Posted on 05/11/2006 2:24:48 PM PDT by freakboy
The row over the imminent release of the Da Vinci Code film grew today when star Tom Hanks hit out at its Catholic critics.
Cardinals, speaking with the authorisation of the Vatican, have called for the Hollywood version of Dan Brown's bestselling novel to be boycotted.
They say the theme of the film - that Jesus Christ had children with Mary Magdalene and that hardline Catholic movement Opus Dei covered up his secret life - is highly blasphemous.
But Oscar-winner Hanks said objectors to The Da Vinci Code are taking the film too seriously, telling the Evening Standard: "We always knew there would be a segment of society that would not want this movie to be shown.
"But the story we tell is loaded with all sorts of hooey and fun kind of scavenger-hunt-type nonsense.
"If you are going to take any sort of movie at face value, particularly a huge-budget motion picture like this, you'd be making a very big mistake.
"It's a damn good story and a lot of fun... all it is is dialogue. That never hurts."
The Da Vinci Code book has sold more than 40 million copies since it was published in 2003. The film, released by Sony Pictures division Columbia Pictures, is set to be one of the year's most successful when it is released worldwide on 19 May.
As well as Hanks, it stars Audrey Tautou and Sir Ian McKellen and is directed by Oscar winner Ron Howard.
The Da Vinci Code receives its world premiere at the Cannes Film Festival next Wednesday.
Calls for Christians to boycott it have been led by Archbishop Angelo Amato, the number two official in the Vatican doctrinal office, which was headed by Pope Benedict until his election last year.
Amato described the novel as "stridently anti-Christian" and called for believers to "reject the lies and gratuitous defamation" in the book.
He added: "If such lies and errors had been directed at the Koran and Holocaust they would have justly provoked a world uprising.
"Instead, if they are directed against the church and Christians, they remain unpunished. I hope you will boycott the film."
Cardinal Francis Arinze, a Nigerian tipped to be Pope last year, went even further.
He said: "Christians must not just sit back and say it is enough for us to forgive and forget. Sometimes it is our duty to do something practical.
"Some know legal means which can be taken in order to get the other person to respect the rights of others."
The Catholic church here is taking a more relaxed line, arguing that in the face of the film's blockbuster appeal, calling for a boycott would be pointless.
Cardinal Cormac Murphy O'Connor, head of the Roman Catholic church in England and Wales, told the Jonathan Dimbleby programme on ITV1 on Sunday: "I think it's a harmless thriller. If people want to read it they can and people who read it should realise it is fiction."
But some prominent UK Catholics favour a harder stance. Piers Paul Read, himself a best-selling novelist, said:
"I am for the boycott. I don't think Catholics should put money into the pockets of people who have invented lies about the church."
Another eminent Catholic, socialite Claus Von Bülow, said: "I am not going to see The Da Vinci Code. This has nothing to do with its historical claims but because I found the book unreadable."
And a steaming pile of bull stuff.
Are you a Muslim? Or are you just a sucker for Islamic fairy tales?
"I always kind of liked Tom Hanks. Now I think he's a piece of trash."
My sentiments exactly. Same for Ron Howard.
"Pure gossip here but I have it from somebody who socialized with Tom Hanks that he was a total arrogant loud mouthed bore who acts out badly and has to be yelled at by his wife. I didn't necessarily figure him for it. I'm sure the incidents described happened, although there can be two sides to every story."
I wouldn't discount it, it's "good to have discourse", lol, as Hanks would say. Seriously, he's been looking pretty bad lately, almost like an alcoholic - bloated, puffy eyed and incoherent. His days are numbered as an actor that people want to see, just like crazy Cruise.
That's why I responded to you in the way that I did. To each his own, but I can't figure out how anyone can be so nonchalant about a movie lying about the very foundations of Christianity and our Lord.
