Posted on 05/14/2006 1:45:57 AM PDT by Murtyo
DAN Brown’s bestseller, The Da Vinci Code, was first published in 2003. By April 2005 it had sold 17 million copies in 44 languages and it is still selling well, as any traveller by plane, bus or train will confirm.
It is a novel of the popular, conspiracy theory type. The central thesis is that “the Church” has covered up the fact that Mary Magdalene married Christ. Christ’s divinity was a myth invented by Roman Emperor Constantine in the 4th century AD and the pair had descendants. Brown suggests that Mary Magdalene’s character was unjustly impugned by “the Church” in the Gospels as a diversionary tactic.
In support of his theory Brown claims that the Dead Sea scrolls show a stronger association of Mary Magdalene with Christ than we find in the Bible. The fact is that the Church of Rome really did fear and try to suppress the Scrolls in a campaign as dastardly as Brown’s fiction. So there is a grain of truth in The Da Vinci Code’s claim that Rome tried to hide something, even if Rome was not trying to hide quite what Dan Brown claims.
Opus Dei
The wealthy, ultra‑secretive, right wing Roman Catholic organisation, Opus Dei, features in The Da Vinci Code. After all, who better than Opus to protect “the Church” by dastardly deeds if the Church was globally threatened?
Thus Opus early discovered that it was, “falsely depicted murdering, lying, drugging people, and otherwise acting unethically”. Opus has been suspected of all these activities and others, but the fictional “mad monks” scenario presented by Brown bears no resemblance to the subtle and suave manoeuvring of Opus in high places.
As sales of The Da Vinci Code escalated, Opus started to handle the issue on its website. It claimed, “Opus Dei is a Catholic institution and adheres to Catholic doctrine, which clearly condemns immoral behaviour, including murder, lying, stealing, and generally injuring people,” but this assertion is lost amongst a welter of links inviting the curious to discover what Opus is really about:
Then last autumn TV took four fans of The Da Vinci Code around the main historical sites featured in the novel. And Lo! The TV company had got a real Opus member to interview in Rome. He was young, articulate, charming and handled awkward questions like a seasoned hack. Three of the fans were taken in by this nice; normal, “regular guy”. But the fourth challenged the others with words to the effect: “Yeah Yeah ‑ regular guy all right ‑ whipping his bottom and wearing barbs on his thigh”. He was of course referring to the strange masochistic practices of Opus Dei members. But 3 to 1 in favour was a good start for Opus.
Buying a sainthood
Rome watchers know that secretive Opus never raises its head above the parapet. The amazing speed and cost of buying the Beatification of the founder in 1992, and his Canonisation in 2002, briefly put the spotlight on Opus, but Opus saw to it that exposure was kept to a minimum and carefully stage managed.
No love is lost between Opus, a largely lay organisation, and the Jesuits. In 1989 Jesuit Michael Walsh wrote The Secret World of Opus Dei to help ‑ worried parents and families who have lost young folk to Opus. Walsh took Opus unawares and Opus clammed shut. But could Opus now be turning The Da Vinci Code to its own advantage? My suspicions were soon confirmed by a 30 minute Radio 4 programme on the 27th October. This was a scoop claiming ‘unrestricted access’ to Opus.
It beat Channel 4 TV, whose Opus Dei and the Da Vinci Code did not go out until 12th December last. A policy decision to take the bull by the horns had clearly been taken at the top in Opus.
Most literature criticising Opus is in Spanish. What is available in English is largely known to myself. I recorded both these programmes ‑ and went through them with care. Far from being exposures, there was little new revealed of any substance. The interviewers did not press issues and did not probe. This was presumably a condition of access to Opus. One investigator was a former monk. The alleged ‘unrestricted access’ was stage managed and ‑ mostly limited – to the women’s quarters. (The women in Opus are entirely separate and inferior to the men.) Channel 4 seemed to have less revealing footage of the interior of the Rome HQ than was permitted by Opus during the furore surrounding the hasty Beatification of the founder in 1992. Channel 4 had posed the question, “Does Opus Dei deserve its sinister portrayal?” The programmes tame verdict was a foregone conclusion.
