Posted on 05/23/2006 2:55:11 PM PDT by The Ghost of FReepers Past
THE DA VINCI CODE - BLASPHEMY HITS THE BIG SCREEN
By Don Feder
Posted May 19, 2006
The Da Vinci Code -- which opened today -- might be subtitled "Religion for Morons" or "Gnosticism Meets The New Age."
It's fantasy posing as reality. The Sony Pictures film is blasphemous, defames the Catholic Church, and promotes neo-pagan Goddess worship.
I find it offensive, and I'm not even a Christian.
Director Ron Howard (who specializes in visual candy) assures us that Opie's opus will be true to the novel - a pretentious, overwritten piece of trash that makes Bridget Jones's Diary look like one of the 100 Greatest Books Ever Written.
The plot of Dan Brown's mega-best seller (45 million copies sold) goes like this: Jesus married Mary Magdalene, who bore his children, who became the Merovingian monarchs of France, whose descendants are running around Europe today - being chased by Opus Dei or Mormon missionaries or Martians or someone.
Again, according to The Code, The Catholic Church has for centuries concealed the truth about Jesus to maintain its power. Mary Magdalene represents the "sacred feminine" - which supposedly predates monotheism - and which wicked patriarchalists have spent millennia trying to suppress, the better to deny man's sexual nature and subjugate women.
The book (and presumably the film) even has a ritualistic orgy, where communicants dance with orbs and the grand master of the book's mysterious order gets frisky with a plump, middle-aged lady. The scene is described on page 311: "'The woman you behold is love!' The women called, raising their orbs again. The men responded, 'She has her dwelling place in eternity.'" (All I want is lovin' you, and music, music, music?)
(Excerpt) Read more at donfeder.com ...
Oops. I confess, I didn't check. Well, that was posted on the 19th so maybe many people missed it.
Oh worthless me. I went to see it and enjoyed it, it is a pretty good scavenger hunt on the same order as "National Treasure". It needs to be taken with a grain of salt as it is just a MOVIE.
READ MY LIPS......It is a fiction movie, based on a ficton book.....I can't belive all the hype...it is FICTION..it is a fictional movie, it is a fiction book....calm down, take a deep breath....
We should also remember that the church threw out a large number of gospels and one man decided which ones.
Well, go ahead and "attack" the other movies too. I think it's a sad position to demand no one ever criticize Hollywood. Or that if we criticize one particular movie for specific reasons, we must criticize all the flaws of all the other movies. What's that about?
I never said you shouldn't go if you want to. Surely you agree that the rest of us have the right to NOT see it.
It is offensive and if this was about Moses being a gay butcher, there would be a price to pay.
If this was about Mohammad (piss be upon him) there would be tolerance towards the making of the movie.
IMO Christians are more secure about themselves and don't mind the garbage that much, because they know it is bunk and figure all involved are ignorant fools.
An absolute fallacy...
If someone wrote a book, filled with all kinds of false accusations against your best friend, wouldn't you defend him/her, even though it was "fiction"?
Your right but remember it's fiction.
"It's just a movie" ... and those are just souls in the balance being led astray. Met any Christians lately?
No I'm right look it up. It's historical fact.
No you are wrong, about just as wrong as all of the so-called "facts" in this book/movie and "Holy Blood, Holy Grail".
As a Goddess-worshipping, neo-pagan, Brown seeks to reverse the Bible's process of taming man's erotic nature (by channeling it to fidelity and family), once again divorcing the sexual from the spiritual - freeing man's hedonistic urges from Judeo-Christian constraints. That Brown has so many admirers among Hollywood libertines is unsurprising.
But why all the fuss? After all, it's only a movie, right?
The novelist/philosopher Ayn Rand was once asked why she primarily wrote fiction, instead of works of philosophy. Rand explained that it's far easier to convey ideas through fiction than non-fiction - witness Dante's The Divine Comedy, witness Uncle Tom's Cabin, witness Ben-Hur, The Screwtape Letters and To Kill a Mockingbird .
Novels and films aren't footnoted. The author or screenwriter can create a thoroughly convincing universe that powerfully projects his message. From The Birth of a Nation and Triumph of The Will to Thelma and Louise and Brokeback Mountain, films have told us how to think about the world around us.
Most movies present the world according to Hollywood (and the word became flesh - lots of flesh) - that the sex act is good in and of itself, that people should follow their feelings (which invariably will lead them to right conduct and happiness), that prayer is like throwing a penny in a wishing well, that God is within us, that God is love, that God makes no demands of us and that the followers of traditional religion are a bunch of uptight, puritanical, hypocritical killjoys.
Debunking Christianity - which is The Da Vinci Code's mission - advances this worldview.
All too many people read novels or see films and think they're experiencing reality. Their understanding of the complicated history of settlers and Indians comes from Dances With Wolves. They are informed about the crusades by Kingdom of Heaven. Their understanding of the theory of global warming comes from The Day After Tomorrow.
According to a Barna Group survey, 24% of those who read The Da Vinci Code said it aided their "personal spiritual growth and understanding." In other words, one in four of its readers believe the book's thesis (as opposed to its storyline) is true. Our "personal spiritual growth" isn't aided by what we believe to be a lie.
Come on be serious if anyone that see's it and is led astray because of it tells me a great deal about their mental attitude in the first place.
The conversation back and forth of this movie made lots of folks curious to see it. If those against the movie had just shut-up the movie would not have had so many viewers.
Reminds me of when I was a young girl in the 1950s, when a book was published that may have been "risque" the talk was that it was banned in Boston, which of course made folks buy the book. lol
You are most definitiley wrong. It was in fact the Christian community beginning with the very witnesses of Christ while He walked amongst them who placed a stamp of approval upon which letters and gospels were acceptable, and they based that upon one sure thing, 'does the letter or gospel focus upon Him and Him crucified and risen for our salvation and justification?' When you make such a statement try to stand, you had better be ready to post what you assume to support your lie.
