Tron: Allegory

20 Jan 2012 3 Comments

by C.O. Bonham in Random Musing, Theological Musings Tags: , ,

The other night I was watching Tron and I suddenly had a revelation. The story line is a total metaphor for the gospel and the writers didn’t even try very hard to disguise it either. I’m sure that a lot of you will have a hard time seeing Kevin Flynn as Jesus Christ, he isn’t really his character is still only human after all, but the idea is there.

 It began when the Master Control Program (MCP) saw itself as equal to, nay, even greater than his Creator and began taking over his fellow created beings in order to gain more power. The MCP sounds a lot like Satan so far.

 Flynn is a User, a writer of code and a creator of Programs. He is transformed into a program by the MPC who sees Flynn as a threat and thinks that he can humiliate and destroy him on the gamming grid.

 Satan did not make God man. He doesn’t have that kind of power. Christ chose to become human and he chose to die. This makes Christ greater than Flynn.

 As a User Flynn finds that he has special powers that allow him to alter the way the virtual world operates.  And in the Scriptures Jesus performs many miracles in order to demonstrate the power of God.

 In the end Flynn throws himself into the MCP in order to give Tron a chance to destroy him. Just like Jesus sacrificed himself in order to save us his creations.

 Then there is the character of Ram, the faithful believer who is the first one to be graced with the knowledge that the creator walks among the created. He even uses the line “Oh My User,” and not in the shocked way that we humans exclaim “Oh My God.”

Another stunning parallel is the scene where Tron goes into the input tower to speak with Alan One. The reverence and the magnitude of the moment are similar to a high priest entering the Holy of Holies to speak directly with God. Which is pretty much what Tron is doing.

 I also love the opening of the movie, when the guard program throws the accounting program into the holding cell he calls him a “Religious nut.” Like I said, the movie makers certainly weren’t trying very hard to hide the symbolism.

It all still holds up even with the addition of Tron: Legacy to the Canon. In fact if you really think about it Tron: Legacy is really just the same movie only with better effects.

 Yes I realize that there is nothing new under the sun. Especially when the sun is a thirty year old movie with a cult following. Here are some other good articles that make the same observations I just did:

 www.overthinkingit.com/2009/09/29/tron-religious-subtext

 totallytawn.wordpress.com/2011/01/17/tron-legacy-and-religion

Christ is Christmas

22 Dec 2011 1 Comment

by C.O. Bonham in Random Musing, Theological Musings, Uncategorized, Well founded paranoia Tags: , , , ,

You may have seen the various wall postings making their way around Facebook that tell you to keep Christ in Christmas.

The sad truth is that Christ never left Christmas. We did.

We leave by forgetting that Christmas is the birth of Jesus. By rushing and worrying and spending and wanting. When Christmas becomes “All I want for Christmas” instead of  “Good Christian men rejoice” then that is when we leave Christmas and actually kind of revert back to Black Friday (Hint: Not the same as Good Friday).

Christ-mas. See he’s still there. It is actually impossible for there to be a nonreligious holiday because holiday means Holy day.

What about Secular Christmas carols? Nope I’m sorry it’s still music that glorifies a Christian Holy day.

surprisingly it isn’t even Santa’s fault. We can’t even rightly blame the retail industry.

The real reason that so many people are forgetting what Christmas is, is because of this war that is being waged in the name of inclusion and tolerance. But these people, who claim to be all about not offending anyone, are too greedy to give up their yearly pile of gifts, so they tell themselves that the gifts are all that matter. Then they tell other people that it doesn’t matter what ancient beliefs started the holiday just give gifts anyway.

But the truth is that no matter what they believe every time some one says “Merry Christmas” they are acknowledging and condoning those ancient beliefs and the centuries of Faith that created the Holy day called Christmas.

So, Good Christian men rejoice, Joy to the world, “God bless us everyone,” and Merry Christmas.

Cathrine 🙂

 Here is some recommended movies to enjoy this Christmas:

How the Grinch Stole Christmas — Cartoon or live action the message in this story is so important. “It came, It came, It came just the same.”

A Christmas Carol — whichever version you choose remember that it isn’t actually about celebrating Christmas but about living a better life all year-long.

A Charlie Brown Christmas — yea Linus knows what he’s talking about.

P.s. if this offended you then good.  Again I say Merry Christmas!

Vampires: only a Christian can kill them

31 Oct 2011 1 Comment

by C.O. Bonham in Random Musing, Theological Musings Tags: , , , , ,

Happy Halloween!

This is a very special blog post. I understand that some people who read my blog might not realize that I am a Christian. So I am including this one time *RELIGION ALERT* if you don’t think you can handle hearing a bit of the Bible then I will not fault you for not reading but I do hope you will read and think and enjoy.

It has always struck me as weird that only a Christian can kill a vampire. You’ve got: Crosses, Holy water, and in Bram Stoker’s novel Dracula Van Helsing even uses Communion bread to create barriers against Dracula. Even their vulnerability to sunlight is a metaphor for only The Son (of God) can kill them. Yet a Christian is about the last thing that you would expect to see in a Vampire horror movie.

Check out this clip from Fright Night the new remake of the 1985 cult movie.

This clip has a parallel scene in the original 1985 version but alas I could find no Youtube clip for it.

Interestingly, there is also a stunning parallel found in the Bible:

 “Some Jews who went around driving out evil spirits tried to invoke the name of the Lord Jesus over those who were demon-possessed. They would say, ‘In the name of Jesus, whom Paul preaches, I command you to come out.’ Seven sons of Sceva, a Jewish chief priest, were doing this. [One day] the evil spirit answered them, ‘Jesus I know, and I know about Paul, but who are you?’ Then the man who had the evil spirit jumped on them and over powered them all. He gave them such a beating that they ran out of the house naked and bleeding.” (Acts 19:13-16 NIV)

The very name of Jesus contains power but only for those that have permission to use it.

The above verse reinforces and give credibility to the claims made in the movie Fright Night that the only way a mere mortal can take on the undead is by having a relationship with the ultimate Undead, Jesus Christ, and in so doing become Undead ourselves.  

“And if the spirit of him who raised Jesus from the dead is living in you, he who raised Christ from the dead will also give life to your mortal bodies through his spirit, who lives in you.” (Romans 8:11 NIV)

Do you get it? Not just Heaven; not eternal afterlife. But Life in our mortal bodies.

Being one of the undead is great. Unlike the vampires and Zombies who terrorize and murder large numbers of people to survive a Christian only needs to feed on the soul sustaining flesh of ONE man. The Body and Blood and of our Lord Jesus Christ.

Halloween is the night that the Undead supposedly walk the earth. But Christians are the Undead.  So why is this night dominated by the forces of Darkness? Why does a Faith filled Christian never come to the rescue in Vampire movies?

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