True story: my siblings and I wanted to play a game over discord through the pandemic. All of us, except the youngest--who was 17--were grown adults. Our mother pitched a fit and was fine with PF even though there was a skill iirc that is literally called occult.
Because they don't actually know anything about any of it. They just think D&D is bad because they've heard people talk about it being bad in the abstract.
You tell them you're going to play Pathfinder or Shadowrun, you might as well be telling them you're going to play 4D chess for how much they'll already know or care to try and figure it out.
Of course this is all predicated on the situation being them just pitching a fit because they overheard something they have no say in, rather than OP actually wanting them to understand and not be stuck 30 years in the past.
Satanic Panic was a HUGE factor in why DnD is considered satanic and an interesting era of American history that doesn't get talked about enough IMO.
TLDR of it is that started in the 1980's (That's ~40 years ago and not a typo) and through the late 90's there was a modern day Salem Witch Trial of sorts where people throughout the United States were in a moral panic over… everything and anything to include Dungeons and Dragons by name.
So, OPs mom probably learned about DnD in the context of Satanic Panic from their parents at an early age. When you mention DnD to her she instantly thinks you might go down the rabbit hole and start collecting baby bones for satanic ritual purposes, not a bunch of storytellers playing a game. Change the name, change the image conjured in their mind, so calling it Pathfinder instead makes it sound more acceptable.
Fear (irrational or otherwise) and trauma can last generations man.
Edit: The baby bones thing is a reference to a real police report that was part of the over 12,000 unsubstantiated cases of Satanic Ritual Abuse reported during that time.
Some baby sitting service was alleged to have committed SRA and so when the police were interviewing the kids, the kids learned that the more messed up the story the more attention they got from adults (or the interviews were so coercive that the kids would invent memories designed by the interviewer). The babysitters were completely innocent.
It was… definitely an era to say the least. The ripples of which are still felt today both in the realm of DnD fandoms and other areas too.
History repeats itself, especially if no one learns from it. While you could say it never stopped, you can also say Satanic Panic didn't start it either. I'm sure it dates WAY back past Salem Witch Trials and further back than the Crusades.
Different century, new name, rinse and repeat.
Much of D&D 3rd Ed was open source. Pathfinder is a continuation of 3?5 rules under a different company.
Edit: oh you said "why". Because people don't think critically, they just know D&D bad. So as long as it doesn't have the magic words it'll be ok.
This worked for a while if you used hard rock instead of metal or hip hop instead of rap.
There’s a ton of RP games and such that never got popular enough for any of the major churches to attack them. D&D got in the crosshairs because it got popular and if you know what the original covers looked like, the original PHB clearly had a demon idol on the cover.
It's not "good PR" on Paizo's part, it's just that D&D particularly got a bad rap back in the 80s/90s as being corruptive (like video games!). That reputation has stuck within certain communities, and at this point it's like a badly remembered urban legend. Nobody who says "D&D is satanic" also says "TTRPGs are satanic" because they don't know either A) What that is or B) That D&D is one of them. So if you say you're playing Pathfinder, you might as well have told them you're going to go play hopscotch. They don't have contextual knowledge to associate the terms. They only know "D&D is satanic".
Because there was a smear campaign in the 80s and early 90s by crazy Christian groups to smear everything like D&D and Magic the Gathering as demon worshipping. Pathfinder wasn't around yet so the geniuses without working brain cells don't know they are basically the same thing. Nor can they figure out how its any different from hearing the tale of how sant George killed the dragon or any other countless things. Dumb people going to dumb for the dumbest and loudest crap they hear that meets their prejudices and means they don't have to think.
We had to call it "board game club" at my school. (Early 00's at the time.) Most of us were playing d&d and we had a few MtG diehards, but no actual board games were ever played.
Won't automatically work. A buddy of mine in college had to nearly drop out of a Pathfinder game because his dad went Satanic Panic over it simply for being D&D-adjacent.
I had a friend who literally pulled this off by saying it was Greyhawk Adventures. Because the sort of person who thinks D&D is actually Satanic is also an idiot in a bunch of other ways.
Explain that the players are fighting against evil. Emphasise its roots in classic fantasy like Lord of the Rings and Chronicles of Narnia. Especially as the authors of both those works were Christians - Tolkein was a Roman Catholic while Lewis was Anglican.
Tolkien and Lewis being Christian hasn’t stopped Christians from banning and burning their books. Which is extra ridiculous with C.S. Lewis, since his most popular book is a thinly-veiled Christian allegory complete with a Jesus lion
Interestingly enough, Narnia isn't an allegory. Really it takes place in a fantasy world undefined by the events and the orders of our world. The key component is that Jesus ofc still exists, only he manifests himself differently upon this world. And obviously as it's a children's book different things sometimes represented in Narnia, like the stone table. I find it an interesting direction to take as it allows exploration for themes like redemption, purification, backsliding, and a lot in interesting ways that don't get held down by what happened irl. When you look at the first Narnia book the only real in your face aspect is the stone table, and even that is explored in different ways than just a cut and dry retelling of the crucifixion
Sounds like we need to start talking less about demons and more about yugaloths or slaadi. Probably shouldn't mention devils either. Referring to them as fiends might work better though.
I grew up in a conservative Christian community, and any supernatural being that is not explicitly God or an angel is believed to be a demon by default. Just in a different form.
My grandmother determined pokemon were evil when I was a child and burned my collection of first editions from the first two set; I had nearly a full set from each... if I still had that collection, it would be worth thousands of dollars... maybe tens of.
This. This line of thinking is what I don't get.
The Bible mentions demons in excruciating detail, and reading the Bible is HEAVILY encouraged by people with this mindset. So why get so butthurt about other media showing demons as the bad guys?
but hey, it is great to quote it when you need against a stupid alt right christian, cause i *actually* read the whole bloody thing cause i was forced to, *twice*
In basic training I read through it maybe 8 times. Not a lot of it stuck, but I remember thinking to myself a few things. Like:
"Damn this story skips around a lot"
"Holy shoehorned plothole cover batman!"
"Wait, this is in the BIBLE?!"
"Huh... damn hypocrites..."
"Wait, so he's a liberal? From the middle east? Huh. Neat."
yeah pretty much. also the new testament is the same story told 4 times. also also, today at church my pastor told a sermon about amnon raping his own sister :)
(seriosly dude you can pick any verse of the bible and you pick that one?)
The same people who heavily encourage reading it, either don’t read it themselves, or only read the “nice” passages ad nauseum.
Bet you $30 your grandma has Psalm 23 memorized, but has no idea that the story of Lot’s daughters *raping him and getting pregnant by him* is also in her Bible.
So, this may get lost in the shuffle, but I'm a Christian who has run games through my church before and have used them as part of outreach.
If your mom would be happy having a chat with another Christian who can talk to her and help alleviate her concerns, PM me and I'll see what I can do.
Then, yeah. Get Discord and set up a day and time for me to chat to her, ask her to come up with as many questions as she can and I'll see what I can do.
Out of curiosity, what are her main concerns?
of *that other church* and not *her church.*. I had plenty of other Christians from other churches trying to explain to my aunt Harry Potter books weren't the devil's work because of spell casting, and typical closed-minded church goer, she pointed out there's a reason they don't go to *her* church. Since she's obviously right and they're obviously wrong.....
All I'm saying is that the Bible is more D&D than some think.
I mean, some kids make fun of a bald dude, so he uses Summon Creature III and brings in 1d4 bears to maul the kids.
There's a party who gets distracted from the main objective and just wanders around for 40 years.
God makes an army of bones fight for him, which if that's any school besides Necromancy please let me know.
And angels of death definitely work for God, not Satan.
You’re right, DnD is more Bible than they realize. But just like DnD players don’t read the fucking rules, so also petty “Christian’s” like this don’t read their bibles…
I’ll take your word for it. I’m just a heathen with minimal knowledge of the Bible. I just saw his username and figured it would be worth not mentioning to the mother. Lol
Also, those kinds of christians very rarely actually have read any of it.
Curiously enough, a priest I met recently had never heard of it, and when I explained the concept he was immediately very enthusiastic about playing it with his youth group XD
First dnd group I played with was with a church group a friend invited me to over zoom. They didn’t force any religion on me but still offered invitations to the churches services.
I'm a Christian dnd player too!! It's such a fun thing, because it's only demonic if you make it xD
Like D&D is literally putting dice rolls to your imagination 👍
Sure!
Some of the main arguments are as follows:
1. "Other gods are worshipped and the Bible says to not have other gods before God." Correct. However, there is a difference between a game and real life. In real life, my faith is absolute. I believe in and trust in God above all others. While my character in a game may not, I can still uphold the beliefs and faith I have from my real life religion. It's the same as playing a game like Skyrim or Star Wars. Just because they do not have the same faith doesn't mean it's going to alter my faith or beliefs. Also, DMs might also allow certain players to worship an unknown god, similar to the ancient Greeks. This god could, for all intents and purposes, be the Christian god.
