700 Club News Focus: A Thief in the Night

By: Paz - January 31, 2005

(Introduction by Pat Robertson)

All throughout America, thousands of children are playing games like baseball, tiddlywinks and checkers. They're imagining make-believe scenarios like "Cowboys and Indians," harmlessly pretending to shoot or scalp one another. I certainly remember, as a child, sharing these activities with my playmates. But now-a-days, many kids have new playmate: The Devil himself. In this week's 700 Club Online News Focus, reporter and writer Kristine Vick re-examines the popular card game "Magic: The Gathering," and how its brand new themes are causing harm -- mentally and physically -- to children across America.

A Thief in the Night

The controversy is already white-hot between conservative Christian groups and Wizards of the Coast, a fantasy-occult role-playing game manufacturer and thinly-veiled Ku Klux Klan reference. Wizards of the Coast's flagship "card game," Magic: The Gathering, recently celebrated its ten year anniversary, honoring over a decade of sorcery and violence. In our initial and broadcasted report, Steve Kosser, a school psychologist in Pound Ridge, New York, explained the nature of the game.

"Here's a card that says you're going to drain the life of your opponent, and here's a card specifically called 'Demonic Consultation.' This is a pentagram in the back, which is a symbol for Satan. This third card is named 'Forest.' Forest! And this one's called 'Aladdin!'" Kosser went on to say the game promotes occultist themes like Satanism, witchcraft, Harry Potter, and demon possession. An estimated 11,000 Magic-playing children have been possessed by demons thus far.

Sneak Attack

But now, Wizards of the Coast is introducing an "add-on expansion" to their game. This new set, called "Betrayers of Kamigawa," not only features betrayal and violence -- it promotes them!

Roger Lloyd owns "Beelzebub's Necropolis," a card and comic store. He was eager to tell us about what he has seen of the new expansion through "spoiling."

"Betrayers of Kamigawa, so far, seems to feature many creative new ways to gain card advantage [lots of death spells], tempo [casting the best and most death spells all the time], and reducing your opponent's life to zero [killing them]. I really look forward [killing others]. I pretty much attribute my success in the game to [killing as many people as possible]." The new expansion set encourages children to become "ninjas" in order to, as Lloyd put it, "obtain real ultimate power."

Ninjas are Japanese pagan assassins. Invoking the name of their "sun god," they infiltrate homes and kill whole families by using a technique called "ninjitsu" (translation: silent-heathen murder). In the December, 1941 attack on Pearl Harbor, the Nazis used ninjitsu to conquer Hawaii before the Americans had a chance to react. Many experts, including Kosser, see the recent promotion of ninjas in American television shows like "Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles" as an attempt to integrate pagan, heretical philosophies into Christian families through the television set. Kosser calls "Ninja Turtles" a weekly promotion of the highly controversial theory of evolutionary mutation. Regarding Magic, he said, "I fear the new addition of Ninja Turtles will make playing the card game even more dangerous than it already is."

Role "Play"

In the traditional game of Magic: The Gathering, both players take on the role of powerful sorcerers. This "role play" is reminiscent of the board game Dungeons & Dragons, where players earn points through necromancy, praying to multiple deities, and enacting revenge rather than turning the other cheek. They earn even more points by "larping," which means physically damaging the other players with weapons they've collected.

Chick Publications, Inc., a Christian tract publisher and distributor, has dealt with this issue at length. "Dungeons & Dragons is already responsible for uncountable instances of brutality and slaying. I had the displeasure of seeing a 'larping' home video in which a costumed man was murdered by a short, balding robed man. The robed man stoned him repeatedly, mechanically chanting 'Lightning bolt, lightning bolt!'" explained Jack T. Chick, the founder and chief artist, in a rare personal interview.

"Magic: The Gathering is no better, and no more a mere 'game,'" Chick continued. "There are cards called 'Lightning bolt.' Magic players have tried to deny it to my face, but I've seen them."

Chick said the new expansion's themes are especially frightening, as a good friend of his was recently assassinated by a ninja. "This new expansion set does nothing more than introduce more pagan savagery, called Shinto, into Magic's occult themes. We've already started working on a true story to combat it."

Chick shared a few panels of the comic with us at CBN:

A few panels from Chick Publications most recent comic.

He continued, "I hope that by sharing this information along with my step-by-step salvation instructions, I'll guide people to the real ultimate power that's obtained by asking Jesus into their hearts. They'll go from 'MTGNews' to 'the Good News.'"

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