Anime Lectio: A Girl and her Guard Dog

                                                           1. Why do Anime Lectio? 

Anime Lectio is a time for us to stop and take a breath. Between work, activities, family life, and social media, our minds are always moving. We rarely take time to contemplate and ask, why am I watching this anime? What’s the point of all this? And, how is this making me feel? 

2. Put away all distractions 

(phones, work, etc.)

We are so enslaved to things that stimulate our minds. Let this be a moment for us to free our minds, look inside of ourselves, and be at peace.

3. Deep Breathing

Take several deep breaths. Let your mind relax. If you’ve had any questions, desires, or struggles that you’ve been hiding or stuffing away, let them rise up to the surface. 

4. Open yourself to God’s Presence

Remember God places all our thoughts and desires inside of us, and He uses them to draw us closer to Himself. God gives us a community to help us understand who we are and what He is calling us to do. The faces of other people you know and don't know are like signs of God’s presence.  

5. Think About What’s on Your Mind in Relation to the Anime

Think about what’s been on your mind in relation to the anime.  The following is an example of such thoughts written by me. 

Romance in anime is something that's usually on my mind a lot, specifically how it's seen.  Trying to understand and make sense of what is happening is important, which requires seeing the romance anime in question as a whole, not just focusing on certain parts of it.  While this is also important to do this with all of anime, and there are better romance anime out there to focus on (for example, my latest obsession is the second season of The Dangers in My Heart, as well as the OP for the second season), this should also be done with anime series that are like A Girl and her Guard Dog.

6. Brief and written explanation of the anime

Pay attention to how the brief and written explanation of the anime seen on this blog, or seeing the anime for yourself since that's better than any explanation, might “speak” to you or shed light on the things that have been on your minds.

When her parents die in a car accident, a little girl ends up living with her grandfather, who happens to be the boss of a yakuza, or Japanese mafia, family. The grandfather assigns a member of this family to be the guardian of her granddaughter, which this family member takes really seriously. When the little girl becomes a teenager, she decides she wants to enroll in school far away in order to make friends and live a life that teenage girls usually live. However, her guardian, insisting that she'll need someone to watch over her even at a far away school, manages to enroll himself in the same school and as a result, the two get involved in crazy adventures that bring them closer in ways that they don't understand.

7.  Reflect on the anime

Has this brief and written explanation of the anime shed any light on what's been on your minds?  The following is an example of a reflection on the anime from me.

As I said in the reflection before the explanation of the anime given here, understanding anime series like A Girl and her Guard Dog is really important. When you see an anime series like it, it's easy to understand why understanding it is really important. I'm definitely not justifying what happens in the series, but attempting to explain what happens. The two getting involved in crazy adventures that bring them closer in ways that they don't understand is really the best way to explain what happens. It's also something that I don't really want to explain in detail here, nor do I think it should be done, so seeing what happens for yourself is the best way to go with something like this and forming an opinion on this based on what you see and think, not what others see and think. What's also important in forming an opinion on this anime is to remember what else happens based on the explanation given. If the member of the yakuza family assigned by his boss to be the guardian of his granddaughter didn't take this assignment seriously, even really seriously, he would be punished severely somehow (most likely some sort of torture or even death). As for the teenage girl, show me a teenage girl who really understands her feelings and I'll show you a liar and a fool. Understanding things properly, especially relationships, is important, even if this understanding is admittedly difficult to remember at times and involves seeing questionable things.

8. Final Prayer

Please voice any prayer intentions for friends, family, or people around the world that relate to this anime.  The following is an example written by me.

Let us pray for an understanding of our relationships, no matter what they may be, as well as the fact that we have more than one.