Once upon a time, when I was a young boy, pinballs and table football (and the basketball playground on sunny days) were the top attractions at the oratorio (impossible to translate: it should be something like "parish youth centre"). Nowadays, Protestant churches in the US are using a highly successful Mature-rated videogame to attract teenagers to their youth centres. It sounds sensible:

David Drexler, youth director at the 200-member nondenominational
Country Bible Church in Ashby, Minn., said using Halo to recruit was
“the most effective thing we’ve done.”

In rural Minnesota, Mr.
Drexler said, the church needs something powerful to compete against
the lure of less healthy behaviors. “We have to find something that
these kids are interested in doing that doesn’t involve drugs or
alcohol or premarital sex.”

[from The New York Times]

The objectives include promoting discussions about good and evil, drawing parallels and putting strong emphasis on teamwork. I am not being ironic: I really believe that it is a good idea, coherent with the mission to be "fishers of men".  But I am highly disturbed by the fact that, as a fishing bait, they are using Halo 3: a highly successful videogame which is rated "M for mature audience" in the US and labeled "blood and gore – violence" in the EU (requiring to be respectively 17 and 16 years old in order to be allowed to buy it in a store).

These mixed, controversial messages undermine any self-regulating effort made by the gaming industry (PEGI, ESRB). I am really disappointed by this attitude: the age ratings system may be ineffective, unenforceable, hypocritical or whatever but it is the best tool we have to downplay  occasional hysteria and to promote responsible behavior by parents – unless we think that censorship is better.

It all sounds, well, kind of moral relativism.

[Original image by joshuakaufman – some rights reserved]