GIBSON'S PASSION (New York Sun op-ed by ADL National Director Abraham H. Foxman)

The New York Sun/ADL Website ^ | 8/4/03 | Abraham H. Foxman

[DPB101]

Do you know if Foxman gets any taxpayer money? Another of Mel's critics, Marvin Hier, has received millions from both the Federal and state government.Isn't that a kick? Taxpayers subsidizing a person who bashes a Christian movie (and, I assume, says nothing when anti-Christian films are made).

The left uses our own money to attack us.

[The Iguana]

Third, because Mr. Gibson, a "traditionalist" Catholic, has expressed strong criticisms of the modern church and is supportive of views of church policy that question or reject the many 20th-century changes, including the revolution in attitudes toward Jews beginning with Nostra Aetate in 1965.

There is no evidence whatsoever for this allegation. If Foxman has such, he needs to present it.

To question aspects of Vatican II does not automatically entail rejecting the Council's rejection of the deicide charge. This allegation is equivalent to charging anyone critical of Lincoln as being supportive of slavery.

Ridiculous. Foxman ought to know better.

[dennisw]

Taxpayers subsidizing a person who bashes a Christian movie (and, I assume, says nothing when anti-Christian films are made).

How dare that uppity Jew criticize a Christian movie!!! This is the enduring theme of your remarks. Only 15 million Jews in this world so your theory is they should shut up due to the much greater number of Catholics? Is this some kind of Catholic antiJew crusade of yours? You are making me curious. Are you in fact Catholic?

It's funny but this is how the Islamics behaved. They treated Christians and Jews as dhimmis due to their much greater weight in numbers. If you want a taste of what being minority is go carry your Christian banner waving in an Arab nation and see how you are treated. Often the Muslims were much more brutal to the Christian dhimmis than the Jews. Such as the Armenian holocuast. Early 1900s Greeks too were slaughtered by the dominant Turks.

[dennisw]

Has Foxman seen it? I don't recall seeing it in the article. If he hasn't seen it, then he has NO room for criticism......


No room for you touting it since you have not seen it

[dennisw]

It is this sort of anti-Catholicism--claiming the Vatican waged an anti-Semitic war against the Jews--that most Catholics find outrageous........


READ THIS BOOK and your mind will be changed. Here's a book for ya! http://www.amazon.com/exec/obidos/tg/detail/-/0375406239/qid=1054685031/sr=lmlf-9/ref=cm_lm_asin/103-7423797-8152664?v=glance

[Cacophonous]

I don't think I was.

[Cacophonous]

But the opinions of those that have seen it carries more weight for me than of those that have not. And I don't know if Foxman has seen it.

[dennisw]

Plenty of other freepers are touting it who have not seen it. I theorize it's a good movie. I object to the slamming of Jews who raise questions about it. This what's been going on. I have objections to some of what Abe Foxman does but I say he raises honest and legitimate concernes here.


The words "Passion Play" have a history in the Jewish mind.

[Cacophonous]

I'm looking forward to seeing it.

[ultima ratio]

No, my mind won't change because I've seen this kind of bigotry before and I know what the Catholic Church stands for--and it's not anti-Semitism. There has been a concerted effort over the years to destroy the reputation of Pius XII, for instance--although he was a good and just man and had done all he could to rescue Jews during the Holocaust. Were this a serious and scholarly Book, it would not carry the title it carries, designed to stir bigotry rather than to enlighten. There was no "war against the Jews" by the popes of the Catholic Church--ever. Such a contention is either paranoid or malicious.

[dennisw]

How many billion Catholics are there in the world. 1.5 billion? How many Jews? 15 million. Jews are far more vulnerable.

[ultima ratio]

Time to make careful distinctions. The Crucifixion is a central fact of Christianity. All Christians, including Catholics, believe Jesus died because of the sins of all mankind. Christians do not blame the Jews specifically.

There is a need for a certain delicacy in these matters that ADL does not appreciate. Instead it has waded-in theologically on a religious issue of vital importance to Christianity in an attempt to pre-empt a film it perceives might stir up ant--Semitism. It does so by casting doubt on the Gospel narratives themselves and by insisting that Jews played no role in the death of Jesus. This is offensive on a couple of fronts. First, it impugns the veracity of the Gospels which all Christians hold sacred. Second, it suggests that to depict the Crucifixion truthfully is an anti-Semitic act.

This is to start a religious fight with devout Christians in a way that can only harm mutual understanding between Jews and Christians. What's more, by starting this un-nuanced fight, the ADL and others risk undermining the very strong pro-Jewish sentiment that already exists in the Christian community. It is on the face of it outrageous to tell people of another religion what they must and must not believe and depict about their own faith. And it is also the unwisest of all tactics, especially ridiculous since Jewish critics who have actually seen the film insist it is a work of high art and not at all anti-Semitic.