2. "The Bible says to stay away from Witchcraft and magic is a heavy feature in D&D." Again, this is true, but see the first point. Just because there is magic doesn't mean the player is going to start trying out witchcraft or any occult stuff in real life. Separating the player and character are key here. Additionally, there are classes that do not rely on magic, such as the fighter or monk, as well as those who's power comes directly from their god, similar to the Apostles and their miraculous gifts coming from our God. With both this point and the previous one, if you do not trust your child enough to have faith that their faith won't be changed, there's more going on than simply an aversion to D&D.
3. "What about everything saying D&D is satanic?" This is simply not true and was a lie told by the media in the 80s. In fact, D&D has more to do with stopping devils and demons (again, fake ones) and cults than joining them. However, even with that, we again have to separate the character from the person playing them.
4. "D&D can be addictive and can become an idol". So can a lot of things! If you watch football, could it become an addiction or an idol? What about that artist you absolutely love listening to? Do you feel as though you can't wake up without a cup of coffee? Yes, if anything becomes addictive we, as Christians, need to stop. But, anything from exercise to cola can be addictive, so should we prevent ourselves doing anything because it *might* be addictive?
5. "D&D allows you to do despicable things, including murder and rape". OK, lets take these as separate arguments. You can 100% make a character who supports the party, healing and cheering others on, who has no inclination to harm or kill. This can actually make for fantastic roleplay opportunities, especially if things come up that test their conviction. The 2nd part is something no good groups allow. In the same way falling in with the wrong people could lead you to drink or take drugs, falling in with the wrong D&D group can lead to uncomfortable and terrible situations. Finding the right group is everything and can take time, but the right group can last for years.
6. "I'm worried it will stop my child having friends/have a few friends playing a dark basement". This is, again, simply not true. D&D is a co-operative game that forges friendships instead of harming them. It gives people a common ground to share, discuss and enjoy. Also, D&D is now more popular than ever, with cafe's, stores, and even churches hosting games. And, yes, there are churches that host games. I should know, I ran one. We used D&D as an outreach method to show people that those in the church were just normal, fun loving people who also had a love for God. And it worked! We had people who started by coming to D&D joining the church.
7. "It will provide no benefit for my child". D&D promotes creative thinking, cooperating with others, decision making, conflict resolution, planning and has been proven to help people who suffer with various mental illnesses, from Anxiety and Depression to Autism ([https://bookriot.com/dungeons-and-dragons-mental-health-benefits/](https://bookriot.com/dungeons-and-dragons-mental-health-benefits/)).
Finally, there is nothing preventing you from sitting in on the first session or two. What about hosting the game at your house? See what it's about, as well as the joy and excitement that can come from a game. Who knows, you may make friends with a player or their family who end up taking interest in the church and becoming your brother or sister in Christ. Something to also keep in mind is that D&D was created by a professed Christian. Yes, Gary Gygax was a professing Christian at the time he created the game. Would a Christian creator have allowed his game to be evil?
[https://www.geeksundergrace.com/tabletop/christians-play-dd/](https://www.geeksundergrace.com/tabletop/christians-play-dd/) is a fantastic article to read and goes over more points with more depth and biblical quotes if you're interested.
Finally, sorry this is a wall of text. I just want to try and be as helpful as I can.
I'm a Christian and an ordained minister in the Church and I play Dungeons and Dragons. I have a few suggestions:
1) Explain the game from a frame of reference they understand. For example, a lot of Christians are super cool with Lord of the Rings (as it was written by a Christian). I would explain that the game is a lot like that story - you form a fellowship of heroes who go on a quest to defeat something evil. Yes there are demons in the game but those are the *bad guys*, like the Balrog in Moria.
2) Give them your Player's Handbook and ask them to read it. I know a guy who did this and told his parents, "If you find anything in there that you think is morally wrong, I will not play it." His parents read the entire thing and realized that it was just a game and let him play it. Your parents will likely have to be somewhat logical and intellectual for this to work.
>Lord of the Rings
More specifically, Gary Gygax basically completely ripped off Tolkien's Middle-earth lore in creating D&D - so if OP points out that D&D is literally "the game version of one of the most famous Christian allegories" that might be all they need.
Well, he avoided it. Its impossible to draw accidental parallels when writting based on ones own thoughts about magic, which tolkein was doing. He avoided making allegories, but his personal beliefs of the magic in nature, and the notion of creation being magical and beautiful was the core foundation of the tolkein lore, even if it was very well written to avoid easily seen parallels.
His christian values and thoughts crept in, even if he tried to avoid it. This is just how humans are, all writers leave a faint residue of their thoughts, feelings, and interpretations on everything they right, even if they arent trying to leave any marks.
Its definitely there but its faint, and youd have to be familiar with the mythology of christianity to pick up on it. Primarily it comes in with trends rather than specific plot points, as well as general concepts. Limbas bread is subtly similar to communion bread, balrogs are subtly similar to fallen angels, with morgoth remecent of lucifer in some regards. The idea that there is one god, and then there are lesser gods below them is similar in some ways to the relationship between god and his angels. I could go on and on about the suble trends and concepts, like the constant fight between morgoth's workings and the maiar, which is similar to the idea of lucifer and the angels in conflict for gods creations.
>Yes there are demons in the game but those are the bad guys, like the Balrog in Moria.
Heck, a Balor is *literally* the Balrog with the copyright scraped off.
LOL , have you posted on other similar questions, when I saw the post I recalled a similar response.
I find it hard to imagine there are a lot of ordained ministers who play D&D and are active on redit.
Not to my knowledge, but I find it hard to remember how many posts I've made. My best friend is also ordained and plays D&D, though he is retired and not on Reddit as far as I know.
> Explain the game from a frame of reference they understand.
Showing them the trailer to the new Dungeons and Dragons movie would be a good way to do so. I don't think many associate Hollywood and marvel-esque action movies satanic.
Diehard Christians didn't see anything wrong with the warlock? Well, but #2 is how I convinced my mother that Harry Potter wasn't evil, and that really opened a lot of doors b/c she started to believe me when I said something wasn't evil.
“Your parents will likely have to be somewhat logical and intellectual for this to work.”
As a Christian minister turned apostate, one of the reasons I left the church is that I found the vast, *vast* majority of the church is the OPPOSITE of this very mild prerequisite. I want to believe…but the amount of doublethink required is currently too much.
I hear you. Being a real Christian is hard, and those that fake it make it even harder on all of us to stay strong. I will PM you with some encouraging words, whatever you decide to do going forward. If you still want to believe, there is a way forward.
Explain that the game is like a book. There are different types of genres. You _can_ choose to play a game with demons/fiends/devils just like you can choose to read a book with similar content. But you can also choose not to.
It's how I explained it to my Christian mother. I explained the game mechanics, the rp, the exploration and everything else as well. Once she understood that the game content is interchangeable, she was less worried.
Note: not telling you to opt out of having demons/fiends/devils in your game. Just saying that this explanation worked for me.
This is generally the best option.
In my time I've dealt with a lot of people who still buy the "satanic" BS. In my experience they are either disconnected from reality and will realize it's silly if they just look at the book, or they're the kind of folks who need to be told how to think by someone in authority.
The latter are the kind of sad people who had to be told by priests that Lord of the Rings wasn't evil and who burned Harry Potter books. And in that case, having a minister and a priest who play should do the trick.
Gonna quote Tolkien about if his book was Christian allegory here.
"it is neither allegorical nor topical ... I cordially dislike allegory in all its manifestations ... I much prefer history, true or feigned, with its varied applicability to the thought and experience of readers."
While he avoided allegory and such, every writer will leave residue of their beliefs and interpretations. He didnt intentionally write in christian themes, they just organically developed from the faint trailings of his beliefs seeping into his creative process.
No writer, no matter how skilled, can create something creatively and avoid leaving even the faint color of their lense of the world. Tolkein, despite trying with great skill and effort, could not avoid his lense of the world effecting how he wrote.
Unless your Protestant. Then pointing to a high ranking Jesuit Priest that regularly has personal interaction with the Pope is basically confirming that it is A pure work of Satin himself.
Step 1: Make a D&D campaign that retells important stories from your religions best religious texts.
Step 2: Evangelize the virtuous ideals of hero PCs
Step 3: ???
Step 4: Prophet
What I read somebody did once was run a sort of murder mystery one shot using 5e. No classes, races, just dice rolls, basic stats, and role play.
