Mr. Rogers vs. the Superheroes

But the ratio of quality work to crap is much higher in children's books than in other media. Especially if you stick to children's books that aren't attached to toys or other media. Compare, for example, anything Disney, where the books are often just a long series of nonsequiturs with barely any narrative structure, let alone emotional depth, to anything by Philip Stead.

So, I'm saying perhaps there is something to be learned from examining the problem in depth rather than taking a "shoot on sight" sort of stance. Nothing about that required there be some single unifying framework, it's simply calling for an evidence based examination of whether there are methods that have a more beneficial outcome than that.

E.g. In the case of trying to reduce crime in general, you can increase criminal punishments or you can try to prevent people from becoming criminals. I suspect the latter is a better return on investment socially, and for the victims and criminals in particular.

> There is a framework for understanding say schizophrenia, and so potential for a cure

Good! All the more reason to look for additional frameworks that can help in other types of situations.

> Till then we should treat them all as crimes and prosecute accordingly

I'm not sure anyone here has said they shouldn't be prosecuted. I certainly haven't. I'm confused as to why you keep bringing it up, since it seems to assume people are arguing against treating sexual child abuse as a crime. Who here is proposing that?

You could take a practical book about how to survive on a desert island. But, since you're gonna live forever, everything in there is stuff you could figure out on your own eventually. So this book's value is only short-term.

You could take a new age book with lots of feel-good, intuitively-pleasing platitudes. But, again, you could just invent all that by yourself. Probability of eternal-term value: 0.

A collection of stories like the ones in question at least has some chance of providing eternal-term value, precisely BECAUSE on the short-term they seem so absurd. If they were intuitively pleasing at first glance, then you could just come up with them yourself eventually. This same reasoning would apply to any similar collection of stories, but the stories in question at least have a lot of precedent / test-of-time / reputable endorsements.

If a higher power would try to teach me some lessons, I assume (by analogy) that those lessons would similarly come in the form of stories or parables etc. Just like my daughter understands my teachings better in that form, I assume I would understand a higher power's teachings better in that form.

If a book claims to be inspired by a higher power, and I read it and everything looks immediately feel-good intuitive/logical on the surface, than I'm going to reject it, saying: "I could have written that myself!"

I think the pride comes in assuming that the being that created the book is exactly like yourself. That assumption is egocentric.

That the nature of the being who created this universe is complex, and isn't exactly like us, shouldn't be that surprising. Any being capable of such things would surely be different from us in some material way. When that being describes himself, and those descriptions do not line up with our expectations, thats ok. He doesn't exist inside the confines of the universe he created and that we live in, and is not bounded by it or its rules.

The gospel isn't, on the whole, that complicated. All mankind are sinners. The consequence of sin is death. The way to be saved from death is to accept a divine gift. To accept the gift, you need to acknowledge your sin, accept that the giver exists and that the gift exists, and ask for it. There are further details and surprising depth and beauty, but the basics are very simple.

I don't think He hid the keys.