I should stop looking through the CBD catalogs. This one annoyed me more than most. It had "Homeschooling Sale" blazoned across the front, but that wasn't the part the troubled me. It was the "You know it's Christian when you see the [insert fish symbol here]" note in the bottom corner of some of the pages. So I looked, and sure enough, there were things with a little fish symbol next to them, and things without the little fish symbol.
It was funny to see what things were marked in this way; everything from Tolkien, to the Little House series, to the Spencerian Penmanship Set. All of which I have read or used, and none of which I would label as especially 'Christian', just as written by people who were working from a Christian perspective. The materials have Christian attitudes and perspectives because the writers couldn't help it, not because they were trying to put it there. The only possible exceptions are the penmanship copy books, and they have strong Christian overtones because the schools at the time did.
But the Christianity or lack thereof of the items they've labelled isn't really the problem. It's the fact that the people getting the catalog need to be told which are which. This is CBD, for crying out loud! The acronym stands for Christian Book Distributors!
So, apparently parents need to be told which things they're getting for their kids are most Christian. Which reeks of the current mindset in, say, the Christian music industry:
"This is Christian music, so it must be good for you!"
"This isn't Christian music, so we don't think it's as good for you!"
Even if they aren't saying that, the constant practice of differentiating between 'Christian' and 'secular' music/books/games/whatever only underscores that Christians don't feel like influencing the outside world anymore. Instead we have to have a separate 'Christian' section of everything. Can Christian artists not manage to compete with secular artists? Can Christians not figure out which things are good and profitable without the little 'Christian' label?
Nope, we're all stupid and have to rely on the publishing houses and book distributors to tell us what we want and what's good for us.
Posted by Ardith at December 22, 2004 06:50 PM | TrackBack