Angel invasion
From Angels to Aliens: Teenagers, the Media, and the Supernatural. By Lynn Schofield Clark. Oxford University Press, 284 pp., $29.95.
Into each generation a Slayer is born. One girl in all the world; a Chosen One. One born with the strength and the skill to fight the vampires, to stop the spread of their evil and the swell of their numbers." So begins the story of Buffy the Vampire Slayer, one among many current television series that portray angels, aliens, witches and paranormal phenomena as part of everyday life. Do these supernatural representations shape the religious lives of teenagers?
This is the question Lynn Schofield Clark, a scholar of media, religion and culture at the University of Colorado School of Journalism and Mass Communication, attempts to answer. She concludes that it depends on what you think religion is. Teens shaped by Protestant Christianity are only minimally influenced. Clark's inquiry reveals what she calls a "religion of the possible"--a belief in and an openness to the possibilities of the supernatural, a belief that often coexists with religious traditions.
