Dungeons & Dragons And The Liturgies Of Imagination

Jon Del Arroz recently suggested that Dungeons & Dragons is “inherently Christian and right-wing,” lamenting what Hasbro has done to the franchise. Jon’s impulse here is admirable, for he sees a cultural artifact that once reflected a certain moral texture and notices it has slipped into the undercurrent of contemporary woke ideology. However, while Jon's concern deserves respect, the claim that D&D is inherently Christian requires more scrutiny.

Here, I would bring up A Christian Response to Dungeons and Dragons, a booklet by Peter Leithart and George Grant. Therein, they do not treat the game as a Christian vessel. Rather, they sees it as a "catechism of the New Age," a phrase used deliberately because a catechism is a formative structure. Catechism is a liturgy that teaches by repetition. D&D is catechismal because it induces its own spiritual rehearsal, shaping the player’s moral instincts and metaphysical assumptions through the rhythm of its gameplay.

Role-playing games shape the imagination toward autonomy and spectacle. They offer a kind of spiritual high, a retreat into the self that mirrors modernity’s descent from the bright light of God's creation into the shadowed corridors of personal fantasy. The dungeon, in this view, is not a site of testing Christian heroism but a metaphor for spiritual rebellion.

At the heart of this critique lies the theme of power. In D&D you acquire a variety of spells, weapons, magical items, and influence. Players level up, they accumulate resources and they conquer dungeons. Might makes right. The monsters and demons that populate the game are drawn from real-world occult traditions, reinforcing the idea that power, whether that be divine, arcane, or infernal, is the axis around which the game turns.

This reinforces a power-centric imagination and one that is not neutral. Here, players see magic as a morally flexible tool, usable for good or evil depending on alignment. They are invited into a dualistic universe where law and chaos are symmetrical forces. However, this undermines the Christian view of creation where evil is not a coequal rival to good but, in fact, a distortion of good.

Lest one think any of this is reactionary, here is a concession: role-playing itself is not inherently corrupt. In fact, its pedagogical power ought to be affirmed. Children do, indeed, learn through imitation. Stories have the inherent capacity to form moral vision. The problem, however, is not imagination but the telos of one's imagination.

What kind of world does the game invite us to inhabit? What virtues does it cultivate?

This is where a contrast between D&D and the works of Lewis and Tolkien becomes instructive. As we know, Narnia and Middle-earth are filled with fantastic creatures like witches and goblins, right? But what stands out is all the heroes who are just ordinary people. For instance, Frodo isn't out and about throwing fireballs nor is Aragorn smiting his enemies with yellow light. Likewise, Father Christmas in Narnia arms Peter with a sword and a shield, not a book of spells. The point is, the magic in these tales was never a tool for self-assertion but, more often, a temptation to be resisted. The narrative arc bends toward humility, sacrifice, and the restoration of order.

The deeper concern is not just with magic here but with the metaphysics surrounding magic. There are cases where magic is, indeed, good such as when it is used by Gandalf. His magic is not a spell-book of tactical options. It is metaphysical authority which is restrained, mission bound, and sacramental.

Gandalf is a Maia, a lesser angelic being sent by the Valar to guide Middle-earth’s peoples. His power is immense, but deliberately veiled. He bears Narya, the Ring of Fire, which inspires courage and resists despair but is not used for domination like the Ring of Power.

When Gandalf confronts the Balrog, he does not cast a a single spell. He speaks a word of command. He projects an ontological authority, not one based in combat mechanics. The magic he has flows from his being, from his mission, and his submission to a higher order. While his fireworks delight, his whispers to moths evoke wonder, none of it is a systematized school of magic. The magic of the Maia is poetic, not procedurally generated based on mana reserves or resting cycles.

D&D magic, by contrast, is mechanized. It is divided into schools, governed by rules, and quantified by spell slots. It serves the player’s goals, not a divine mission. A wizard may cast Fireball or Charm Person regardless of alignment. The magic of fantasy role-playing games is often depicted as existing within a dualistic universe where law and chaos are equally powerful. Characters may align with good or evil, law or chaos, and the game treats these as symmetrical options. When players begin to see reality through the lens of the game’s moral taxonomy, the imagination is no longer forming virtue.

In contemporary media, evil is often reduced to trauma or misunderstanding. Villains are not embodiments of vice but victims of circumstance. Their choices lack metaphysical weight, their malice no longer mirrors a corrupted will. This flattening makes it difficult to write a compelling antagonist because the moral architecture that once gave villains their grandeur has been hollowed out.

And the collapse doesn’t stop there. It becomes difficult even to describe what a hero is. Without a transcendent moral horizon, heroism devolves into charisma, competence, or resistance to traditional norms. The hero is no longer a figure of virtue but a cipher of audience projection. Their goodness is assumed but never actually proven.

One should also reflect on the nature of role-play itself. Role-playing is a powerful tool for learning, especially in religious education. Scripture is full of imitation: Paul even urges believers to imitate him as he imitates Christ. But role-play must remain in submission to God. Christians are not called to inhabit fictional personas for their own sake. They are called to imitate Christ, not to rehearse their own capacity for autonomy. When role-play becomes a rehearsal of moral compromise or spiritual deception, it ceases to be formative and becomes corrosive.

Jon is right to care about the moral shape of our cultural artifacts. But D&D was never a doctrinal text. It was born from pulp fiction, wargaming, and mythic bricolage. Gary Gygax’s personal faith may be relevant biographically, but the game itself defies a true theological framing.

One last thing to keep in mind is that one must ensure one's counsel is practical about these things. Do not panic or devolve into anxieties. Instead, be discerning and not reactionary. Understand the game’s mechanics, its metaphysical assumptions, and its emotional pull. If you are a parent, you ought talk with your children, not merely forbid certain things without reason only to further induce unbidden panic on society about such things. This is because of the Streishand effect and how, even in forbidding certain temptations, one may increase their seductive nature.

If we are to engage D&D as Christians, we must do more than assess its dangers. We must ask how it might be redeemed from within. The game’s imaginative structure is not beyond repair. Its mechanics can be reoriented, its stories retold, its moral architecture reshaped. When roleplay is submitted to the rule of God’s law, when power is tempered by humility, and magic becomes a metaphor for temptation rather than triumph, the dungeon can become a place of pilgrimage. The liturgy of the game need not rehearse autonomy. It can rehearse true Christian virtue. That is the deeper task and one that is well worth undertaking.

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