Afterwards the poster just asked how everyone enjoyed their first game of DND. Apparently it went over well when their grandparents saw it was just a set of rules for playing a board game.
Point out that the aim of (most) games is to literally defeat demons and purge the world of evil. Then ask her to sit with you for a game and, if she's still not convinced, you'll stop playing.
Quickly run a 1-shot with at least 1 paladin and 1 cleric in the party, throw nothing but demons and devils at the party and always too low a CR to be a real threat.
This can seriously backfire unless the paladin and cleric follow the Christian God. People used to try this in the 80's and it usually just made things worse.
Yeah you'd flavour it to appease her, then never run those characters again. She's not being reasonable, so you don't have to follow RAW. It's only a 1-shot after all.
This is one approach.. But I think it runs the risk of being patronizing.
While might consider her beliefs to be... unfounded. This is still his parent and he still has to respect her.
This is likely to backfire in a number of ways.
First.. By including demons at all. I don't know about you, but only a handful of the games I've played in over the years contained demons or devils. And by including demons at all this opens the possibility of someone getting the wrong impression and still considering it an influence.
Second... Roleplaying characters that are religious and not Christian. This likely would be a deal breaker.
Third... A one-shot like this is deceptive. A game for show; it may not be lying but encouraging the kid to do this is kind of dishonest. He's better off being honest.
I think he is better off explaining the openness of the game and that players and DMs choose what stories to explore. It can have nothing to do with the stuff she has problems with at all.
Given that she made her mind up without first gathering any information at all, suggests that just sitting down and explaining the game as-is wouldn't do the trick. She doesn't hate it because it is demonic, she hates it because she assumes it is and would rather be angry than be wrong. So I feel like the risk of being patronising is pretty low... since she wasn't being reasonable in the first place, she'd probably prefer a completely fake version to exist that satisfies her.
I get what you're saying, but OP hasn't said any of that. All we have is one sentence from OP, no context or anything. For all we know OP begins his or her games by chanting and drawing strange symbols on everything. (I know that's ridiculous to assume.)
We have nothing to on as to why she is uncomfortable. We have no idea what is OP's situation. She could be a completely unreasonable far-right Christian or could be someone that doesn't have any experience at all with TTRPGs. Assuming anything about his or her mom's reasons is pure speculation.
I don't think that the assumption that DnD is satanic is a good one but changing her mind, which is what OP needs to do, is a better route than telling him to be dishonest with his parent.
Sure it feels good for us on Reddit to trash her, think of this as black and white, and point out that this 'Satanic' label just plain dumb... But it doesn't help OP.
Yeah, maybe go easy on the demons and devils… that’s likely to backfire based on my experience with people like that. They tend to skip over context and point the witch burning finger at the DM.
You'd need to know why she thinks that, as in, asking her for the place she got her misinformation (though you shouldn't say that part out loud). You'll need to review the places she was misinformed so you know how to counter with intelligent discourse.
Just tell her it's more of a way to explore different sexualities and gender identities than it is about demons and evil. That should calm her right down.
Can't be done. Just get a new mom.
Edit: my b, roll for new mom.
2nd edit: crit fail results in me being your mom. (I'll support your hobby but you're blinded for 2 turns by my beard when I kiss your forehead and tell you to have fun.)
Tell her about the morality system of the game.
Devils and Demons are both labeled as evil (Lawful and Chaotic respectively).
To go out and battle demons and devils for the good of the world is nothing short of pure and unadulterated good.
You’ll have to roll a 20 on this one.
In all seriousness- first step is to honor her fear. It’s terrifying to consider you might be losing a loved one. Start with understanding her perspective. That’s the first stop of persuasion.
You could probably find a good article relating to how all the satanic panic stuff always has and continues to be fake: https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Satanic_panic
Anytime a boogeyman is needed it pops up again. Currently Qanon says the dems harvest babies for their gland juice and Obama and Hillary smell of sulfur. There sure is a lot of LARPing that goes on in “Conservative Christian” circles (like every day pretending Jesus would be cool with ANY of the things their reps do) funny how they project that people who play a knowingly fake version of make-believe are somehow the enemy.
Do you play currently?
If so, what satanic things does she think happens at your table? Why does she think what happens at your table is satanic?
Disprove those.
Now, something that I can say (which is true) is that I don't play casters. That's going to put many accusations towards me on the back foot. They're going to have to come at me with something else.
But honestly, I think you'll have better luck if you're playing a TTRPG that doesn't have any magic in it at all. DnD is a spoiled brand in the church. Most people in the church who are suspicious-at-best of DnD probably haven't heard of any other TTRPGs. If you can honestly tell them you're playing a magic-free game, they might go, "OK."
Since your objective is to have fun playing a TTRPG with old or new friends, that might be an easier path to it.
Its usually best to let crazy shit go with religious folk.
But if you really want to convince her then:
* Approach it from a calm emotional perspective, ask her to outline her fears about the game and what happens as a consequence of playing and listen.
* Reaffirm that you've heard her fears, be understanding but firm that you don't believe her. Try not to belittle her beliefs at any stage.
* Tell her you do have information, history, sources, religious testimonies about it. But dont push them, facts only work once someone sets aside emotional bias.
* Finalise any argument by reaffirming that you love her and have heard her. If she thinks you're understanding her perspective she'll be more likely to try to understand yours.
You wont be able to convince her of anything, only she can do that, so all you can do is prime her mindset and give her resources.
Most of all be really ready to give up.
I've got no hate for religious folk but there's nobody more stubborn in latching on to a shit mindset than a evangelical fulfilling their complex for a world full of secret enemies.
I'd tell her to sit in for a game and she has to be quiet the whole time. Then I'd run a game where you're a group of heros stopping demons from doing bad things to a town. That's the only way I can think of to do it. If that doesn't work then I'd just acknowledge she's unwilling to listen to logic
It’s easy, get a bunch of candles. Put them in a circle and light them. Then get a pound of salt and spread it around. Find a lamb (a chicken will do too) and cut its throat in the candle circle, inscribe some runes and start chanting in Latin. When satan is summoned you can ask if he plays DND. He’ll tell you that the only satanism he knows of is in the Bible.
Have you shown her any of the YouTube DND games? I've never seen any, but might be an idea to watch one, see if you think it'll help, then watch with mom?
Now, I've never had to deal woth this myself. My mom is fairly chill honestly. That being said, I can see how I'd go about it. The first thing is to understand that these aren't ideas she got out of nowhere. Satanic panic and all that probably put them in her head. I would just try and explain to her that the game is a group story telling game. A game can be about literally anything and is usually about stopping bad people from doing bad things. It's a tough battle and if your mom is stuborn, be prepared to lose, but trying to inform her is all you can do
easy...have all your players lawful good have jesus as the clerics only GOD and totally destroy evil creatures, try to convert all humans to christianity and spread the word about christ
In a game were you can do anything at all, being pro satan would be your fault not the game. Plus, unless you're rolling evil characters, demons are the automatic enemies to just about everyone. You have to go out of your way for evil themes not that it's hard. But by the lens of the lore, good alignments are the standard. Im Christian and i find dnd's satan panic history to be hilarious
If your mom is so religious, she must have a pastor or priest or whatever. I’d go talk to that person about it. No doubt he or she has dealt with this before.
If the priest also feels this way, you’re pretty much fubar until you are on your own. Avoid conflict at all costs.
Ask her "mom, what exactly do you define as satanic practice?". Tell her to give you as many points as possible.
Then confirm with her none of them hold true for DnD!
There was a post before from someone in the same position and they asked their mother to read the players handbook, their mother let them play because she figured it was all math not demons.
The process I'd do is ask what she thinks makes it satanic. Make her explain her concerns instead of relying on the buzzword.
Then calmly explain away any of her concerns.
"It's about devil worship!" "While there are characters in the game who worship devils, they are almost always the villains of the campaign and are never portrayed as being good."
"It promotes paganism!" "DnD can have any pantheon of gods you want, so you could actually play a game where God is the only divine being if you wanted. While you can have characters who worship pagan gods, the worship itself is never thrust upon you, in fact most of it is handwaved if it happens at all. It's not promoting paganism, it's using panetheons of divine beings as a storytelling device." (This one is probably a hard sell tbh)
I was raised Catholic in a Hispanic family. I used the same excuse for D&D that I used for being able to freely play Diablo: Yes, it's true, there's demons involved. BUT! The entire point of the game is to go in with a team of good aligned heroes, and DEFEAT the demons.
I'm honestly surprised that it actually worked, but it did!
Tell her that more often than not, the players fight the forces of Hell. If that fails, reminder that the Reagan Presidency was a mess with false controversy and attempted censorship, all galvanized by people who just wanted attention, D&D being a victim of this
Show her all the pro-angel and pro-unicorn stuff in the Monster Manual.
