Heroes, Monsters, and Faith
Video Games and the Moral Imagination of Christian Soldiers
The Christian worship service, held on Wednesday before military and civilian workers at the Pentagon, was Hegseth’s first since the Iran war began, the Associated Press reported. Hegseth called for violence during a prayer.
“Let every round find its mark against the enemies of righteousness and our great nation,” Hegseth said in the prayer service. “Give them wisdom in every decision, endurance for the trial ahead, unbreakable unity, and overwhelming violence of action against those who deserve no mercy.”
- The Guardian, Thursday, March 26, 2026
Jane is a fictional sociologist studying the effects of video games on American soldiers who identify themselves as Christian. As part of her research, she interviews them, asking how video games have shaped the way they make their way in the world, and how they understand the relationship between those games and their Christian faith. Here is what one soldier told her:
"How do I make my way in the world? To tell you the truth, part of what I’ve learned about life comes from video games. I’ve been a gamer since I was in junior high school, and I especially love combat games with heroes and monsters. The heroes help me realize that my task is to follow a call of duty and fight evil, while the monsters help me understand who the enemies are and how they can be fought.
I am also a Christian, and I believe the Bible confirms this way of seeing things. It teaches me to be faithful to God’s call of duty and to destroy the enemies—the monsters—who deserve no mercy. That’s what I think Christianity is about: choosing the good and fighting evil.
My mom asked me if I really believed the enemies deserve no mercy. She reminded me that Jesus said we should love our enemies. I didn’t really know what to say, but I held to my convictions and quoted a prayer offered by my Secretary of War, Pete Hegseth, himself a Christian: “Let every round find its mark against the enemies of righteousness and our great nation. Give them wisdom in every decision, endurance for the trial ahead, unbreakable unity, and overwhelming violence of action against those who deserve no mercy.” He is the kind of Christian I want to be.
I wouldn’t say this to her, but I think there’s something a little soft—maybe even a little ‘woke’—about my mom's kind of Christianity. I understand that the Pope disagrees with Hegseth’s way of thinking and has criticized a more militant kind of Christianity like his. The Pope seems closer to my mom’s way of seeing things. But, well, I’m not Catholic. I go to a Bible church. At my church we think Christians can hate their enemies. I've never heard anyone say we should love them.
And as a soldier I kind of have to hate them. Like Hegseth says, we soldiers should show no mercy to those who do not deserve it. That's a more manly way to live in the world.
I really like being a soldier. One thing I like about it is that it makes me feel proud of myself, because others are proud of me. When I’m in an airport, people come up and thank me for my service. Sometimes they shake my hand or offer to buy me a meal. I can see in their faces that they respect what I’m doing. It makes me feel like I’m part of something important, something bigger than myself, and that I’m on the right side of things.
Which takes me back to the video games. I think video games have helped me be a better soldier. I know it sounds funny to say that video games were guides for me, but they gave me a way of seeing the world that made things clearer. There were heroes, and there were monsters. There was a mission, and there was a goal. You knew what side you were on, and what you were supposed to do. You didn’t have to second-guess everything or wonder if you were doing the right thing. You just followed the call, trusted your instincts, and acted."
Note to Fellow Christians and to Soldiers
Hegseth’s way of understanding Christianity runs counter to what many of us believe about God, about Jesus, and about how we are called to live in the world. We are much closer the soldier's mom. It should also be emphasized that the soldier portrayed above is entirely imaginary. He represents the kind of figure I imagine Hegseth seeks to inspire, not the kind of person who actually fills the ranks. To those in service who do not think in these Hegsethian ways, I ask your forgiveness. I am proud of you, too.
Hegseth’s way of understanding Christianity runs counter to what many of us believe about God, about Jesus, and about how we are called to live in the world. We are much closer the soldier's mom. It should also be emphasized that the soldier portrayed above is entirely imaginary. He represents the kind of figure I imagine Hegseth seeks to inspire, not the kind of person who actually fills the ranks. To those in service who do not think in these Hegsethian ways, I ask your forgiveness. I am proud of you, too.
Video Games and Heroic Mythologies
Dom Ford joins Jana Byars to talk about Mytholudics: Game and Myth (DeGruyter Brill, 2025). Games create worlds made of many different elements, but also of rules, systems and structures for how we act in them. So how can we make sense of them? Mytholudics: Games and Myth lays out an approach to understanding games using theories from myth and folklore. Myth is taken here not as an object but as a process, a way of expressing meaning. It works to naturalise arbitrary constellations of signs, to connect things in meaning. Behind the phrase ‘just the way it is’ is a process of mythologization that has cemented it.
Mytholudics lays out how this understanding of myth works for the analysis of games. In two sections each analysing five digital games, it then shows how this approach works in practice: one through the lens of heroism and one through monstrosity. These ask questions such as what heroic mythology is constructed in Call of Duty? What do the monsters in The Witcher tell us about the game’s model of the world? How does Hellblade: Senua’s Sacrifice weave a conflict between Norse and Pictish mythology into one between competing models of seeing mental illness? This method helps to see games and their worlds in the whole. Stories, gameplay, systems, rules, spatial configurations and art styles can all be considered together as contributing to the meaning of the game.
Mytholudics lays out how this understanding of myth works for the analysis of games. In two sections each analysing five digital games, it then shows how this approach works in practice: one through the lens of heroism and one through monstrosity. These ask questions such as what heroic mythology is constructed in Call of Duty? What do the monsters in The Witcher tell us about the game’s model of the world? How does Hellblade: Senua’s Sacrifice weave a conflict between Norse and Pictish mythology into one between competing models of seeing mental illness? This method helps to see games and their worlds in the whole. Stories, gameplay, systems, rules, spatial configurations and art styles can all be considered together as contributing to the meaning of the game.