Amid holiday season, our thoughts turn to tradition. And not just to American tradition, but to the Western tradition, because the two are linked. Out of that linkage comes the enduring hope for peace and unity.

The most powerful recent expression of that underlying cultural yearning is the new movie "Harry Potter and the Goblet of Money" — oops, make that "Goblet of Fire" — which is dominating the box office on both sides of the Atlantic.

So while one must give credit to the skill of author J.K. Rowling and the filmmakers, one also might note they have tapped into a deeper pattern: to the continuing allure of the Middle Ages, to the mystic-memory chords of Americans, most of whom trace ethnic and/or religious ancestry back to Europe.

The religions of Europe, Judaism and Christianity, trace back even further, all the way to the Middle East. But the images from that distant time and place, while powerful, are more central to religion than to popular entertainment. The lives of Moses and Jesus are better celebrated in a religious service than in a movie theater.

By contrast, the "Potter" series — like "Lord of the Rings" and any number of King Arthur-ish "sword and sorcery" tales — are more user-friendly in the popular culture. Kids and others love to role-play and story-tell as they imagine themselves amid knights and knaves, dungeons and dragons, grails and quests, damsels in distress. One might even note that the "Star Wars" movies, complete with sword-wielders and wise old wizards, owe as much to the Middle Ages as to the Space Age.

So while "Potter" is set in the present day, the appeal is strictly medieval. The characters live in a world of stained-glass castles and flickering candles, but even more powerfully, they inhabit a land of enchantment — just as our ancestors did, before the gather-by-the-hearth collective reverie of olden times was punctured, at least for many, by the cold steel of science and rationality.

Some observers, such as University of Chicago's Richard Weaver, one of the pillars of modern conservatism, have decried this change. In his 1948 classic, "Ideas Have Consequences," Weaver lamented the "disintegration of the West" that began back in the 14th century, when intellectuals started applying analytic humanist rigor to questions previously left to God. Out of that rigor, Weaver sighed, came the scientific revolution, which overturned and overwhelmed our permanent things.

And while few would want to trade away a millennium's worth of material progress for the snug security of that lost citadel of faith, many would like to go "home" again — if only for an evening of reading, or for a few hours at the multiplex.

Some protest that the faith of "Potter" is inconsistent with orthodox religion. As Christian film reviewer Bob Smithouser wrote in pluggedinon line.com, a publication of Focus on the Family, "The film's wall-to-wall sorcery is birthed from a faulty worldview that taps into the occult and never recognizes any divine authority." Yet if Smithouser is right to say that "Potter" neglects God, it is still undeniable that Rowling & Co. are nonetheless products of Western civilization, which always has included a substantial magical/pagan undercurrent. Today, many a monotheist nevertheless makes room in his or her life for astrology, numerology and other superstitions — none of which, strictly speaking, fit into Judeo-Christianity.

How do people reconcile those divergent strands of belief? They do it, that's all — and always will.

And so for better or worse, "Potter" is a permanent addition to our cultural landscape, reminding us of times past, and perhaps pointing us toward a future where the most savage rivalry between groups is confined to competitive broomstick riding. We aren't there yet, in 2005, but the dream of an overarching intelligence, which might yet save us from damnation or destruction, dies hard. And where would we be without that dream?

James P. Pinkerton is a Newsday columnist.