"Have You Ever Been Condemned to Hell for Playing Video Games?"

I consider myself a Christian man, but not a bible thumper by any means. I have the “you do what you want” and “I’ll do what I want” attitude when it comes to having faith. I can’t stand extremist on any level, whether it be the “follow me or you’re going to hell” people or the “you’re an idiot for believing in a higher power” people. I know that really didn’t need to be said because I’m sure most people feel the same way, but this story is one of the reasons why I feel that way.

When I was younger, back in the late 80’s, I attended a Catholic school. Now, what I’m about to say isn’t a knock on the Catholics, but on the extremists who have a knack of taking things a little too far, hence the name extremists. Well as I was saying, the big console at the time was obviously the NES and like most people my age that played video games would recall, it was a normal thing to trade and/or borrow games from our friends. Games weren’t given to us a frequently as they are given to kids today, so to be able to play a wide variety of games, we had to trade with our friends or believe it or not go over their houses to play what they had.

One afternoon before heading home I was talking to one of my friends, he wanted to borrow Gauntlet and for the life of me I can’t remember what I was going to borrow from him, but I agreed. The next day at recess, not even during class, we break out the games to make the switch not really thinking anything of it. A nun walked by and saw what we were doing; she grabbed both the games and brought us into the office.

She saw the cover of Gauntlet which featured a wizard and whatever game he had featured some sort of demon or devil looking thing on the cover, which did not sit well with her. She read us the riot act, told us how playing these things was going to guarantee us a spot in hell, as if to imply grab your pitchfork and horns because you’re invited to a barbeque! Now, I may be heading to hell, if not already there, but I can tell you for sure my video game collection isn’t going to be the reason why!

She then decided she was going to keep the games and have our parents come in to pick them up, which was a big mistake on her part. I guess she thought she was going to fill our parents in on what was going on, with the hopes of “saving” us. I don’t think she realized we got these games from our parents and not some guy hiding out behind the school selling games in plastic baggies. My mother was not someone to play around with; especially when you try to keep something she had to spend fifty dollars on, let’s just say it didn’t end well for the nun.

If she thought Gauntlet was a bad, good thing she never came across games like GTA or House of the Dead: Overkill!

Has anyone else ever experienced something like this?

MJM