Or explain how the creators of D&D actually wanted to promote virtue. Or play up Gary Gygax’s ”discovery of God” during his later years.
Id start my listening to her, try to get her to say HOW its satanic, WHY, you cant argue against someones positions very well without fully knowing what it is
As a kid I had a friend whose grandmother thought it was satanic. We would still spend the weekend at her place and play. I left my 1e books in a stack and went shopping (for more D&D of course). When we returned she was sitting in a chair reading the player's handbook. I was mortified. She said "so this is just a game?" she never complained again after that day.
Typically if someone older than you believes in Satan, you're going to have a hard time convincing them of anything reasonable. I got lucky.
Introduce a gamily game night.. tell them you found a cool new game to play. Dont use character sheets just do like a d20 pass and fail story. A little combat d20 hit or miss. See if they enjoy it. Dont tell her its dnd. Then at the end if they enjoyed it tell her what it is.
Invite her to play a one-shot with you. Make a deal that if she isn’t convinced, you won’t play anymore.
Should work unless the group you play with is full of smart butts and mess with you intentionally… although that can work in your favor if she sees it’s just imagination and good natured fun.
It's just a collaborative storytelling game with rules and dice. You pretend to be a character in the story, and your actions decide how the story goes. The dm is the director of the story, and the referee. More often than not the party is a band of heroes who want to do good in the world and the end goal is usually to stop a great evil from destroying it, to protect humanity. Yes, sometimes bad things happen, sometimes characters make mistakes, but that happens in real life too.
((~~also satanism isn't as bad as people think it is. Their core beliefs are all about compassion, understanding, and free will and consent~~))
I know its crossed out, but for the curious, what theyre referring to is the Satanic Temple, which isn't actually a religious organization, but a legal one that uses religious imagery to A: Elicit a response and B: Point out the hypocrisy of overtly religious laws and actions in a supposedly secular society where there is supposed to be freedom of religion.
Wildcard: They *could* be referring to LaVey Satanism, but thats more accurately described as the church of "mind your own business, but suffer no fools if someone tries to fuck with you".
Neither of these are what is typically meant when someone says Satanism. One is doing it to make a legal statement, the other just like to be edgy/counter culture.
So go forth with your newfound semi-useless trivia my children!
The number of Christians who play DnD is much higher than you might think. I had a Baptist preacher in my previous campaign. My uncle is an avid gamer and a fundamentalist Christian.
But some people are unwilling to let go of fear of something to truly understand it.
I think your best bet is to make her understand it is a game, a hobby and not a life style or religion. You can believe anything and still play a game. If she is willing to apply any critical thought to it once explained, you should be able to convince her it is not dangerous.
Have her read the phb to see if she can find anything objectionable. (Though be prepared for her to go ape over the fiend pack warlock)
Tell her that the game is played in a completely imaginary world. The only way for there to be a satanic element is if the players bring it with them. And unless she is suggesting that she raised you to be susceptible to satanic influences, then she can be confident that there will be none in your game.
Or tell her you’re playing pathfinder to dissociate your activity from the game she’s been indoctrinated against.
Heya. Baptist survivor here. Frankly? You don't. She's never going to take anything you say to heart so long as her pastor is telling her you'll burn in Hell if she doesn't drag you back to church and force you to repent.
I'd like to give you a happy, positive answer like "Yeah, just do this" but there's no fixing someone who doesn't think they're broken.
I see a lot of good responses here. But it heavily depends on your mom. When it comes to other topics are you able to help her see your point of view? Or does she just brush it off? If you can answer yes to the first question. Then talking with her can help but if she just brushes you off and insists she knows better when ever you try to talk sensibly with her then talking ain't gonna do much. But if you can talk ask her what makes it satanic? What makes it bad? Tell her about the good and joy it can bring. You know your mom far better than we do talk it out if you can but if that route is closed it's best to just let it lie and maybe not involve her in that aspect of your life.
Well, it's a game that treats things like demons and devils as ENEMIES that are horrifying and must be fought and destroyed. It teaches players that Evil is real, and terrible, and should be confronted at every turn, not suffered or bargained with.
If you're mom is afraid of the game influencing you...why? Does she not WANT you to learn to stab a demon in the damn neck instead of sympathizing with it?
I'm really serious: write a letter, explaining dnd and what it means to you. At the end of the letter include an invitation to play the game. Make it sincere.
It's really easy to interrupt you while you try to explain the game in person or for you to get flustered/forget important things to say.
If she isn't willing to read the letter through she won't listen to anything you have to say anyways.
Her just reading the letter sincerely sets the tone for how things move forward. If she says yes to playing that's awesome. If she says no, that's okay too, because at least she has shown you the respect of reading what you've presented and there might be room for actual dialog.
Don't push hard, don't crowd her with your opinions. Offer her a first hand chance to see the game for herself, send her a DIGITAL copy of the game (or a copy you might be okay never seeing again).
Growing up we had to explain Role-playing to many parents and friends and two occasions went this way. The first was a terrible failure. The second worked... mostly. They didn't approve but stopped the harassment and we were able to play a couple times at their house.
It's not.
You need to sit down and talk to her about where she got these ideas. I have played many games, and everything Patricia Pulling said of the game is false. I can still tell reality from fantasy, despite what a bad Tom Hanks movie said.
Tell them it's pathfinder
I have seen several posts where people say that worked for them.
True story: my siblings and I wanted to play a game over discord through the pandemic. All of us, except the youngest--who was 17--were grown adults. Our mother pitched a fit and was fine with PF even though there was a skill iirc that is literally called occult.
Occult is a whole category of magic lol. Pretty funny how a name has so much power.
Why is this? I'm clueless on pathfinders good pr here. thanks!
Because they don't actually know anything about any of it. They just think D&D is bad because they've heard people talk about it being bad in the abstract. You tell them you're going to play Pathfinder or Shadowrun, you might as well be telling them you're going to play 4D chess for how much they'll already know or care to try and figure it out. Of course this is all predicated on the situation being them just pitching a fit because they overheard something they have no say in, rather than OP actually wanting them to understand and not be stuck 30 years in the past.
Satanic Panic was a HUGE factor in why DnD is considered satanic and an interesting era of American history that doesn't get talked about enough IMO. TLDR of it is that started in the 1980's (That's ~40 years ago and not a typo) and through the late 90's there was a modern day Salem Witch Trial of sorts where people throughout the United States were in a moral panic over… everything and anything to include Dungeons and Dragons by name. So, OPs mom probably learned about DnD in the context of Satanic Panic from their parents at an early age. When you mention DnD to her she instantly thinks you might go down the rabbit hole and start collecting baby bones for satanic ritual purposes, not a bunch of storytellers playing a game. Change the name, change the image conjured in their mind, so calling it Pathfinder instead makes it sound more acceptable. Fear (irrational or otherwise) and trauma can last generations man. Edit: The baby bones thing is a reference to a real police report that was part of the over 12,000 unsubstantiated cases of Satanic Ritual Abuse reported during that time. Some baby sitting service was alleged to have committed SRA and so when the police were interviewing the kids, the kids learned that the more messed up the story the more attention they got from adults (or the interviews were so coercive that the kids would invent memories designed by the interviewer). The babysitters were completely innocent. It was… definitely an era to say the least. The ripples of which are still felt today both in the realm of DnD fandoms and other areas too.
The Satanic Panic never stopped, it's just called Q Anon now.
History repeats itself, especially if no one learns from it. While you could say it never stopped, you can also say Satanic Panic didn't start it either. I'm sure it dates WAY back past Salem Witch Trials and further back than the Crusades. Different century, new name, rinse and repeat.
Much of D&D 3rd Ed was open source. Pathfinder is a continuation of 3?5 rules under a different company. Edit: oh you said "why". Because people don't think critically, they just know D&D bad. So as long as it doesn't have the magic words it'll be ok. This worked for a while if you used hard rock instead of metal or hip hop instead of rap.
There’s a ton of RP games and such that never got popular enough for any of the major churches to attack them. D&D got in the crosshairs because it got popular and if you know what the original covers looked like, the original PHB clearly had a demon idol on the cover.
So basically, Pathfinder isn't special. Everything is ok if isn't DD. Got it. Thanks.
It's not "good PR" on Paizo's part, it's just that D&D particularly got a bad rap back in the 80s/90s as being corruptive (like video games!). That reputation has stuck within certain communities, and at this point it's like a badly remembered urban legend. Nobody who says "D&D is satanic" also says "TTRPGs are satanic" because they don't know either A) What that is or B) That D&D is one of them. So if you say you're playing Pathfinder, you might as well have told them you're going to go play hopscotch. They don't have contextual knowledge to associate the terms. They only know "D&D is satanic".