This article is especially aimed self-identifying Christians who's only retort seems to be, "It's only fiction".
Should we just shut up when Christ is being attacked?
You apparently do not understand the meaning of 'coming to a knowledge of Him' and 'faith cometh by hearing and hearing by the word of God'. What you spittle out is the notion that 'any gospel will do' and you appear to believe leading others into apostasy is an innocent strole.
. The formation of the Tetramorph, or Fourfold Gospel Irenæus, in his work "Against Heresies" (A.D. 182-88), testifies to the existence of a Tetramorph, or Quadriform Gospel, given by the Word and unified by one Spirit; to repudiate this Gospel or any part of it, as did the Alogi and Marcionites, was to sin against revelation and the Spirit of God. The saintly Doctor of Lyons explicitly states the names of the four Elements of this Gospel, and repeatedly cites all the Evangelists in a manner parallel to his citations from the Old Testament. From the testimony of St. Irenæus alone there can be no reasonable doubt that the Canon of the Gospel was inalterably fixed in the Catholic Church by the last quarter of the second century. Proofs might be multiplied that our canonical Gospels were then universally recognized in the Church, to the exclusion of any pretended Evangels. The magisterial statement of Irenæus may be corroborated by the very ancient catalogue known as the Muratorian Canon, and St. Hippolytus, representing Roman tradition; by Tertullian in Africa, by Clement in Alexandria; the works of the Gnostic Valentinus, and the Syrian Tatian's Diatessaron, a blending together of the Evangelists' writings, presuppose the authority enjoyed by the fourfold Gospel towards the middle of the second century. To this period or a little earlier belongs the pseduo-Clementine epistle in which we find, for the first time after II Peter, iii, 16, the word Scripture applied to a New Testament book. But it is needless in the present article to array the full force of these and other witnesses, since even rationalistic scholars like Harnack admit the canonicity of the quadriform Gospel between the years 140-175.
A phrase repeated too often becomes trite.
Examples:
"But it was only about sex."
"Bush lied."
"The culture of corruption."
and (insert drumroll here) "It only fiction."
Good comment.
Why do you care that we condemn the movie? If it is only a movie, why are you even commenting?
Thrown out gospels?
Never heard of such. Go to your local store and you will find a Bible. That is the Word of God. Not some supposedly lost or hidden "code".
Shut up? Sure that would prevent any of the boycotting. People always go see something that derides religion or gives them an opportunity to discount the church.
But what would it say about the church members and Christians if they never even spoke up about Jesus being mocked, insulted, lied about? It would say they just don't care that their Lord is disrespected.
Every time you click "refresh" it creates a brand new Dan Brown novel!
Warning! This is a high-volume ping list.
Commentary on Brown from the priest of the Orthodox parish I have been attending while away from home on sabbatical: "It's not even good gnosticism."
Would world wide reaction be the same if the religion in question was Juadism or Islam? I think not. It seems as if Christianity is the worlds fair game whipping boy.
Its just a movie. A work of fiction. Take a stresstab!
I wonder how Freepers would feel if it was a movie telling lies about Ronald Reagan . . . Oh wait, that already happened and everybody cheered when it went away at CBS.
Sigh.
Well, as he indicates on his website, he's to the right of Attila, and even Pat Buchanan. His hit piece here supports that. It was a good fun book. That's all. No history, no dogma other than his fictionalized accounts. Screaming about heresy, lies and blasphemy will not affect anyone outside of the Christian Right, and to my knowledge, none of them have either read the book or plan to see the movie.
In truth, the Gospels never link the miracle of Jesus conception with his sinless state. The sexless nature of his conception was indicated "as a sign" that he indeed was the hoped for Messiah that Isaiah had spoken of.
It is true that the Gospels do not reveal any evidence that Jesus ever had a wife or children. However, it is equally true that the Gospels neither definatively assert that Jesus never intended to marry or that there would be no great meaning to that blessed event. Jesus never stated that he was disqualified for marriage.
Why, then, if there is no assertion, no evidence for either position, do we so forcefully and unequvically insist that our Jesus would have nothing to do with marriage and sex? It is because of the assumed linkage between sexual intercourse and sin. Sexual intercourse, even in marriage, mind you, is considered a step away from the divine.
The irony is that it is this unclarity in traditional theology that stands as one of the contributing factors of the decline of the family (and the rise of aberrent sexual models). . .Many Christians today are not offended by Jesus being associated with the ideal of marriage and family. . .the DaVinci Code opens the door to that discussion and it is a vitally important one.
When we see Jesus on the cross, if we speculate that he may have not only offered his blood, but also his spouse, his children and all the loves of a perfect family life that never was, we not only are magnifying the sacrifice of Christ but we are also magnifying the value of the family. Thus, when we take up the commitment of marriage and family we do so in the knowledge that this holiest of sacrements is rooted in the shed blood of Christ. Society would only be strenthened by that assertion.
Thank you! My fairy tale is better than yours.
Bottom line...they're all fairy tales.
Thank G-d for Don Feder.
LOL
That post is yet more evidence that Dan Brown's readers accept The Da Vinci Code as "gospel truth".
Clancy you and frogjerk basically said the samething, I think the movie is offensive even though it is just a movie and Brown states such, but the rhetoric in defending Christians caused more people to see the movie, making money for Brown.
The same thing happened when Fahrenheit 9\11 by Michael Moore, was discussed seemingly forever, moviegoers paid Moore handsomly, his movie was offensive as well, although in a different way.
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