Anime Lectio: 2.5 Dimensional Seduction Season One

                                                          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. 

As a monk, part of what we do, or rather should do, is wear a uniform known as a habit (how often monks wear it depends on the individual monk, as well as other things, like what you are doing at a particular time, where you are going at a particular time, etc.).  Personally, I like wearing mine whenever I feel like wearing it since when wearing it, I feel like I'm in cosplay (the habits Benedictines wear happen to look like black cloaks, so we look like ANBU without masks from the Naruto series when wearing them - I guess that's why I like wearing it when going to anime conventions).  However, there are times when I'm not wearing the habit, so does that make me a different person?  Do other people's feelings about me depend on when I'm wearing a habit vs. not wearing it?  These questions, as well as others, can also be seen and asked in the first season of the series 2.5 Dimensional Seduction.

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.

A high school manga club now only has one male member since the other members recently graduated, so the only male member spends time by himself in the club room watching anime based on a particular manga.  A new female student happens to see this and is interested in joining the club since she also happens to be obsessed with the series that he was watching.  This also includes cosplaying, or dressing up and acting, as the main female character, which leads to the only male member for liking her more since he only likes 2 dimensional girls.  After preparing for cosplay events, which involves the club getting new members (all female) and a club advisor (also female, as well as a former cosplayer), they realize that they do have romantic feelings for each other all of the time, not just when she's in cosplay.  This is complicated by the fact that the other female members of the club love him too, which will most likely be explored more, and maybe resolved, in a second season.

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.

Besides a manga club being about things besides manga, which is something that I tried to do with such a club in the school I work in (thought about calling it the Geek Culture Club, which is pretty much what all anime conventions are about anyway), this series also gets into what love means for different people. While this can be expressed in rather interesting ways, like female cosplayers, as well as male cosplayers, getting really into what they are doing (I think conventions for just cosplay only exist in Japan), I think it's important to think about what it really means, as well as people who do this don't always do that for a living. Most people don't spend most of their lives acting like someone else (or shouldn't anyway - the only person you should act like most of the time is yourself) and wearing what they would wear. Monks aren't like most people, but we are still people, so liking, and even loving, monks is important as liking and loving other people, as well as understanding the different ways to like and love other people depending on things like who they are, who you are, and who they are to you. And not just sometimes either, but all of the time.

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 that we can understand how and why we like and/or love others all of the time, not just sometimes, like when we feel like it.