The longer I watch movies for a living, the more careful I’ve become about what movies I watch when I’m off the clock. The longer I watch TV for a living, the more careful I’ve become about what programs I tune in with my family. The longer I listen to music for a living, the more careful I’ve become about what’s on my iTunes account (and lurking in that old stack of tapes and CDs in my basement).
We talk to you about how important media discernment is all the time. And I can tell you, quite candidly, that the ongoing process of discernment is at work in me in just the same way we hope it’s working in you. The more we take the time with what we encounter in the entertainment world—the more we evaluate it and meditate on it and hold it up to God’s standards and wishes and desires—the less we crave the things that none of us should be encountering to begin with.
“Love God and do whatever you please: for the soul trained in love to God will do nothing to offend the One who is Beloved.” That’s the way Augustine of Hippo thought of it. And it applies to our entertainment choices in pretty much exactly the same way it applies to our big life choices of careers and spouses and friendships. Mylon LeFevre, in his ’80s Christian rock, simplified it to “Love God, hate sin!”
But this isn’t just a Plugged In/Christian subculture phenomenon. Writes James Poniewozik for Time:
People sometimes assume that, because I’m a TV critic, I’m permissive about what my kids (who are 8 and 11) watch. It’s really the opposite, maybe because I’m professionally exposed to what’s out there.
It’s been interesting to read James’ thoughts on the subject over the years, and even discover that he and his family end up watching some of the same shows my family watches: The Food Network’s Chopped, for example, and old episodes of The Cosby Show. But the pickings are slim at times, slimmer than even James lets on—which can actually be more of a good thing than bad (without commenting, of course, on what so many unhealthy TV shows and movies can do to the culture at large). The less there is to watch on TV and at the theater, the more time my families has to do things together, instead of just sitting and soaking and then moaning about what we’re absorbing.
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