Maybe you're not religious and I'm certainly not the Puritan church goer, but I do resent anyone or anything that misrepresents Christianity and tries to rewrite Biblical history. And I don't subscribe to the I'm okay, you're okay, anything goes philosiphy.
The left needs to quit attacking conservatives and our religion and others need to quit defending them for doing so....
Hanks is too - OK - stupid - to know how stupid he sounds.
At our church we'll be doing some Bible studies using a booklet specifically to "talk about" (refute) the book/movie. Of course we may (probably?) just end up preaching to the choir.
The life of Christ was apparently described to Central Asians by the Nestorians and other Christians and they adopted it to Issa This makes a lot more sense. Christians did make it to Central Asia. Notovitch was writing almost 1900 years after the Lord's birth. The Gospels were writen by His contemporaries.
FWIW I was never taught he was God only the son of God. Part of the Deity - yes he may be a god but not God.
The Divinity of Christ (most Protestants hold this view also)
Of course it's fiction, but the author of the book claims it's based on verifiable facts. A statement to that effect is printed in the forward of the book, and every word of it is a flat out lie.
His book is not only diabolical fiction, it's an intentional, direct attack on the faith of new or experienced but weak Christians who aren't well grounded in the truth of the biblical Gospel message. Already many such people are going to their priests or pastors saying that they no can longer believe in the divinity of Christ or the veracity of holy scripture. And that's not to mention the thousands of people who were on the verge of becoming Christians, but who are now confused and unsure of what to believe about Jesus Christ and his church. That is exactly what the atheist enemies of Christ and his church wanted to see happen when this book was published, and it is happening in every nook and corner of the US.
It's a free country, or so I hear, and Mr. Brown is free to write just about anything he chooses and Hanks can defend Brown's lies and slanderous attacks on the church and it's divine Head to his heart's content. But don't expect those of us to whom Jesus Christ is not only God incarnate but also the most important and beloved human being to ever walk on planet earth to cheerfully go along with the unchurched crowd and applaud a book and film which defames the holy character and profanes the name of the resurrected Son of God who willingly gave his life by way of a horribly brutal Roman crucifixion to save other men and women from eternal death.
But even if Jesus Christ had not been who he claimed to be, but only an outstandlingly good man who had more influence for good in the world than any other human who ever lived, Brown's lies would still be reprehensible. Would any respectable author write a slanderous attack piece disguised as a novel about some great humanitarian such as Dr. M.L. King or Albert Schweitzer, fully intending to cause it's readers to lose faith in those men's character and virtues? I don't think so, and if he or she did the people would reject it out of hand. Why is it that a slanderous attack on Jesus Christ's divinity and a pack of vicious lies about his church is the entertainment coup of the decade, while another book and film attacking another great but lesser man would not make the tiniest splash in the public's collective mind? Maybe it's because the proposition that there really is a higher authority than man's own fallible human mind, and that men and women will eventually be held accountable for their deeds and misdeeds by that authority is too frightening to contemplate for those who live only for their own pleasure and benefit.
And your "proof" of that comes exactly from where?
Well said.
I am not disagreeing that DVC is an attack, but I think that it is more on the human "Church" than it is on Jesus Christ himself. And the "Church" itself down through history has always been Christianity's weak spot, because it is made up of men, not gods. Brown plays on that common feeling about the "Church".
I think it is absoulutely wrong of him to cloak this whole thing in a way that claims that the book or movie contains Truth. He sort of implies that the book is Fiction because the actual murder mystery story is made up, but that the historical and religious framework is accurate.
Or, they could just say, "This was a story, a work of fiction." It presents an opportunity to tell the real story, which is much more wonderful.
Many people saw the movie National Treasure. But most of them know that there is not some underground treasure hoarded and stored by our country's founders. Compare DaVinci Code to National Treasure and this will have somewhat put it in the proper context.
Another analogy is Gone with the Wind, it is a glorified version of the Old South. The story is of course made up, but so is some of the detail about plantation life etc.
sheesh
You mean I should stop digging under the church now?
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