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From: chuqui@nsc.UUCP (Chuqui Q. Koala)
Newsgroups: net.religion
Subject: Re: Yellow Press in SciFi?
Message-ID: <2163@nsc.UUCP>
Date: Sun, 6-Jan-85 11:54:46 EST
Article-I.D.: nsc.2163
Posted: Sun Jan  6 11:54:46 1985
Date-Received: Mon, 7-Jan-85 03:26:13 EST
References: <1253@hou4b.UUCP>
Reply-To: chuqui@nsc.UUCP (Chuqui Q. Koala)
Organization: The Warlocks Cave
Lines: 37
Summary: 


 
>If I recall, H.G.Wells had a heavy anti-religion bias, but confined it mostly
>to public debates with Chesterton and published essays.  I don't know for sure.
>
>Are my observations typical of scifi writings?  If so, why?  Is perversion of
>religion just a good way to depict a damaged society?  Or do these writers
>consider religion a malady of society?  And is the Catholic Church singled out
>the way that IBM is singled out when we think of computers -- ``They have an
>IBM machine'', or do these writers have a grudge against Catholicism ?

Wells got in his digs as much as anyone-- look at 'Things To Come' for
instance, and there are sub-themes in both 'Food of the Gods' and 'Time
Machine'.

No, I don't think your observations are any more typical of SF (scifi?
ugh!) than they are of any other genre or media. How many evil priests show
up on TV and movies? There are certainly a number of 'free-thinking' SF
authors, as well as agnostics and true athiests, but that is true of the
population in general. If you are interested in looking for SF books that
show religion in an intelligent and thoughtful way, I suggest you track
down 'A Case of Conscience' by James Blish, 'A Canticle for Leibowitz' by
Walter MIller, or 'Behold the Man' by Michael Moorcock. A very interesting
book about religion from a less traditional view is 'Black Easter', also by
Blish, and its companion 'Day ofter Judgement'. An interesting short that
comes to mind is 'The Star' by A.C. Clarke. I wouldn't call any of these
stories pro-religious propoganda, but I also don't believe any of them to
be blatantly anti-religious. Their basic purpose is to look at religion and
make you think about it and I think they are all fair (some more than
others) to religion as a concept.

chuq (someone is gonna flame me for Behold the Man... I can feel it already)
-- 
From the ministry of silly talks:		Chuq Von Rospach
{allegra,cbosgd,decwrl,hplabs,ihnp4,seismo}!nsc!chuqui  nsc!chuqui@decwrl.ARPA

Now look here Mister "I'm not just a word processor"...