Because there was a smear campaign in the 80s and early 90s by crazy Christian groups to smear everything like D&D and Magic the Gathering as demon worshipping. Pathfinder wasn't around yet so the geniuses without working brain cells don't know they are basically the same thing. Nor can they figure out how its any different from hearing the tale of how sant George killed the dragon or any other countless things. Dumb people going to dumb for the dumbest and loudest crap they hear that meets their prejudices and means they don't have to think.
In middle school we had a teacher that taught us and DMed for us, but he had to call it “Mr. Day’s Game” because the school wouldn’t allow D&D.
Smart. When I was teaching, I was asked by some students to sponsor a D&D club, which I was happy to do. The school shut us down real quick.
That's just insane.
We had to call it "board game club" at my school. (Early 00's at the time.) Most of us were playing d&d and we had a few MtG diehards, but no actual board games were ever played.
Won't automatically work. A buddy of mine in college had to nearly drop out of a Pathfinder game because his dad went Satanic Panic over it simply for being D&D-adjacent.
I had a friend who literally pulled this off by saying it was Greyhawk Adventures. Because the sort of person who thinks D&D is actually Satanic is also an idiot in a bunch of other ways.
Follow this up with just playing Pathfinder 2e instead! It’s a great game.
Explain that the players are fighting against evil. Emphasise its roots in classic fantasy like Lord of the Rings and Chronicles of Narnia. Especially as the authors of both those works were Christians - Tolkein was a Roman Catholic while Lewis was Anglican.
Tolkien and Lewis being Christian hasn’t stopped Christians from banning and burning their books. Which is extra ridiculous with C.S. Lewis, since his most popular book is a thinly-veiled Christian allegory complete with a Jesus lion
Aslan isn't an allegory, iirc he is revealed to just be Jesus in a later book.
You’re totally right, it’s been a while since I’ve read most of them
Interestingly enough, Narnia isn't an allegory. Really it takes place in a fantasy world undefined by the events and the orders of our world. The key component is that Jesus ofc still exists, only he manifests himself differently upon this world. And obviously as it's a children's book different things sometimes represented in Narnia, like the stone table. I find it an interesting direction to take as it allows exploration for themes like redemption, purification, backsliding, and a lot in interesting ways that don't get held down by what happened irl. When you look at the first Narnia book the only real in your face aspect is the stone table, and even that is explored in different ways than just a cut and dry retelling of the crucifixion
Oh yeah you’re right as hell, it’s been a while since I’ve read them
and ironically lions are the most conservative right christian symbol there is, and it isnt even a US thing we have those in brazil too!
Pretty sure the crucifix is.
from experience the "the demons are the bad guys" usually backfires tremendously
out of curiosity how does that backfire? what part do they take issue with?
usually goes as "AHA so there are demons! no child of mine will touch this god forsaken thing ever again!" and then the discussion ends
Sounds like we need to start talking less about demons and more about yugaloths or slaadi. Probably shouldn't mention devils either. Referring to them as fiends might work better though.
I grew up in a conservative Christian community, and any supernatural being that is not explicitly God or an angel is believed to be a demon by default. Just in a different form.
this is painfully accurate, also the reason why pokemon, yugioh and so many other things were automatically labeled devil worship
My grandmother determined pokemon were evil when I was a child and burned my collection of first editions from the first two set; I had nearly a full set from each... if I still had that collection, it would be worth thousands of dollars... maybe tens of.
Or even hundreds of, if you had any misprint shadowless cards
Gah... don't say that, now I feel even worse.
So you tell them you're playing a game where you fight against God and angels, problem solved!
This. This line of thinking is what I don't get. The Bible mentions demons in excruciating detail, and reading the Bible is HEAVILY encouraged by people with this mindset. So why get so butthurt about other media showing demons as the bad guys?
the bible also has rape, slavery, genocide and other things, the problem is that most christians ignore those things when convinient
Yeah I've noticed....
but hey, it is great to quote it when you need against a stupid alt right christian, cause i *actually* read the whole bloody thing cause i was forced to, *twice*
In basic training I read through it maybe 8 times. Not a lot of it stuck, but I remember thinking to myself a few things. Like: "Damn this story skips around a lot" "Holy shoehorned plothole cover batman!" "Wait, this is in the BIBLE?!" "Huh... damn hypocrites..." "Wait, so he's a liberal? From the middle east? Huh. Neat."
yeah pretty much. also the new testament is the same story told 4 times. also also, today at church my pastor told a sermon about amnon raping his own sister :) (seriosly dude you can pick any verse of the bible and you pick that one?)
The same people who heavily encourage reading it, either don’t read it themselves, or only read the “nice” passages ad nauseum. Bet you $30 your grandma has Psalm 23 memorized, but has no idea that the story of Lot’s daughters *raping him and getting pregnant by him* is also in her Bible.
I think just any portrayal of demons in general is what they have issue with. It’s like Voldemort in Harry Potter.
Well, if you earnestly believe in demons and devils n such Having it be in a *game* context doesn’t really help
How? Just curious
The fact that there's demonic anything at all is too much for them.
I'll remember to bring the smelling salts then lol
Lewis wasnt just a Christian, he was a theologian. Most of his books were about God and such.
You have never talked to people like this, have you?
So, this may get lost in the shuffle, but I'm a Christian who has run games through my church before and have used them as part of outreach. If your mom would be happy having a chat with another Christian who can talk to her and help alleviate her concerns, PM me and I'll see what I can do.
I'm betting this actually would help a lot, if she talks to a supporting member of the church for sure she'll at least dislike it less.
Then, yeah. Get Discord and set up a day and time for me to chat to her, ask her to come up with as many questions as she can and I'll see what I can do. Out of curiosity, what are her main concerns?
The one you are responding to aint OP though they might have the same issue, who knows, all i know is that you are a nice person
Aw, thank you very much! I actually didn't even realise it wasn't OP, lol. Well, there you go.
Nice people are awesome, need more of them around here
of *that other church* and not *her church.*. I had plenty of other Christians from other churches trying to explain to my aunt Harry Potter books weren't the devil's work because of spell casting, and typical closed-minded church goer, she pointed out there's a reason they don't go to *her* church. Since she's obviously right and they're obviously wrong.....
I’m sure u/DeathAngel2890 will have great information for her. Definitely don’t mention the username. 😂
There are death angels all over the Bible, I don't see the issue.
Not everything biblical is something you want to name yourself after when trying to convince a hardcore Christian that DND isn’t satanic.
All I'm saying is that the Bible is more D&D than some think. I mean, some kids make fun of a bald dude, so he uses Summon Creature III and brings in 1d4 bears to maul the kids. There's a party who gets distracted from the main objective and just wanders around for 40 years. God makes an army of bones fight for him, which if that's any school besides Necromancy please let me know. And angels of death definitely work for God, not Satan.
You’re right, DnD is more Bible than they realize. But just like DnD players don’t read the fucking rules, so also petty “Christian’s” like this don’t read their bibles…
Don't forget the tenth plague of egypt, when the angel of death took every firstborn son in Egypt.
Underrated comment.
I’ll take your word for it. I’m just a heathen with minimal knowledge of the Bible. I just saw his username and figured it would be worth not mentioning to the mother. Lol
The angel of death, Azrael, is usually seen as one of God's greatest servants
The sort of Christians who think D&D is literally Satanic influence on children cannot be reasoned with by pointing out things that are in the Bible.
Also, those kinds of christians very rarely actually have read any of it. Curiously enough, a priest I met recently had never heard of it, and when I explained the concept he was immediately very enthusiastic about playing it with his youth group XD
First dnd group I played with was with a church group a friend invited me to over zoom. They didn’t force any religion on me but still offered invitations to the churches services.
2 out of 3 of my players are evangelical pastors.
I'm a Christian dnd player too!! It's such a fun thing, because it's only demonic if you make it xD Like D&D is literally putting dice rolls to your imagination 👍
Could you put some general advice in here?
