizard world never sees how awesome it is until a “first year” from a non-wizarding family comes to Hogwarts and takes in the wonder they have taken for granted. The Weasley twins have some good pranks, but my roommates in college could have shown them a trick or two.

So it goes. We forget that before the throne of Creator God there will be many tongues, languages, and peoples all being themselves. Holiness is the same for all creation, God is Holy, but that leaves almost everything for us to do or not do. We fixate on a few things that we cannot do and forget the nearly infinite diversity in infinite combinations of Creation. (Thank you, Rev Spock!)

In this glorious Christendom, nobody is left behind or needs to be forgotten. Every lack is an opportunity. Every opportunity produces something wonderful if we allow the Spirit to reconcile us with Goodness.

Wheatstone for me is a chance to renew my wonder in the most magical process I know: the dialectic. There I face open ended questions about everything and enjoy seeing “first years” see the very stairs they have just climbed rhetorically move out from under their feet! I can’t wait.

________________________________

Part I is here.

Part II is here.

Spiritual Reflections

Previous Post

June 17, 2015

Find Good Friends and Stick It Out OR How Harry Potter got me to Wheatstone this Summer (Part II/III)

Next Post

June 18, 2015 One Way to Honor the Dead: Get Rid of the Flag of Treason and Slavery

Browse Our Archives

Select a Category Apologetics Art Culture Education On Books On Education Philosophy Politics Pop Culture Spiritual Reflections Uncategorized

Select a Month October 2026 September 2026 August 2026 July 2026 July 2025 June 2025 September 2024 July 2024 June 2024 December 2023 June 2023 September 2022 May 2022 April 2022 March 2022 February 2022 July 2021 June 2021 May 2021 April 2021 March 2021 February 2021 January 2021 December 2020 November 2020 October 2020 September 2020 August 2020 July 2020 June 2020 May 2020 April 2020 March 2020 February 2020 January 2020 December 2019 November 2019 October 2019 September 2019 August 2019 July 2019 June 2019 May 2019 April 2019 March 2019 February 2019 January 2019 December 2018 November 2018 October 2018 September 2018 August 2018 July 2018 June 2018 May 2018 April 2018 March 2018 February 2018 January 2018 December 2017 November 2017 October 2017 September 2017 August 2017 July 2017 June 2017 May 2017 April 2017 March 2017 February 2017 January 2017 December 2016 November 2016 October 2016 September 2016 August 2016 July 2016 June 2016 May 2016 April 2016 March 2016 February 2016 January 2016 December 2015 November 2015 October 2015 September 2015 August 2015 July 2015 June 2015 May 2015 April 2015 March 2015 February 2015 January 2015 November 2014 October 2014 September 2014 August 2014 July 2014 June 2014 May 2014 April 2014 March 2014 February 2014 January 2014 December 2013 November 2013 October 2013 September 2013 August 2013 July 2013 June 2013 May 2013 April 2013 March 2013 February 2013 January 2013 December 2012 November 2012 October 2012 September 2012 August 2012 July 2012 June 2012 May 2012

TAKE THE

Religious Wisdom Quiz

What Christian group is known for door-to-door evangelism?

Select your answer to see how you score.

Baptists Catholics Pentecostals Jehovah’s Witnesses

Books by This Author John Mark Reynolds

See All Titles »