Does This Mean the Book Burning's Been Cancelled?

Gee, it seems like only last year that fundies everywhere were putting Harry Potter on the pyre. Maybe they ran out of lighter fluid:

But it looks like now that the book series is complete and the whole story is known, the evangelical community is having a change of heart:

Conservative Christian reviews of the new Harry Potter movie are surprisingly positive.

"As 'Harry Potter and the Half-Blood Prince' opens, we are once again reminded of the characteristics that make him something of a Christ figure," Connie Neal writes for the evangelical Christianity Today.

"It is more likely that at the end of the viewing or reading, rather than the allure of magic ... what remains are the scenes that evoke values such as friendship, altruism, loyalty, and the gift of self," wrote L'Osservatore, the Vatican's semi-official newspaper.

Even Focus on the Family's pluggedin finds something redeeming: "Harry, whatever his faults, embraces such unglamorous words as 'duty,' 'responsibility' and 'sacrifice.'"

[snip]

Um, it's still fiction, guys. But I do find it so ironic that once again, the evangelical community went off in ignorance over something that once their initial fear and fearmongering was over, they found commonality in.

That's what we in the reality-based community like to call "not judging a book by its cover." You should try it more often.

I don't think this flirtation will last. After all, when the last movie comes out, they'll have to face the fact that Dumbledore's still gay.

But at least they've backed away from the bonfire for now.