Hello Everyone,

Well as usual I was writing along and doing some research after my day job and in the background I had a movie on. I often do this to break up the silence of thought and allow my mind to drift away from time to time on the regular work I am doing. I find it also helpful to break away from the zone of writing and therefore it allows me to free my mind a little and think about other topics or other possibilities in my writing. Don’t get me wrong when I am in a trance or a heavy writing zone everything goes off and I just type away.

Anyways a movie was on and the actors and actresses caught my attention when the screamed that they needed to get to the church. They needed to get there to claim sanctuary form the evil forces that were pursuing them. Of course this is because it is holy ground or grounds consecrated by the religious beliefs of those people in that particular community. Given the movie it was most likely some Christian church and the crosses on the church and outside kind fo gave it away. Still the main thing that got me is the “sanctuary” part.

Why do we so often see this, sanctuary?

I think we often see it in movies and when writing because it was the belief and still is a strong belief of people in religious faiths that churches or other places of worship allow us to have a sanctuary from evil and it also identifies the obvious…..you ready for it….light vs. darkness, evil vs. good.

These are the common beliefs that have passed down over the centuries and millennia that sanctuary is a place to deliver us from the evil knocking on our regular doors.

Take a step back:

Now, I am putting myself in the movies. Sleepy Hollow, Red Riding Hood, etc.. Yes of course the evil can’t make it into the sanctuary but they always find a way to get what they need out, using a different weapon sometimes, using a person possessed, the powers of manipulation. There are many ways the evil still tries to drive us out of that protected sanctuary. In the movies and books it more often than not succeeds at doing this. Then where are those characters left. Dead.

Now what about the fact that there would be limited food supplies in the building or on the grounds. What if the evil simply didn’t disappear or lose its power when the sunrise came. What would they do then? Starve? Dehydrate?

Conclusion:

Well, just putting myself in those people’s shoes for a moment and it makes me begin to think that perhaps this sanctuary bit is more of a trap and the people would have had a better chance running in the first place instead of searching out these sanctuaries.

Sorry if I destroyed the safety of sanctuary for anyone. Just another tangent and a few thoughts of mine.

Thanks for reading,

Joshua Crane Dowidat