"The Hunger Games"
Psalm 23
Scout Sunday – April 29, 2012
Reverend Dr. David C. Brown
Pilgrim Congregational United Church of Christ
400 Glenwood Drive, Chattanooga, TN 37404
Let’s begin with a survey. How many of you here this morning have seen the current blockbuster movie “The Hunger Games?”- For young adults this was one of the most anticipated movies of the year. Tickets started selling more than a month in advance, and the movie trailer was featured during this year’s Super Bowl. The movie set viewing and financial box office records and millions of young people continue to see it. Though you may not have seen the movie, have you read any or all of the novels in “The Hunger Games” trilogy by Suzanne Collins? They are a futurist dystopian fantasy of life set in a post-apocalyptic North America? Following its publication in 2008, “The Hunger Games” quickly became a “New York Times” best seller as did the sequel books, “Catching Fire” in 2009 and “Mockingjay” in 2010. The books have won numerous awards in the categories of young adult fiction and fantasy writing. Noting the impact of Collins’ books, “Time” magazine named her one of “the world’s most influential people.” I had my own experience of the popularity of the books when a month ago I was walking by the book section in Wal-Mart. The clerk was re-stocking the shelves with “The Hunger Games.” She told me she had to do this twice a day! By now the books have sold more than 25 million copies. Intrigued Barbara and I went to see the movie ourselves.
I asked my survey questions as to whether you had seen the movie or read the book knowing in advance that most of you had not. But if I asked the same questions in any American Junior High or Senior High School, almost every hand would shoot up. Clearly, “The Hunger Games” has struck a deep chord in most young people. “The Hunger Games” confirms their profound pessimism about their own future and the future of the world. I’ll return to that theme in a moment, but, first, for those who have not seen the movie or read the book, let me summarize the story.
At some unspecified point in the future, the place that long ago was called North America is now called Panem. The name of the country, Panem, comes from the Latin phrase “panem et circenses,” which translates into ‘bread and circuses.’ In exchange for free bread and entertainment, ancient Romans gave up both their political power and responsibility. Clearly, Collins and many of her youthful readers see the same thing happening today in America with tragic results.
The country of Panem consists of twelve districts surrounding one shining capitol. Imagine a wagon wheel divided by twelve spokes defining the districts all divided by electric fences and walls. The hub at the center is the Capitol. In this dystopian future society, a group of wealthy, pampered overlords in the Capitol are the country’s rulers. They are authoritarians with violet hair, outrageous clothing, and the vicious manners of pre-Revolutionary French courtiers. They threaten and control the impoverished starving population in the districts who supply everything their leaders want or need. Years before the story begins, the valiant commoners of the Districts rose up, unsuccessfully, against their decadent rulers. They’ve been both reminded of this defeat ever since by a yearly lottery called the Reaping in which two teens from each District are selected. The 24 are taken to the Capitol where they are pampered in luxury, trained in martial arts and turned into media stars. They are then turned loose in a controlled wilderness arena where they must survive the perils of nature, hunger, and one another until only one of them is left alive. The survivor will bring home to his or her starving district both glory and food ergo the Hunger Games. Everyone in the country, rich and poor, are required to watch these bloody games on television. Collins’ ideas are derived from the bloodier Greek myths and Roman gladiatorial contests, from William Golding’s “Lord of the Flies,” and from TV spectacles like the myriad “Survivor” show as well as professional sports. Collins’ strategy of putting girls and boys (some as young as twelve) at the center of this deadly struggle is intended, I believe, to add nasty excitement to the tawdry TV shows she draws on.
The first-person narrator and heroine, Katniss Everdeen, comes from a shabby coal-mining district rural Appalachian in the 1930’s. She is a tough, resourceful, expert archer and huntress. She supports her family after the death of her father in a mining accident. There are no safety standards in this capitalistic world. Her mother has had a mental collapse. By her bravery and skill, Katniss wins “The Hunger Games.” But as she does so she also defies and breaks the rules of the Games by insisting that her fellow competitor and boy-friend from her District whom Katniss has kept alive must be a co-winner with her. With great reluctance, the central government authorities allow this to happen. They do not want to encourage compassion or any of the gentler virtues, as the movie and the first novel in the series end; Katniss and Peeta are celebrated and feted by the government leaders. In time, they will be sent back to their impoverished district to live in unimaginable luxury like some contemporary lottery winners.
As I said earlier, I believe this novel’s popularity stems from the profound pessimism many young people today feel about their own and their country’s future. In this “1984” world, the 1% has complete economic and political power over the 99%. The so-called “class war” has been won by the plutocrats. There is no more “American Dream;” there is only a nightmare vision of a future that makes the Stalin’s Russia look mild by comparison. Human life has little value in this society. The only significant struggle is the struggle to survive hunger and grinding poverty. While the citizens of the Capitol wallow in incredible luxury, ordinary people, the workers who make that luxury possible, are living in despair.
I found one fascinating detail missing from the books and movie. There is no mention whatever of God or religious faith. In this “Brave New World” of the future God is either dead or has abandoned human beings to their own folly and sin. Human beings are entirely on their own and they have created a Hobbesian world with the war of all against all. For the favored few life is a perpetual picnic. For the desperate many life is short, brutish and mean. For young people, unless they are the children of the powerful and wealthy, there is no hope. “The Hunger Games” is a ghastly vision of a world gone to Hell, a world without God. As Augustine said, without God all things are possible. And he didn’t mean good things.
Contrast this world with the vision of life in the 23rd Psalm. The Psalm is so beloved and familiar we are likely to miss its central affirmation: life is good not because we are naturally good but because God is good. “The Good Life” does not depend upon our human desire to do good for ourselves and others; that kind of foolish optimism was destroyed by the wars and other tragedies of the past one hundred years. No, in every day and in every way we are not getting better and better. To believe that is to surrender to the first and greatest of all human sins, the sin of pride. When we believe, as Genesis warns, that we can become “like God,” we are a lost people. God alone is God and we are all God’s erring children. Only the powerful presence of God in our lives and in the life of the world can save us from becoming the world of “The Hunger Games.”
Thank God, that isn’t the future God intends for us or the world. The world God intends is a world of safety and generosity, of kindness and compassion. The world God intends is a world where goodness and mercy follow us all the days of our lives and the lives of all God’s children. That is the world our God intends. Our calling is to believe in that God and in that vision and to work with God and other people to make that happen. If we do, the nightmare world of “The Hunger Games” will not be history’s last word. The last word will be God’s. Thanks be to God. Amen.