We've all heard these falsehoods bandied about in the mass media, including some of our most popular movies, books and TV programs.
Which of "our most popular movies, books and TV programs" pushed this?
SouthPark's Cartman, speaking about Kyle
Posted on 05/19/2006 3:52:41 PM PDT by Simi Valley Tom
Editor's note: Dr. Tom Snyder contributed to this column. Dr. Ted Baehr is founder and publisher of MOVIEGUIDE®: A Family Guide to Movies and Entertainment and founder and chairman of the Christian Film & Television Commission. Dr. Tom Snyder is editor of MOVIEGUIDE®.
© 2006 WorldNetDaily.com
"The First Amendment provides for the separation of Church and State."
"The Founding Fathers were all deists."
"America is a racist country."
"Cuba is a worker's paradise."
"The Bible is contradictory."
"Jesus Christ didn't die on the Cross."
"The religious right in America wants to establish a totalitarian theocracy."
"Modern homo sapiens are descended from apes."
"Charles Darwin was an objective scientist."
"Jews are inherently inferior."
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We've all heard these falsehoods bandied about in the mass media, including some of our most popular movies, books and TV programs. Some of you may even still believe some of them.
In his 1925 autobiography, "Mein Kampf," Adolf Hitler described a propaganda technique called the Big Lie. The Big Lie theory proposes that people are more likely to believe a Big Lie rather than a small one because they themselves usually only tell little lies. Thus, they can't bring themselves to believe that someone has the temerity to tell a colossal untruth that is easily punctured.
Contrary to popular opinion, Hitler wasn't overtly advocating the use of this technique himself. He actually was trying to accuse the Jews of spreading Big Lies to hurt the German race. Of course, later on his career, Hitler, with help from his propaganda minister Joseph Goebbels, used the Big Lie to great effect, leading to the mass slaughter of millions, including 4 to 6 million Jews or more.
Dan Brown's book, "The Da Vinci Code," is a modern-day example of the powerful effect that a Big Lie can have in today's 24-hour news and entertainment cycle. Like the so-called "Jesus Seminar" before him (whose lies are still being preached by Dr. Marvin Meyer of Chapman University and other liberal scholars), Brown's book adopts the Big Lie of many atheist Christophobes. It claims that the New Testament gospels and basic Christian doctrines are unreliable sources of truth about Jesus Christ, invented by the Emperor Constantine in an effort to destroy the correct worship of the "Sacred Feminine."
Of course, modern scholarship by such people as William Lane Craig, Norman Geisler, John Warwick Montgomery, Gary Habermas, Craig Blomberg and many others has shown that we can have complete faith in the reliability of the life, death, resurrection and teachings of Jesus Christ described in the New Testament gospels, the Book of Acts, and the New Testament letters by Paul, Peter, James and John. And, since the publication of Dan Brown's "The Da Vinci Code," there have been a plethora of scholarly books, plus some shows on the History Channel, that explode the Big Lie that Dan Brown tells in his novel.
The facts prove the case.
We can rely on what the Bible says, not only because we have factual evidence to support it, but also because the Bible validates itself. The Bible validates itself by providing a reliable historical context in which to describe God's dealings with mankind throughout human history. Included within that historical context is a series of amazing prophecies about Jesus Christ, the Promised Messiah and Divine Savior of all mankind who died for our sins so that whoever believeth on Him, though we shall perish, yet we shall receive eternal life.
Don't surrender to Dan Brown's Big Lie. If you must see a movie this weekend, go see something like "Over The Hedge," "Akeelah And The Bee," "The Lost City," or even "Mission: Impossible III." Don't go see "The Da Vinci Code," much less read the book.
You probably don't want to see the movie anyway. According to Variety, in a review released on Tuesday, the movie is a dull piece of bloodless fiction that's 148 tedious minutes long. Surely, everyone has better things to do than sit through something like that! Never mind all the spurious attacks on Jesus and His apostles and the Bible contained in Dan Brown's story.
Note: For a review of the movie and the book, go to www.movieguide.org.
Nay, the next movie I see will be Snakes on a Plane. It promises to be a cinematic tour de force.
bttt
Which of "our most popular movies, books and TV programs" pushed this?
SouthPark's Cartman, speaking about Kyle
I'm sure they thank you.
C'mon Tom, fess up. You work for Sony Pictures.
But movies and books and media and all manner of entertainment does.
Actually, I don't think yhis piece of entertainment was meant to be taken seriously.
Good glory - he was even sued by contemporary writers, Leigh and Baigent, for "stealing their ideas" from their NON-fiction book: Holy Blood, Holy Grail."
Altho' a bogus suit to begin with as one cannot copyright ideas - and they lost their shirts as the judge told them just that - it should have clued some of the clueless to the fact that the 'ideas' in Brown's books did not come from him...
These "ideas" have been around for 2000 years...and even, currently, there are many other books - Nonfictional now in print that go into much deeper detail and list bibliographies...
One in particular, that got Brown started, was the book "The Woman with the Alabaster Jar" (dare I say it again, NON-fiction)written by a life long Catholic with an impressive bio.
Yet nowhere have I heard a hue and cry about these authors and their claims in their NON-fiction books. Curious>
Is it that people just aren't reading that much anymore?
For those who might have an individual mind, it might be interesting to check out some of the NON-fiction books.
the aforementioned "the Woman With..." by Margaret Starbird, is a great starting point - and then moving on to Sir Laurence Gardner's books, etc.
(Starbirds' bio: Margaret Starbird holds BA and MA degrees from the University of Maryland where she concentrated in comparative literature, medieval studies and German language, studies she pursued on a Fulbright Student Grant at the Christian Albrechts Universitat in Kiel, Germany. She taught German language at the University of Maryland for four years and for one year at North Carolina State University. She later studied at Vanderbilt Divinity School in Nashville, TN. She has lived and traveled extensively in Europe including pilgrimages to Black Madonna and Mary Magdalene shrines and Cathar citadels in Provençe." her web site:
http://www.margaretstarbird.net/
Here's a stained glass window in a church in Europe - longggg before Brown was born.
For all those demanding 'truth' - maybe you should stop blaming/crediting Brown with these "ideas" - it ain't true
I will bet if any one of these people that say they do not have faith are the first ones up offering prayers to God when something goes wrong.
They don't understand how sustaining faith is; our comforting it is. I can't imagine a life without it.
I'm sure they thank you.
As a Christian, I take a very different view from the boycotters -- I see DVC as an opportunity to bring discussion about Christianity to the surface in a way and at a detailed level never seen in the modern secular era.
My motto, and maybe I'll get a T-shirt to this effect, is:
"Secular America, PLEASE DO go see The DaVinci Code. And please do give in to that sophomoric impulse you'll feel to come looking for folks like me to rub my nose in it so I can straighten you out."
So I hope DVC turns out to be the highest-grossing movie of all time.
I thank you...
This book/movie is just the beginning of the emerging of new (old) truth, however imperfect, that will challenge the creeds of orthodox western religion, which in my opinion, is due for a large overhaul.
"The First Amendment provides for the separation of Church and State." True
"The Founding Fathers were all deists." False
"America is a racist country." False
"Cuba is a worker's paradise." False
"The Bible is contradictory." True
"Jesus Christ didn't die on the Cross." Unknown
"The religious right in America wants to establish a totalitarian theocracy." False
"Modern homo sapiens are descended from apes." True
"Charles Darwin was an objective scientist." True
"Jews are inherently inferior." False
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