But Opus has gone further by actually using The Da Vinci Code for recruitment. Instead of the media’s usual custom of cultivating and quizzing individuals on the programme, we were shown more than 60 students at the London School of Economics, tomorrow’s captains of business and industry, attending a lecture on 5th May. It was entitled “The Da Vinci Code and Opus Dei: the Da Vinci Code Fact Or Fiction? Opus Dei Tells All”. The Lecturer was no less than Andrew Soane, Director of the Opus Dei Information Office in Britain. Jack Valero, another suave, smooth talking Opus Director explained: “A few years ago OPUS Dei was virtually unknown outside Catholic circles. Now 70 million people have heard of Opus Dei. They have heard a pack of lies. We can now explain what Opus Dei is and what it does ... It is a great opportunity.”
The lecturer, Soane, began his professional power point presentation by casually stating, “The other day I had been on the underground and I had seen people reading The Da Vinci Code. A question occurred to me. How much about Opus Dei in The Da Vinci Code is true?” Yet it seems incredible that a presentation of the quality given by Soane had been cobbled together in a few days.
Valero said afterwards, “People read the book and phone in”. When the interviewer suggested to him, “Dan Brown is your best recruiting agent,” Valero replied cagily, “Maybe he has done something he did not intend to”.
Murphy O’Connor
On the back of this Da Vinci Code fever, the Roman Catholic journalist John L Allen has issued a new book Opus Dei: Secrets and Power inside the Catholic Church. Allen had certainly been granted access to hitherto denied Opus personnel and records. He said his access was ‘total’. But if so a whitewash was inevitable. Reading his book was frustrating. Allen uses the fictional caricature of Opus in The Da Vinci Code to make points in Opus` favour. Even where criticism of Opus is unavoidable it is muted and over qualified. This book could lead many Roman Catholic parents to take a more favourable view of Opus.
Cardinal Hume expressed serious reservations about Opus but his successor, Cardinal Cormac Murphy‑O’Connor, has recently poured scorn upon Hume’s remarks. In early 2005, O’Connor even gave an Opus priest a parish, which is a completely new departure. Fr Gerard Sheehan was personally recommended to St Thomas More’s, Swiss Cottage, by Murphy‑O’Connor. It just so happens that Netherhall House, a key Opus Student residence, is only five minutes from the church.
Opus HQ
An hour spent outside the Opus HQ in Rome, quietly observing the comings and goings, soon gives a feeling of the true nature of Opus. The Parioli district, north of Rome’s centre, is an exclusive, fashionable area for the very rich, like Mayfair in London. A small apartment in Parioli would cost millions. No tourists or pilgrims come here. Faceless, gated apartment complexes nestle beside discreet, barred high rise buildings. The Viale Bruno Buozzi has a barely visible junction with the Via di Villa Sacchetti at number 73. If photographed from an appropriate angle, property is seen stretching back like a wedge of cheese with no defined limit. This is Opus world headquarters which contains the tomb of Escriva, the founder of Opus.
Opus’ rule of absolute segregation means that women enter only on the Via Sacchetti side and men on the Viale Bruno Buozzi. A former member of Opus, now turned critic, is Maria del Carmen Tapia. She calls it “an immense interconnected structural complex ... the buildings are interconnected . . . Escriva . . . was proud of its 12 dining rooms and 14 chapels ... the largest chapel ‑ shown briefly on Channel 4 ‑ can accommodate hundreds of people . . . and (Escriva) remarked that he could bring a Cardinal in by the front door in the morning, travel fast ... stop 10 minutes for lunch, continue the tour and let him out the back door at dinner time without having seen half the compound.” No doubt the BBC and Channel 4 were treated similarly.
Comings and goings
It was Saturday morning when I stood outside the headquarters. Camera shy ‘numeraries’ dressed in quality grey suits, occasionally went in and out. These men would hold key positions in Rome in business or administration. Their affiliation to Opus might possibly be unknown: Without family ties, the numeraries are promoted over married colleagues (known as ‘supernumer’ by being ever ready to work late or take on extra tasks.
Two gentlemen recognisable as priests arrived to hold the mass and confess the numeraries who are theoretically free to confess elsewhere but in practice are “expected” to confess to Opus priests. These have come from numerary ranks and answer to the leader of Opus Dei, Bishop Javier Eschevarria.
Then, at mass time, some equally affluent families appeared. The men looked much like the numeraries. Their wives, dressed in muted but expensive clothes, tended spotless, obedient children in smart school uniforms. They will go to the main chapel but even they may not have unrestricted access. Sometimes just the husband is a supernumerary or occasionally both will be supernumeraries, that is members living at home but still contributing heavily financially.