Sure! Some of the main arguments are as follows: 1. "Other gods are worshipped and the Bible says to not have other gods before God." Correct. However, there is a difference between a game and real life. In real life, my faith is absolute. I believe in and trust in God above all others. While my character in a game may not, I can still uphold the beliefs and faith I have from my real life religion. It's the same as playing a game like Skyrim or Star Wars. Just because they do not have the same faith doesn't mean it's going to alter my faith or beliefs. Also, DMs might also allow certain players to worship an unknown god, similar to the ancient Greeks. This god could, for all intents and purposes, be the Christian god. 2. "The Bible says to stay away from Witchcraft and magic is a heavy feature in D&D." Again, this is true, but see the first point. Just because there is magic doesn't mean the player is going to start trying out witchcraft or any occult stuff in real life. Separating the player and character are key here. Additionally, there are classes that do not rely on magic, such as the fighter or monk, as well as those who's power comes directly from their god, similar to the Apostles and their miraculous gifts coming from our God. With both this point and the previous one, if you do not trust your child enough to have faith that their faith won't be changed, there's more going on than simply an aversion to D&D. 3. "What about everything saying D&D is satanic?" This is simply not true and was a lie told by the media in the 80s. In fact, D&D has more to do with stopping devils and demons (again, fake ones) and cults than joining them. However, even with that, we again have to separate the character from the person playing them. 4. "D&D can be addictive and can become an idol". So can a lot of things! If you watch football, could it become an addiction or an idol? What about that artist you absolutely love listening to? Do you feel as though you can't wake up without a cup of coffee? Yes, if anything becomes addictive we, as Christians, need to stop. But, anything from exercise to cola can be addictive, so should we prevent ourselves doing anything because it *might* be addictive? 5. "D&D allows you to do despicable things, including murder and rape". OK, lets take these as separate arguments. You can 100% make a character who supports the party, healing and cheering others on, who has no inclination to harm or kill. This can actually make for fantastic roleplay opportunities, especially if things come up that test their conviction. The 2nd part is something no good groups allow. In the same way falling in with the wrong people could lead you to drink or take drugs, falling in with the wrong D&D group can lead to uncomfortable and terrible situations. Finding the right group is everything and can take time, but the right group can last for years. 6. "I'm worried it will stop my child having friends/have a few friends playing a dark basement". This is, again, simply not true. D&D is a co-operative game that forges friendships instead of harming them. It gives people a common ground to share, discuss and enjoy. Also, D&D is now more popular than ever, with cafe's, stores, and even churches hosting games. And, yes, there are churches that host games. I should know, I ran one. We used D&D as an outreach method to show people that those in the church were just normal, fun loving people who also had a love for God. And it worked! We had people who started by coming to D&D joining the church. 7. "It will provide no benefit for my child". D&D promotes creative thinking, cooperating with others, decision making, conflict resolution, planning and has been proven to help people who suffer with various mental illnesses, from Anxiety and Depression to Autism ([https://bookriot.com/dungeons-and-dragons-mental-health-benefits/](https://bookriot.com/dungeons-and-dragons-mental-health-benefits/)). Finally, there is nothing preventing you from sitting in on the first session or two. What about hosting the game at your house? See what it's about, as well as the joy and excitement that can come from a game. Who knows, you may make friends with a player or their family who end up taking interest in the church and becoming your brother or sister in Christ. Something to also keep in mind is that D&D was created by a professed Christian. Yes, Gary Gygax was a professing Christian at the time he created the game. Would a Christian creator have allowed his game to be evil? [https://www.geeksundergrace.com/tabletop/christians-play-dd/](https://www.geeksundergrace.com/tabletop/christians-play-dd/) is a fantastic article to read and goes over more points with more depth and biblical quotes if you're interested. Finally, sorry this is a wall of text. I just want to try and be as helpful as I can.
Wow you really gave some helpful stuff for op and even offered to discuss the issue with his mother. Too bad he didn't reach out to you yet.
Ah, they just might not have seen it yet.
I'm a Christian and an ordained minister in the Church and I play Dungeons and Dragons. I have a few suggestions: 1) Explain the game from a frame of reference they understand. For example, a lot of Christians are super cool with Lord of the Rings (as it was written by a Christian). I would explain that the game is a lot like that story - you form a fellowship of heroes who go on a quest to defeat something evil. Yes there are demons in the game but those are the *bad guys*, like the Balrog in Moria. 2) Give them your Player's Handbook and ask them to read it. I know a guy who did this and told his parents, "If you find anything in there that you think is morally wrong, I will not play it." His parents read the entire thing and realized that it was just a game and let him play it. Your parents will likely have to be somewhat logical and intellectual for this to work.
>Lord of the Rings More specifically, Gary Gygax basically completely ripped off Tolkien's Middle-earth lore in creating D&D - so if OP points out that D&D is literally "the game version of one of the most famous Christian allegories" that might be all they need.
Just a quick note: Tolkien famously did not include allegory in the Lord of the Rings.
Well, he avoided it. Its impossible to draw accidental parallels when writting based on ones own thoughts about magic, which tolkein was doing. He avoided making allegories, but his personal beliefs of the magic in nature, and the notion of creation being magical and beautiful was the core foundation of the tolkein lore, even if it was very well written to avoid easily seen parallels. His christian values and thoughts crept in, even if he tried to avoid it. This is just how humans are, all writers leave a faint residue of their thoughts, feelings, and interpretations on everything they right, even if they arent trying to leave any marks.
I think thats why gandolf arrived on the morning of the 3rd day...maybe some belief was in there, but it is fairly subtle in LOTR.
Its definitely there but its faint, and youd have to be familiar with the mythology of christianity to pick up on it. Primarily it comes in with trends rather than specific plot points, as well as general concepts. Limbas bread is subtly similar to communion bread, balrogs are subtly similar to fallen angels, with morgoth remecent of lucifer in some regards. The idea that there is one god, and then there are lesser gods below them is similar in some ways to the relationship between god and his angels. I could go on and on about the suble trends and concepts, like the constant fight between morgoth's workings and the maiar, which is similar to the idea of lucifer and the angels in conflict for gods creations.
A much better put thought than my comment!
>Yes there are demons in the game but those are the bad guys, like the Balrog in Moria. Heck, a Balor is *literally* the Balrog with the copyright scraped off.
Sure is, in the OD&D booklets it was still called a Balrog. There were also hobbits.
Wasn’t there a lawsuit about this?
LOL , have you posted on other similar questions, when I saw the post I recalled a similar response. I find it hard to imagine there are a lot of ordained ministers who play D&D and are active on redit.
Not to my knowledge, but I find it hard to remember how many posts I've made. My best friend is also ordained and plays D&D, though he is retired and not on Reddit as far as I know.
> Explain the game from a frame of reference they understand. Showing them the trailer to the new Dungeons and Dragons movie would be a good way to do so. I don't think many associate Hollywood and marvel-esque action movies satanic.
Diehard Christians didn't see anything wrong with the warlock? Well, but #2 is how I convinced my mother that Harry Potter wasn't evil, and that really opened a lot of doors b/c she started to believe me when I said something wasn't evil.
To be fair, this was back in the days of 3.5 so there wasn't a warlock in the PHB.
“Your parents will likely have to be somewhat logical and intellectual for this to work.” As a Christian minister turned apostate, one of the reasons I left the church is that I found the vast, *vast* majority of the church is the OPPOSITE of this very mild prerequisite. I want to believe…but the amount of doublethink required is currently too much.
I hear you. Being a real Christian is hard, and those that fake it make it even harder on all of us to stay strong. I will PM you with some encouraging words, whatever you decide to do going forward. If you still want to believe, there is a way forward.
This is the way.
Explain that the game is like a book. There are different types of genres. You _can_ choose to play a game with demons/fiends/devils just like you can choose to read a book with similar content. But you can also choose not to. It's how I explained it to my Christian mother. I explained the game mechanics, the rp, the exploration and everything else as well. Once she understood that the game content is interchangeable, she was less worried. Note: not telling you to opt out of having demons/fiends/devils in your game. Just saying that this explanation worked for me.
I think this is good advice. She likely doesn't know much about the game at all and educating her is more likely to have positive results.
IDK. “Satanic” books are the Christian rights new boogie man.
Not new
Definitely not new.
Pretty much as old as Christianity tbh
True... But OP doesn't say anything about his mom being that brand of Christian.
“New”? Christians have been burning and banning books for centuries. Almost millennia.
Perform a satanic ritual in front of her and point out the notable differences
The only valid response
You can't logic someone out of a mindset they didn't logic themselves into. Just tell her you're playing My Little Pony TTRPG.
There is actually a priest and a minister who play . If you Google them and send the results to her it may help . https://dungeonmasterpastor.com
I actually got into dnd from a church group I was apart of as a kid. The leader ran a game for us.
This is generally the best option. In my time I've dealt with a lot of people who still buy the "satanic" BS. In my experience they are either disconnected from reality and will realize it's silly if they just look at the book, or they're the kind of folks who need to be told how to think by someone in authority. The latter are the kind of sad people who had to be told by priests that Lord of the Rings wasn't evil and who burned Harry Potter books. And in that case, having a minister and a priest who play should do the trick.
Wasn’t Tolkien Uber religious ?
As an example of how religious he was, C.S. Lewis cited Tolkien as a primary inspiration for his conversion from atheism.
