Dust to Dust

As the officials of Jordan College gather around the table in the conference room, Lord Asriel explains to them that they are about see something extraordinary. He shows them a picture of a man and his daemon (soul/conscience). Mysterious elements are flowing like golden flakes from out of the daemon into the man and into the sky. As these elements flow into the northern lights of the sky, a city in a parallel universe can be seen in the distance. The scholars seem confused and awed.

“That,” Lord Asriel tells them, “is Dust.”

From everything that I have studied about the novels, Dust is seen by the Magisterium as the elements of Original Sin. Dust is believed to be dangerous and is to never be spoken of. The Magisterium is seen as wanting to destroy it or suppress it from the people. Dust is what links humans with their daemons and what links us all to the universe and beyond.

However, in the film I was lead to believe that Dust was something good. It was seen as the life force in all living creatures. I never understood exactly why the Magisterium feared it. Lord Ariel seem to be exploring matters of faith and mystery and yet the Magisterium was asking people to give up their faith, to quit acting like children and grow up.

In this way, the Magisterium reminded me of the scholars behind the new atheist movement. Men like Richard Dawkins, Christopher Hitchens, and Sam Harris who discourage and deride any and every exploration of faith. They accuse people of faith of chasing after flights of fancy with little regard to reason.

Dust was portrayed in the film as the unknown, as a mystery beyond human understanding. It seemed that if life flowed from this ethereal spirit and that the Magisterium was seeking to cut this life away from the people. The Magisterium offered a life of security and control free from the mysterious Dust. Lord Asriel was seen as a fool who traded security for the unknown.

The Bible speaks of a spirit that brings us life and that connects us with a world beyond our own.

1Corinthians 2:10-15
“The Spirit searches all things, even the deep things of God. For who knows a person’s thoughts except that person’s own spirit within? In the same way no one knows the thoughts of God except the Spirit of God. We have not received the spirit of the world but the Spirit who is from God, that we may understand what God has freely given us. This is what we speak, not in words taught us by human wisdom but in words taught by the Spirit, explaining spiritual realities with Spirit–taught words. The person without the Spirit does not accept the things that come from the Spirit of God but considers them foolishness, and cannot understand them because they are discerned only through the Spirit. The person with the Spirit makes judgments about all things, but such a person is not subject to merely human judgments,”

2Corinthians 3:6
“He has made us competent as ministers of a new covenant—not of the letter but of the Spirit; for the letter kills, but the Spirit gives life.”

Galatians 4:4-7
“But when the set time had fully come, God sent his Son, born of a woman, born under the law, to redeem those under the law, that we might receive adoption to sonship.Because you are his sons, God sent the Spirit of his Son into our hearts, the Spirit who calls out, “Abba, Father.” So you are no longer slaves, but God’s children; and since you are his children, he has made you also heirs.”

1John 4:13
“This is how we know that we live in him and he in us: He has given us of his Spirit.”

The Spirit is something that is promised to every person who seeks to follow Jesus. It speaks to the mysteries of the created world and guides us into the way of life. There are people that want to cut us away from these mysteries. They seek to make us grow up and to forget about the foolish things of our childhood. They seek to snuff out the “irrational, the unknown, and the religious.” These people however have nothing to do with true Christianity or with Jesus. Jesus offers us a life full of the Spirit, of wonder, of mystery.

I’m chasing the mystery.

Psalms 139:1-18
“You have searched me, LORD, and you know me. You know when I sit and when I rise; you perceive my thoughts from afar. You discern my going out and my lying down; you are familiar with all my ways. Before a word is on my tongue you, LORD, know it completely. You hem me in behind and before, and you lay your hand upon me. Such knowledge is too wonderful for me, too lofty for me to attain. Where can I go from your Spirit? Where can I flee from your presence? If I go up to the heavens, you are there; if I make my bed in the depths, you are there. If I rise on the wings of the dawn, if I settle on the far side of the sea, even there your hand will guide me, your right hand will hold me fast. If I say, “Surely the darkness will hide me and the light become night around me,” even the darkness will not be dark to you; the night will shine like the day, for darkness is as light to you.

For you created my inmost being; you knit me together in my mother’s womb. I praise you because I am fearfully and wonderfully made; your works are wonderful, I know that full well. My frame was not hidden from you when I was made in the secret place. When I was woven together in the depths of the earth, your eyes saw my unformed body. All the days ordained for me were written in your book before one of them came to be. How precious to me are your thoughts, God! How vast is the sum of them! Were I to count them, they would outnumber the grains of sand— when I awake, I am still with you.”

The number one movie of this past weekend was The Golden Compass which made an estimated 26 million dollars. For weeks a controversy over this film and the book series that it is based on has been brewing over the supposed anti-Christian messages being sold to small children with Narnia -like animals, Harry Potter-like magic, and Lord of the Rings-style epic storytelling.

I saw the film on Friday and walked away unimpressed. The story seemed rushed, the characters seemed flat, and the ending was paced very oddly. There was a great polar bear fight with a surprising and satisfying payoff but is was not enough to save this film for me. I could not imaging taking a group of 10 year olds to this film and expecting them to sit still during the almost 2 hour screening.

However, one positive outcome from seeing the film. I found 3 elements of this story that, I believe, Christians can use to discuss their faith with those who have seen the film. This week I’ll be posting these three points for you. Let’s get to it.

1) The Magisterium
According to Entertainment Weekly, the Magisterium is a “fractured church-like body with power over every aspect of life. No Pope, and about as Christian as the Inquisition.” In the film the members of the Magisterium dress like bishops and cardinals and are seen as opposing free will and free thought. The books refer to the Magisterium as “the Church” and they serve a higher being known as “The Authority.” The film briefly mentions “the Authority” but it wasn’t clear to me that the name addressed a being.

The members of the Magisterium meet is secret meetings and slink around with duplicitous looks. In one scene, a top official tries to poison one of the main characters. In another a group of elders are seen conspiring to consolidate power through fear and coercion. All of this leads up to what the Magisterium is really up to.

They seek to separate children from their daemons (souls) in an effort to keep them “safe” from Dust (more on that later) and to help them “grow up.” By growing up and maturing these children can put away childish questions and flippant behavior and get down to the real business of serving the Magisterium’s agenda. Soulless beings are more manageable than beings full of life. We meet one little boy who has lost his daemon. He is a shell. He is nearly physically dead and we see that he has been spiritually ravaged.

In my eyes, the men and women of the Magisterium seem more like Pharisees than a true church body. It was Jesus who said that in order to follow him into the Kingdom of God we must have faith like children.

“He called a little child, whom he placed among them. And he said: “Truly I tell you, unless you change and become like little children, you will never enter the kingdom of heaven. Therefore, whoever takes a humble place—becoming like this child—is the greatest in the kingdom of heaven. And whoever welcomes one such child in my name welcomes me. “If anyone causes one of these little ones—those who believe in me—to stumble, it would be better for them if a large millstone were hung around their neck and they were drowned in the depths of the sea” (Matthew 18:2-6 )

This one was easy. Anyone or group who claims to serve the Lord will speak and act like the Lord. Their agenda is God’s agenda: bringing life to the dead. The Magistirium brought the characters in TGC nothing but pain, sorrow, and loss. That doesn’t sound like any church that I want to be a part of and it doesn’t sound like a church that seeks to follow Jesus.

Part 3: Dust to Dust