The Da Vinci Code was being read everywhere in Rome last autumn, so perhaps Opus’s unwitting recruitment agent, Dan Brown, is swelling numbers there also.
I would think that, like most Christians of any denomination, Paisley would say that the book is a load of rubbish. I'm curious as to why you bring Paisley into this discussion at all.
Earlier today, Michael's heartbroken uncle, Francis McIlveen, paid tribute to DUP leader Ian Paisley for his contact with the family and invited him to attend Michael's funeral. He said it was a time for healing in Ballymena. "I would like him to be there. He was the first one to ring me at the hospital. He is the MP for the area and he has the right to be there," Mr McIlveen said.
No doubt I will be flamed for this, but I hope that this will give a different perspective on Ian Paisley. He was the first politician to meet with the family, he went to the hospital and prayed with them at the boy's bedside whilst the boy was still fighting for life, he has condemned the murder in the strongest terms and called for the severest sentence possible to be applied to the perpetrators(not likely since they are teenagers themselves). If he truly were a sectarian bigot who hates Catholics he would have done none of these things, and the family would not have invited him to attend the funeral.
I happened across it. Thought there was an untapped readership out there for this!! Evidently there is.
this is an article from Ian Paisley's website. I just posted it.
I read this too. I've heard over the years of multiple instances of Ian Paisley being very kind and considerate to victims of "Protestant" terrorists. I think that he should be respected for that. I don't think he's as bad a guy as some think he is. I think he's wrong on some things, but the IRA were and are thugs. If I had to pick between Ian Paisley or Gerry Adams for Prime Minister of Ireland I'd go with Ian.
I don't think it does. Some bishops have very confused understandings of economics. They are concerned for the poor and sometimes mistakenly believe that the govt. is the best means of addressing poverty. This isn't a matter of faith and morals - something that Catholics must believe - it's teachings of individual bishops, that you should consider but are not bound by. There are lots of Bishops and Pastors who don't teach this kind of "Socialism Lite" but I grant you that many do and it annoys me too.
http://www.cbsnews.com/stories/2006/04/27/60minutes/main1552009.shtml
Excerpted here - read the rest, it's fascinating!
(CBS) Since it was published three years ago, Dan Brown's "The Da Vinci Code" has become one of the most popular novels of all time, with more than 30 million copies in print worldwide.
With a major movie based on the book due out soon, the book seems assured of a place on the bestseller lists for a considerable time to come. What has attracted readers to "The Da Vinci Code" is its central theme, which Dan Brown claims is not fiction but fact — that a mysterious European society, known as the Priory of Sion, has for centuries guarded a momentous secret.
That secret, which is the theory at the heart of the novel, is that Jesus Christ married Mary Magdalene and today their descendants are living in France. It's not surprising that this has incurred the wrath of many Christians, including the Vatican, while others have wondered if there might not be some truth to all of this.
Well, wonder no more. Correspondent Ed Bradley reports on the real secret of the Priory of Sion.
To follow the trail of the Priory of Sion, you first need to go to a small, remote village in the foothills of the French Pyrenees called Rennes le Chateau and to go back in time more than 100 years. It was here that the Priory was said to have had........
Thanks for the explanation as to where the article came from - I couldn't make heads or tails of it frankly without some context. It makes more sense now. I know very little about Opus Dei but I believe it is viewed as being controversial in mainstream Catholic circles. And thanks for the reply about Paisley - I completely understand why the mention of him causes the average Catholic's blood pressure to shoot up - but I've seen many posts on this website making him out to be worse than Gerry and the shinners and I wanted to put in a good word for him after his actions last week.
The Pope, OTOH, should have a VERY good grasp of econimcs and he calle for Socialism in his last public speech (I think it was the last one).
The bishops, epecially the ones that don't understand economics (which is to say any outside of the USA), will assuredly follow him.
Just noticed the link at the top of the article - I'm a bit slow today. I'll have to pop over and see what Big Ian has to say.
Crash Goes The Da Vinci Code - Dr. Ron Rhodes:
Brown makes the following assertion regarding this organization on page one of The Da Vinci Code: "The Priory of Sion—a European secret society founded in 1099—is a real organization. In 1975 Paris's Bibliotheque Nationale discovered parchments known as Les Dossiers Secrets, identifying numerous members of the Priory of Sion, including Sir Isaac Newton, Botticelli, Victor Hugo, and Leonardo da Vinci." The question is: Are these parchments reliable?
