Anime Lectio: Saga of Tanya the Evil

                                                            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. The only device you need is the one you use for this blog.

3. Deep Breathing - Open yourself to God’s Presence

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. 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 people you

know and don't know are like signs of God’s presence. 

4. 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. 

Do you manage to get through life with just reason?  Or is your faith important too or instead?  Nothing can really have meaning if you choose to explain everything with reason and make all of your decisions with reason.  It's also easy to rely on reason alone when nothing bad is happening in your life and you don't need to rely on faith, even though faith is still important and there when you need it even when you don't want it.  An example of all of this can be seen in the series Saga of Tanya the Evil.

5. Brief and written explanation of the anime

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

A Japanese businessman is going about his usual life relying on what he has done for himself, which he believes is due to his own efforts.  While waiting for a train, he gets pushed onto the tracks as the train is about to arrive by an employee he fired earlier.  Before he gets hit by the train, everything stops around him and he has a conversation with a mysterious being talking through the people around him (also a nearby bird) about what it would take for the businessman to believe in God and not just rely on reason alone.  This leads to the businessman being reincarnated by God as a little orphan girl that can use magic into a world that is involved in a war that she becomes a soldier in (the first episode of this anime starts with showing this girl leading soldiers in a war - the second episode actually explains how it happens).  While there's a lot going on with the war that the businessman ends up in, which is still ongoing due to the businessman's never give up mindset trapped in the body of a little girl, the girl still thinks she doesn't need God, whom she mocks by calling Him Being X, even though there are times when she has to pray to God in order for her weapons to work.

6.  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 a Catholic monk, I obviously believe in God since if I didn't, then I wouldn't be a Catholic monk. While talking about faith isn't necessarily the same as talking about religion, I think faith is an important part of religion and both are important in thinking. I also think reason is important here as just going by faith isn't a great idea and doesn't solve everything. For example, I am a cancer survivor and while I do think that my faith and religion were heavily influenced by such an experience, as well as others in my life, this influence didn't make me just rely on that for healing as I also understood chemotherapy and other things that involved reason were also important for that. I also think that's true for everything, meaning faith and reason are both important in the decisions you make and what you do in life, even if you don't want to rely on your faith like the main character in this anime.

7. 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 the differences between faith and reason, as well as how they can influence our thinking.