Harry Potter - Life

If you read the book Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows, one of the subplots that don’t quite appear in the movie is the Death Eater’s plot to rid the world of “Mudbloods”, those witches and wizards who are born of Muggle parents. Their blood is not “pure,” which makes them less than human in the eyes of the Death Eaters. Harry’s quest to defeat Lord Voldemort is much more than trying to defeat a very powerful wizard who seeks his own life, actually the defeat of Lord Voldemort would mean the end of a very oppressive genocide.

In the midst of these very dangerous times, someone poses a very interesting, and honest, question to Kingsley Shacklebolt. Kingsley is known in the wizarding world as an extremely powerful auror, and is one of Harry Potter’s closest allies. He is asked what he would say to people who believe it should be “wizards first” in such dangerous times. People who stood up for the rights of Muggle-Borns were in just as much danger as those people who actually were Muggle Born. Why then should Pure-Blooded wizards stand up for Muggle Borns if it could possibly result in a lifetime in Azkaban Prison?

Kingsley’s response to this honest question is shockingly powerful. He is faced with a question posed entirely out of fear and responds with anything but. Kingsley’s response is “I’d say that it’s one step from ‘Wizards first’ to ‘Purebloods first,” and then to ‘Death Eaters.’ We’re all human aren’t we? Every human life is worth the same and worth saving.”

Every time I read this book I am awestruck at the awesomeness of this quote. Standing up for all forms of human life: the unborn, the elderly, the poor, the rich, the disabled, the mentally ill, men and women of all races is something that is essential to the Christian faith. Human life is sacred in all its forms because God created us in his image and likeness, which we see in the very first chapter of the book of Genesis.

These days we are remembering the 38^th anniversary of the Supreme Court’s decision Roe vs. Wade, the case which made abortion legal throughout all 50 states. Tomorrow hundreds of thousands of people will be attending the March for Life in Washington D.C., trying to tell our governmental leaders the same exact thing that Kingsley Shacklebolt tells us in the seventh Harry Potter book “We’re all human aren’t we? Every human life is worth the same and worth saving.”

“Lord Jesus thank you for my life, for creating me in your image and likeness. Bless and protect those whose lives are seen by society to be useless, worthless, secondary. You gave your life on the cross out of love for all human lives; help me to see human life as you do, as a beautiful manifestation of your love.”