The Quest To Kill God

The book The Golden Compass was challenged very harshly by religious groups. Religious groups (mainly catholic groups) saw the book as a direct representation into the catholic church. In the book it showed the corrupted church (that was not intended as an insult to any religion) and how horrible they were towards people. It also showed how humans can become falllible if introduced to something corrupt. The book is also about a orphaned girl who is treated unfairly by the church goes on her own search to kill God.

After the author of the book Phillip Pullman was confronted by the religious groups that wished to ban his book he said, and I quote “I think my position would be that throughout human history, the greatest moral advances have been made by religious leaders such as Jesus and the Buddha. And the greatest moral wickedness has been perpetrated by their followers. How many millions of people have been killed in the name of this religion or that one? Burnt, hanged, tortured. It’s just extraordinary.” — Philip Pullman. He also stated “It’s not the presence of Christian doctrine I object to so much as the absence of Christian virtue.” —Philip Pullman, about him being an atheist.

His book called much attention to the horrible reality of humans. It showed how wretched and twisted some humans are. It also showed how humans can be changed very easily and that even a great and prosperous person can become horrible and twisted if the surronding of this person are wretched.

Another reason why his book shouldn't be banned is because it is an amazing adventure story. It shows awesome traits in the main character which all human beings should try to strive to be. It also shows a story of friendship, undying frienship at that. Now do you really want to ban an amzing story like that?

Also this book shows how organized religion can be a double-edged sword. While it may help people in life try and better themselves so that they can go to better places when they die, like Heaven or Nirvana, it also leads way to much corruption inside of the religious affairs. It shows that all organized religion could become corrupted very easily, and without these kinds of books reminding us we could forget these things ourselves, and in doing so our own religion could be jeopardized by the corruption of not only other religions, but also our own!

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