When I finally finished Millie Maven and the Golden Vial, I had to take a weeklong hiatus from reading any more of those books. My brain felt like mush and the entire series just made me angry. It was supposed to have a good story but instead, it felt like Ted and Rachel Dekker paid a 10-year-old to write it, a 10-year-old who was a fan of YA tropes and Richard Rohr. Despite this, I still pressed on and read the last and (arguably) the dumbest book in the series, Millie Maven and the White Sword.
The White Sword picks up six days after the events of The Golden Vial with a game of capture the flag. How this is supposed to teach the kids how to use their powers, I don’t know, but it does a good job of setting up the main conflict of the book (Soren infiltrates FIGS with Doris’s help and destroys everything). The main thing I want to focus on right now is Dean Kyra’s – the main person who’s been feeding Millie a bunch of theological poison – conversation with some of the people at FIGS, which gives us a bunch of lore and the cure to fear, and thus, to evil:
“I can feel the soil here,” Mac whispered to my right. Dean Kyra must have overheard.
“Me too,” she said to Mac.
“This place holds great significance for FIGS,” Dean Kyra said.
“Why?” Mac asked.
Dean Kyra and Professor Claudia shared a knowing look.
“This is the site of the Great Teacher’s sacrifice,” the motherly professor said.
“What do you mean?” Polly asked. All the students turned their eyes to Professor Claudia.
“This is where the Great Teacher offered his life in exchange for the freedom of his students. In the beginning, when he roamed the school halls, he called each child here by name. He loved each one dearly. But then the darkness came and convinced the beloved children to turn against him.”
I remembered this story from my first day at FIGS. Dean Kyra had told it to me in the library right before she gave me the Great Teacher’s journal. We had all heard bits of the story by now, through classes and in our own discussions about FIGS. We all knew the Great Teacher had been killed.
“I thought the kids murdered him,” Boomer said.
“They did kill him, but only because he gave his life so they could be freed from the darkness of fear.”
“That happened here?” Mac asked.
Claudia looked around fondly. “Yes, and the power of his sacrifice, the power of his blood that soaked the ground, lives on in this soil.”
“How do you know the Great Teacher isn’t still dead?” Dash asked.
“That’s the power of his story,” Dean Kyra said. “Even in death the Great Teacher lives.”
“But if no one has seen him, how do you know?” Dash pressed.
“Because you can feel him,” I said.
Eyes shifted to me and I saw Dean Kyra smile in my direction.
“Yes,” the dean said. Then back to Dash. “You have to have faith, Mr. Elite.”
Dash’s face took on a pondering look and the students fell quiet.
“This is one of the reasons we wanted to hold class here this morning,” Dean Kyra said. “Because of the power in the ground itself.”
“Find an open seat,” Professor Alexandria said. “Quickly.” We turned toward the stadium seating and maneuvered around the flowers to find spaces where the stone seats weren’t covered in plants.
As we situated ourselves, Dean Kyra took center stage. I loved when Dean Kyra led the class. The other professors stood behind her.
“You have heard me say many times that FIGS’s primary purpose is to teach you each about the power you possess,” Dean Kyra started. “I’m not referring to the physical gifts you believe make you special, but rather the power of your hearts. […] As we near the third and final trial, understanding your true purpose will be critical for finishing strong.
“What is the third trial?” Polly asked.
“You will know when it is upon you,” Dean Kyra answered. I couldn’t help but smile. I was getting used to her answering in ways that didn’t actually tell us anything.
“Hear me, please,” she continued. “This is a lesson of the heart that will forever impact your life. Whatever you do in fear breeds more fear, but all actions done in love will result in more love. Offer love to the things you fear because love casts out fear. […] You have all faced deep darkness and fear in the first two trials. […] But your journeys aren’t finished. And what you will face next will change you. But if you can remember this simple truth – that fighting fear with fear will only bring you suffering – I promise you will thrive.”
Do you guys also see what all’s wrong with this section? I’ll tell you: sacred soil, Jesus dying to conquer fear, the “You must have faith” response, the power of the heart, and the idea that fear breeds more fear, and you have to love the fear.