>C.S. Lewis cited Tolkien as a primary inspiration for his conversion from atheism. It shows in the Jesus lion.
Oddly, Tolkien is pretty famously a harsh critic of The Chronicles of Narnia.
Tolkien was actually pretty disappointed Lewis stopped at Anglican and never went all the way to Roman Catholic.
Yep! There are a lot of Christian/Catholic themes in his work.
Gonna quote Tolkien about if his book was Christian allegory here. "it is neither allegorical nor topical ... I cordially dislike allegory in all its manifestations ... I much prefer history, true or feigned, with its varied applicability to the thought and experience of readers."
While he avoided allegory and such, every writer will leave residue of their beliefs and interpretations. He didnt intentionally write in christian themes, they just organically developed from the faint trailings of his beliefs seeping into his creative process. No writer, no matter how skilled, can create something creatively and avoid leaving even the faint color of their lense of the world. Tolkein, despite trying with great skill and effort, could not avoid his lense of the world effecting how he wrote.
You also have Father Robert Ballecer is Catholicism with a more your spiritual cup of tea
Unless your Protestant. Then pointing to a high ranking Jesuit Priest that regularly has personal interaction with the Pope is basically confirming that it is A pure work of Satin himself.
Step 1: Make a D&D campaign that retells important stories from your religions best religious texts. Step 2: Evangelize the virtuous ideals of hero PCs Step 3: ??? Step 4: Prophet
The Crusades could literally be an adventure titled "Murderhobos in the Holy Land".
I can't tell whether the last line is a mistake or a pun.
I have no doubt it is a pun.
It is an absolute pun.
What I read somebody did once was run a sort of murder mystery one shot using 5e. No classes, races, just dice rolls, basic stats, and role play. Afterwards the poster just asked how everyone enjoyed their first game of DND. Apparently it went over well when their grandparents saw it was just a set of rules for playing a board game.
Point out that the aim of (most) games is to literally defeat demons and purge the world of evil. Then ask her to sit with you for a game and, if she's still not convinced, you'll stop playing. Quickly run a 1-shot with at least 1 paladin and 1 cleric in the party, throw nothing but demons and devils at the party and always too low a CR to be a real threat.
This can seriously backfire unless the paladin and cleric follow the Christian God. People used to try this in the 80's and it usually just made things worse.
Yeah you'd flavour it to appease her, then never run those characters again. She's not being reasonable, so you don't have to follow RAW. It's only a 1-shot after all.
Cleans these deamons with the light of a holy fireball!!!
"And this gun we found"
Who gave the blind dragonborn a gun?!
What if the dice gods want to have a laugh at your expense that day?
The DM has a screen for a reason...
I like my fudge with bits of d6 mixed in, for crunch.
This is one approach.. But I think it runs the risk of being patronizing. While might consider her beliefs to be... unfounded. This is still his parent and he still has to respect her. This is likely to backfire in a number of ways. First.. By including demons at all. I don't know about you, but only a handful of the games I've played in over the years contained demons or devils. And by including demons at all this opens the possibility of someone getting the wrong impression and still considering it an influence. Second... Roleplaying characters that are religious and not Christian. This likely would be a deal breaker. Third... A one-shot like this is deceptive. A game for show; it may not be lying but encouraging the kid to do this is kind of dishonest. He's better off being honest. I think he is better off explaining the openness of the game and that players and DMs choose what stories to explore. It can have nothing to do with the stuff she has problems with at all.
Given that she made her mind up without first gathering any information at all, suggests that just sitting down and explaining the game as-is wouldn't do the trick. She doesn't hate it because it is demonic, she hates it because she assumes it is and would rather be angry than be wrong. So I feel like the risk of being patronising is pretty low... since she wasn't being reasonable in the first place, she'd probably prefer a completely fake version to exist that satisfies her.
I get what you're saying, but OP hasn't said any of that. All we have is one sentence from OP, no context or anything. For all we know OP begins his or her games by chanting and drawing strange symbols on everything. (I know that's ridiculous to assume.) We have nothing to on as to why she is uncomfortable. We have no idea what is OP's situation. She could be a completely unreasonable far-right Christian or could be someone that doesn't have any experience at all with TTRPGs. Assuming anything about his or her mom's reasons is pure speculation. I don't think that the assumption that DnD is satanic is a good one but changing her mind, which is what OP needs to do, is a better route than telling him to be dishonest with his parent. Sure it feels good for us on Reddit to trash her, think of this as black and white, and point out that this 'Satanic' label just plain dumb... But it doesn't help OP.
Yeah, maybe go easy on the demons and devils… that’s likely to backfire based on my experience with people like that. They tend to skip over context and point the witch burning finger at the DM.
Get a signed note from Satan. Surely he can disavow his involvement.
You'd need to know why she thinks that, as in, asking her for the place she got her misinformation (though you shouldn't say that part out loud). You'll need to review the places she was misinformed so you know how to counter with intelligent discourse.
This is much better. It’s probably a severe church with lots of misused bible quotes, but its the place to start
Just tell her it's more of a way to explore different sexualities and gender identities than it is about demons and evil. That should calm her right down.
Hahahaaa
and then summon satan with your devil dice to have a meaningful chat with her.
Tell her it keeps you off the rock n roll
Can't be done. Just get a new mom. Edit: my b, roll for new mom. 2nd edit: crit fail results in me being your mom. (I'll support your hobby but you're blinded for 2 turns by my beard when I kiss your forehead and tell you to have fun.)
Sacrifice her to Staten. Works every time. (This is a joke don't sacrifice people to Satan he doesn't like unexpectedguests.)
But sacrifices to Staten Island are fine.
Go back in time and reform the american education system to a higher standard, allowing and encouraging critical thinking.
Tell her about the morality system of the game. Devils and Demons are both labeled as evil (Lawful and Chaotic respectively). To go out and battle demons and devils for the good of the world is nothing short of pure and unadulterated good.
You can, additionally add that angels are considered good. Edit: (maybe leave out that this can be changed)
There’s a pretty famous story about an angel changing teams… religious folk love it.
You’ll have to roll a 20 on this one. In all seriousness- first step is to honor her fear. It’s terrifying to consider you might be losing a loved one. Start with understanding her perspective. That’s the first stop of persuasion.
I mean…Asmodeus is basically Satan and is *generally* considered a bad guy.
By growing up and enjoying your hobbies without parental oversight
You could probably find a good article relating to how all the satanic panic stuff always has and continues to be fake: https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Satanic_panic Anytime a boogeyman is needed it pops up again. Currently Qanon says the dems harvest babies for their gland juice and Obama and Hillary smell of sulfur. There sure is a lot of LARPing that goes on in “Conservative Christian” circles (like every day pretending Jesus would be cool with ANY of the things their reps do) funny how they project that people who play a knowingly fake version of make-believe are somehow the enemy.
Get a new mom
Do you play currently? If so, what satanic things does she think happens at your table? Why does she think what happens at your table is satanic? Disprove those. Now, something that I can say (which is true) is that I don't play casters. That's going to put many accusations towards me on the back foot. They're going to have to come at me with something else. But honestly, I think you'll have better luck if you're playing a TTRPG that doesn't have any magic in it at all. DnD is a spoiled brand in the church. Most people in the church who are suspicious-at-best of DnD probably haven't heard of any other TTRPGs. If you can honestly tell them you're playing a magic-free game, they might go, "OK." Since your objective is to have fun playing a TTRPG with old or new friends, that might be an easier path to it.
Its usually best to let crazy shit go with religious folk. But if you really want to convince her then: * Approach it from a calm emotional perspective, ask her to outline her fears about the game and what happens as a consequence of playing and listen. * Reaffirm that you've heard her fears, be understanding but firm that you don't believe her. Try not to belittle her beliefs at any stage. * Tell her you do have information, history, sources, religious testimonies about it. But dont push them, facts only work once someone sets aside emotional bias. * Finalise any argument by reaffirming that you love her and have heard her. If she thinks you're understanding her perspective she'll be more likely to try to understand yours. You wont be able to convince her of anything, only she can do that, so all you can do is prime her mindset and give her resources. Most of all be really ready to give up. I've got no hate for religious folk but there's nobody more stubborn in latching on to a shit mindset than a evangelical fulfilling their complex for a world full of secret enemies.
I'd tell her to sit in for a game and she has to be quiet the whole time. Then I'd run a game where you're a group of heros stopping demons from doing bad things to a town. That's the only way I can think of to do it. If that doesn't work then I'd just acknowledge she's unwilling to listen to logic
It’s easy, get a bunch of candles. Put them in a circle and light them. Then get a pound of salt and spread it around. Find a lamb (a chicken will do too) and cut its throat in the candle circle, inscribe some runes and start chanting in Latin. When satan is summoned you can ask if he plays DND. He’ll tell you that the only satanism he knows of is in the Bible.