As a backdrop to answering this question, allow me to point out that Brown obtained much of his information on the Priory of Sion from a book entitled Holy Blood, Holy Grail, by Michael Baigent, Richard Leigh, and Henry Lincoln. In this book we find a dependency on the above–mentioned parchments which allegedly prove that Jesus married Mary Magdalene, had a baby named Sarah, and, following Jesus' death on the cross, Mary relocated to a Jewish community in France. Their descendents were French allegedly royalty.
Now, here is the big problem with all this. These parchments are completely bogus. Historically, in 1953, a Frenchman named Pierre Plantard spent time in jail for fraud. In 1954 he founded a small social club named the Priory of Sion. The purpose of the club was to call for low–income housing in France. The organization dissolved in 1957, but Plantard held on to the name. Throughout the 1960s and 1970s, Plantard put together a number of bogus documents which "proved" the Jesus–Mary Magdalene theory, with French royalty being their descendants. Plantard claimed that he himself was one of the descendents of this couple.
Some time later, a friend of the French president found himself in legal trouble and Plantard ended up being called to testify in the case. While under oath, the judge asked him about these documents about Jesus and Mary Magdalene, and he admitted he made the whole thing up. An associate of Plantard's also conceded that Plantard made the whole thing up. All this has been thoroughly documented by several French books and a BBC special.2
What all this means for The Da Vinci Code is that the Priory of Sion—and the accompanying Jesus–Mary Magdalene theory—is based on bogus information with a capital "B." Hence, Dan Brown's claim that his book is based on historical secret societies is flat wrong.
Slane,
Is that the Rev. Ian Paisley you are referring to or his son?
IOW this is just another "last temptation of christ" BS christian bashing movie.
Remember when the Godfather came out? The producers RUSHED to put a disclaimer at the start of the movie.
That is true.
I think Paisley, like Thatcher, is an unsung hero of this island - many people don't seem to realise that their tough stand against both Hibernofascism and Anglofascism is actually a good thing for the people of the island of Ireland.
BTW, I wasn't trying to flame you there - just making a point, FRiend.
In 1988, when Pope John Paul II was speaking before the European Parliament, he was there as an MEP and he stood up with sign and was shouting "The Pope is the anti-Christ! The Pope is the anti-Christ." That got my attention as I had just started dating a girl from Dublin who would eventually be my wife! I can remember being in Dublin in 1989 and nearly doubling over in laughter when RTE was broadcasting an interview with Jerry Adams and "translating" for him since the rule at the time was that he was not allowed to be heard on BBC or RTE. The next interview was with Paisley and to this day, whenever there is something I want to tease my wife about, I put on my strongest Northern Ireland accent and exclaim "It's a Papist plot. A Papist plot!"
Paisley had been excoriating the Catholic Church for years before that obviously and was quite a known quantity. If he had just left it at "The IRA are terrorists", I wouldn't think half bad of him!
I have some relatives up the North though not in his district. As Catholics, they get along fine with pretty much everyone though there are a few thick skulls even among medical doctors. And just like the Irish Catholics in Massachusetts that put Teddy Kennedy back in office every 6 years, Paisley delivered for Northern Ireland despite his rhetoric.
However, his comments and abrasive style personalized the bigotry in the North for many of the young people at the time in the Republic. If you were an impressionable boy with few friends in the early 80's attending a Christian Brothers' school in Cork, reading "The Trinity"* and listening to your pro-IRA instructor, you would be the perfect candidate for IRA recruitment and Paisley's antics only eased the process.
Though since the Good Friday agreement, Ian Paisley seems to have calmed down but his tenacity to pursue the IRA's arms disposal is quite admirable. I can't say I've researched much about what is son is up to though.
* I can't remember if that's the exact name of the book I'm thinking of but it was a book of Irish history that made the English look like ogres. It was written in the 70's I think. (A book probably read by a few FReepers we know!)
Carolyn
Actually, I know about that incident in the European Parliment, I regard anything that disrupts the workings of the EU as a good thing, hehe.
Seriously, from what I can gather, a lot of Paisley's anti-Catholic rhetoric is hot-air - he doesn't seem to mean what he says on that front, as slane pointed put, he is popular with his Catholic constituents.
But, ok, I can see your point there.
And as for Margaret Thatcher, she was a breath of fresh air for the British (though reviled even by the socialists among them) and for the entire world. She also routinely snubbed Charles Haughey and accused him of running guns up to the North in the 60's. Maybe she anticipated the tribunal that would take place 20 years later!
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