Twilight Untwisted: Book 2: New Moon
In New Moon, Bella continues her obsession with Edward as she handles the separation from him by withdrawing completely from the world around her; she becomes emotionless in effort to avoid feeling the pain of loss.
When she discovers that she can hear his voice through her sub conscience when she is in danger, she begins to purposefully place her life in danger. While she apparently is not attempting to commit suicide her thrill seeking could easily end her life.
She very easily uses other people for her own ends, while she does struggle briefly with the guilt of doing so; ultimately she keeps her mission clear that it is all about her own selfish motives.
There is an old song that says “the hardest part of love is letting go” If we forget for argument sake what it is that Bella has chosen to love, and see New Moon as a break-up story, we see that Bella’s unhealthy attachment to Edward makes it impossible for her to let go. She displays signs of depression, and an impulse control disorder.
Although Bella doesn’t see her thrill seeking attempts as suicide attempts, the mere fact that she is aware of the potential danger to her life and moves forward anyway is disturbing.
The Catechism of Catholic Church tells us: (CCC 2281) Suicide contradicts the natural inclination of the human being to preserve and perpetuate his life. It is gravely contrary to the just love of self. It likewise offends love of neighbour because it unjustly breaks the ties of solidarity with family, nation, and other human societies to which we continue to have obligations. Suicide is contrary to love for the living God.
Bella seems to lack this natural inclination to preserve and perpetuate life. She is the personification of the culture of death in the way that she devalues her own life and disregards the importance of saving her soul.
At one point after she goes cliff diving and nearly drowns to death, she glorifies the near death experience. Similar to how she did at the end of the first book, Twilight when she indicated “death is easy, life is harder.”
In my opinion, Bella continues to set a poor example to our teenagers, who already face the complex of invincibility. We need to make sure our children understand how precious life is; that God willed their life out of love and any attempt to endanger or destroy life is a grave sin against God.
In the end we discover that Edward never meant to break up with Bella. He left her thinking it would be safer for her, if he and his family were not around, but he also struggled to deal with the separation. At the time he broke up with her, he believed lying about why he was leaving would make it easier for her to move on.
When they are reunited, Edward makes an observation that not only sums up Bella’s character but our modern society as well, “Why can you believe the lie, but not the truth?”
How have we as a society embraced the lie, and questioned the truth?
I leave with these quotes:
John 18:37:38 Jesus says to Pilate: “For this I was born and for this I came into the world, to testify to the truth. Everyone who belongs to truth listens to my voice.” Pilate said to Jesus, “What is truth?”
John 14:6 Jesus said, “I am the way, the truth and the life.”
Living Water 