The sacred soil thing makes no sense and honestly feels like it came from the Catholic belief in relics that was so popular in the Middle Ages. While some leeway can be given in this judgement because it isn’t a theological book that we have to take seriously, when you’re trying to present the Gospel in a book, this can be a bit iffy. It’s especially weird since FIGS is supposed to be Eden and that wasn’t where Jesus died (it was destroyed), but once again, I suppose it sort-of works for the sake of the book.
Secondly, Jesus didn’t die to conquer fear. He died so that we could be saved from God’s wrath, the punishment for our sins.
Thirdly, I take major issue with Dean Kyra telling Dash that he just needs to have faith. While there can be some good applications of this phrase, I all too often see it being used by Christians (or people who want you to believe that they’re Christian) as a sort of “shut-up-go-away” phrase for when they can’t answer tough questions. This type of answer to a serious question such as the one that Dash asked (“But if no one has seen him, how do you know?”) is what often leads to a lot of people growing to resent the church and Christianity and leave the faith. If this book was theologically sound, this could’ve been a good place to fit in some basic apologetics, such as the idea of general revelation, but all we get is Millie’s answer of “You can feel him,” and Kyra’s affirmation of that.
Fourth, in Dean Kyra’s speech about why everyone is at FIGS, she says that it’s a lesson about the power of the heart. While I can agree that the heart is a very powerful force in every aspect of our lives, it’s often not a force for good, something that the Bible acknowledges quite a bit. By itself, this statement might be good but given the context of the other books in the trilogy and the fact that everyone seems to be getting their powers from the power of navel-gazing and believing that they’re worthy, it’s a testament to the horrible theology of the Dekkers.
Lastly, there’s Kyra’s closing statement that fear breeds more fear, love breeds more love, and that you must love what you fear in order to conquer it and thus conquer evil. This is the law of attraction and is stupid on so many levels. For one thing, there are different types of fear. Fear is often what keeps you safe. It’s only a problem if it’s an irrational fear or is something that actively disturbs your life (such as an anxiety/panic disorder, misophonia, etc.), in which case there are steps to get more accustomed to that in which you fear (cognitive-behavioral therapy puts particular emphasis on this), but that doesn’t mean you have to love it.
It’s the same with love. There are different types of love for different people in your life. The closer you are to them, the deeper you love them, but this doesn’t necessarily mean that they will love you back in the same way. In fact, some acts of love may drive them away and make them dislike or even hate you (for example: not attending your best friend’s wedding as the maid/man of honor because they’re marrying a scumbag, and you can’t honestly support them in making that mistake). Taking this back to my earlier paragraph, deep love for your partner, family, or children can cause a lot of fear and anxiety for a myriad of different reasons, the main one being because there’s always the risk of losing them. Even if you’re a total narcissist and only love yourself, you will still have that anxiety.
Other bits of stupidity in The White Sword include the idea that a seed must die so that the new plant can grow (apparently none of the Dekkers took a basic biology class in school), everyone is the Chosen One in their own perception of the events happening (because the God of this book is a #%$&^ and everything is an illusion, apparently), and they renamed Jesus “Justin” because the only allegory that any of the Dekkers can write is one that’s so painfully obvious that even Dora the Explorer could find it.
Then there’s the plot twist towards the end where Millie finds out that her mother is alive, and Aunt Pricilla spills that beans that she couldn’t conceive and so stole Millie from the hospital and paid off the nurse so no one would know (except the people who saw the security footage, but they’re irrelevant). While this type of stuff has happened before, Rachel (Millie’s mom) hears this news and seems to just shrug it off. She never calls the cops, never disowns her sister, nothing. Everything’s fine and apparently there’s no punishment for what she did.
In conclusion, this trilogy is a waste of time and money. Give your kids The Chronicles of Narnia or Harry Potter to read or something. Almost anything would be better than this trilogy.
Until next time,
M.J.
The Tanuki Corner 