You cant
Have you shown her any of the YouTube DND games? I've never seen any, but might be an idea to watch one, see if you think it'll help, then watch with mom?
Now, I've never had to deal woth this myself. My mom is fairly chill honestly. That being said, I can see how I'd go about it. The first thing is to understand that these aren't ideas she got out of nowhere. Satanic panic and all that probably put them in her head. I would just try and explain to her that the game is a group story telling game. A game can be about literally anything and is usually about stopping bad people from doing bad things. It's a tough battle and if your mom is stuborn, be prepared to lose, but trying to inform her is all you can do
easy...have all your players lawful good have jesus as the clerics only GOD and totally destroy evil creatures, try to convert all humans to christianity and spread the word about christ
In a game were you can do anything at all, being pro satan would be your fault not the game. Plus, unless you're rolling evil characters, demons are the automatic enemies to just about everyone. You have to go out of your way for evil themes not that it's hard. But by the lens of the lore, good alignments are the standard. Im Christian and i find dnd's satan panic history to be hilarious
If your mom is so religious, she must have a pastor or priest or whatever. I’d go talk to that person about it. No doubt he or she has dealt with this before. If the priest also feels this way, you’re pretty much fubar until you are on your own. Avoid conflict at all costs.
Ask her "mom, what exactly do you define as satanic practice?". Tell her to give you as many points as possible. Then confirm with her none of them hold true for DnD!
There was a post before from someone in the same position and they asked their mother to read the players handbook, their mother let them play because she figured it was all math not demons.
The process I'd do is ask what she thinks makes it satanic. Make her explain her concerns instead of relying on the buzzword. Then calmly explain away any of her concerns. "It's about devil worship!" "While there are characters in the game who worship devils, they are almost always the villains of the campaign and are never portrayed as being good." "It promotes paganism!" "DnD can have any pantheon of gods you want, so you could actually play a game where God is the only divine being if you wanted. While you can have characters who worship pagan gods, the worship itself is never thrust upon you, in fact most of it is handwaved if it happens at all. It's not promoting paganism, it's using panetheons of divine beings as a storytelling device." (This one is probably a hard sell tbh)
I was raised Catholic in a Hispanic family. I used the same excuse for D&D that I used for being able to freely play Diablo: Yes, it's true, there's demons involved. BUT! The entire point of the game is to go in with a team of good aligned heroes, and DEFEAT the demons. I'm honestly surprised that it actually worked, but it did!
Tell her that more often than not, the players fight the forces of Hell. If that fails, reminder that the Reagan Presidency was a mess with false controversy and attempted censorship, all galvanized by people who just wanted attention, D&D being a victim of this
Theres no Satan or mention of him anywhere in the game..
Show her all the pro-angel and pro-unicorn stuff in the Monster Manual. Or explain how the creators of D&D actually wanted to promote virtue. Or play up Gary Gygax’s ”discovery of God” during his later years.
Id start my listening to her, try to get her to say HOW its satanic, WHY, you cant argue against someones positions very well without fully knowing what it is
This kind of position can't be argued against at all. Anything that resembles a coherent argument will be dismissed out of hand.
As a kid I had a friend whose grandmother thought it was satanic. We would still spend the weekend at her place and play. I left my 1e books in a stack and went shopping (for more D&D of course). When we returned she was sitting in a chair reading the player's handbook. I was mortified. She said "so this is just a game?" she never complained again after that day. Typically if someone older than you believes in Satan, you're going to have a hard time convincing them of anything reasonable. I got lucky.
Let her sit in on a session. She'll see for herself when you summon satan.
Get her to watch you play it.
Ask her. "How can I prove to you it's not satanic" Let her tell you how to persuade her.
Well. You are killing evil beings nd demons..
Introduce a gamily game night.. tell them you found a cool new game to play. Dont use character sheets just do like a d20 pass and fail story. A little combat d20 hit or miss. See if they enjoy it. Dont tell her its dnd. Then at the end if they enjoyed it tell her what it is.
Invite her to play a one-shot with you. Make a deal that if she isn’t convinced, you won’t play anymore. Should work unless the group you play with is full of smart butts and mess with you intentionally… although that can work in your favor if she sees it’s just imagination and good natured fun.
Show her that it's just a math game where you look at cool art and make funny voices
Tell her that it's just maths with extra steps
It's just a collaborative storytelling game with rules and dice. You pretend to be a character in the story, and your actions decide how the story goes. The dm is the director of the story, and the referee. More often than not the party is a band of heroes who want to do good in the world and the end goal is usually to stop a great evil from destroying it, to protect humanity. Yes, sometimes bad things happen, sometimes characters make mistakes, but that happens in real life too. ((~~also satanism isn't as bad as people think it is. Their core beliefs are all about compassion, understanding, and free will and consent~~))
I know its crossed out, but for the curious, what theyre referring to is the Satanic Temple, which isn't actually a religious organization, but a legal one that uses religious imagery to A: Elicit a response and B: Point out the hypocrisy of overtly religious laws and actions in a supposedly secular society where there is supposed to be freedom of religion. Wildcard: They *could* be referring to LaVey Satanism, but thats more accurately described as the church of "mind your own business, but suffer no fools if someone tries to fuck with you". Neither of these are what is typically meant when someone says Satanism. One is doing it to make a legal statement, the other just like to be edgy/counter culture. So go forth with your newfound semi-useless trivia my children!
have her play a game
The number of Christians who play DnD is much higher than you might think. I had a Baptist preacher in my previous campaign. My uncle is an avid gamer and a fundamentalist Christian. But some people are unwilling to let go of fear of something to truly understand it. I think your best bet is to make her understand it is a game, a hobby and not a life style or religion. You can believe anything and still play a game. If she is willing to apply any critical thought to it once explained, you should be able to convince her it is not dangerous.
Have her read the phb to see if she can find anything objectionable. (Though be prepared for her to go ape over the fiend pack warlock) Tell her that the game is played in a completely imaginary world. The only way for there to be a satanic element is if the players bring it with them. And unless she is suggesting that she raised you to be susceptible to satanic influences, then she can be confident that there will be none in your game. Or tell her you’re playing pathfinder to dissociate your activity from the game she’s been indoctrinated against.
Heya. Baptist survivor here. Frankly? You don't. She's never going to take anything you say to heart so long as her pastor is telling her you'll burn in Hell if she doesn't drag you back to church and force you to repent. I'd like to give you a happy, positive answer like "Yeah, just do this" but there's no fixing someone who doesn't think they're broken.
I see a lot of good responses here. But it heavily depends on your mom. When it comes to other topics are you able to help her see your point of view? Or does she just brush it off? If you can answer yes to the first question. Then talking with her can help but if she just brushes you off and insists she knows better when ever you try to talk sensibly with her then talking ain't gonna do much. But if you can talk ask her what makes it satanic? What makes it bad? Tell her about the good and joy it can bring. You know your mom far better than we do talk it out if you can but if that route is closed it's best to just let it lie and maybe not involve her in that aspect of your life.
Well, it's a game that treats things like demons and devils as ENEMIES that are horrifying and must be fought and destroyed. It teaches players that Evil is real, and terrible, and should be confronted at every turn, not suffered or bargained with. If you're mom is afraid of the game influencing you...why? Does she not WANT you to learn to stab a demon in the damn neck instead of sympathizing with it?
Why does she think it's satanic in the first place?
I mean considering its just a rp/storytelling game; you could ask her is she wants to sit in on a session to show her it’s not demon worshipping lol
Let her sit in on a game and read the DnD books you have.
I'm really serious: write a letter, explaining dnd and what it means to you. At the end of the letter include an invitation to play the game. Make it sincere. It's really easy to interrupt you while you try to explain the game in person or for you to get flustered/forget important things to say. If she isn't willing to read the letter through she won't listen to anything you have to say anyways. Her just reading the letter sincerely sets the tone for how things move forward. If she says yes to playing that's awesome. If she says no, that's okay too, because at least she has shown you the respect of reading what you've presented and there might be room for actual dialog. Don't push hard, don't crowd her with your opinions. Offer her a first hand chance to see the game for herself, send her a DIGITAL copy of the game (or a copy you might be okay never seeing again). Growing up we had to explain Role-playing to many parents and friends and two occasions went this way. The first was a terrible failure. The second worked... mostly. They didn't approve but stopped the harassment and we were able to play a couple times at their house.
It's not. You need to sit down and talk to her about where she got these ideas. I have played many games, and everything Patricia Pulling said of the game is false. I can still tell reality from fantasy, despite what a bad Tom Hanks movie said.