Posted on 12/04/2006 7:52:47 PM PST by Pyro7480
'The Nativity Story' Movie Problematic for Catholics, "Unsuitable" for Young Children
By John-Henry Westen
NEW YORK, December 4, 2006 (LifeSiteNews.com) - A review of New Line Cinema's The Nativity story by Fr. Angelo Mary Geiger of the Franciscans of the Immaculate in the United States, points out that the film, which opened December 1, misinterprets scripture from a Catholic perspective.
While Fr. Geiger admits that he found the film is "in general, to be a pious and reverential presentation of the Christmas mystery." He adds however, that "not only does the movie get the Virgin Birth wrong, it thoroughly Protestantizes its portrayal of Our Lady."
In Isaiah 7:14 the Bible predicts the coming of the Messiah saying: "Therefore the Lord himself shall give you a sign. Behold a virgin shall conceive, and bear a son, and his name shall be called Emmanuel." Fr. Geiger, in an video blog post, explains that the Catholic Church has taught for over 2000 years that the referenced Scripture showed that Mary would not only conceive the child miraculously, but would give birth to the child miraculously - keeping her physical virginity intact during the birth.
The film, he suggests, in portraying a natural, painful birth of Christ, thus denies the truth of the virginal and miraculous birth of Christ, which, he notes, the Fathers of the Church compared to light passing through glass without breaking it. Fr. Geiger quoted the fourth century St. Augustine on the matter saying. "That same power which brought the body of the young man through closed doors, brought the body of the infant forth from the inviolate womb of the mother."
Fr. Geiger contrasts The Nativity Story with The Passion of the Christ, noting that with the latter, Catholics and Protestants could agree to support it. He suggests, however, that the latter is "a virtual coup against Catholic Mariology".
The characterization of Mary further debases her as Fr. Geiger relates in his review. "Mary in The Nativity lacks depth and stature, and becomes the subject of a treatment on teenage psychology."
Beyond the non-miraculous birth, the biggest let-down for Catholics comes from Director Catherine Hardwicke's own words. Hardwicke explains her rationale in an interview: "We wanted her [Mary] to feel accessible to a young teenager, so she wouldn't seem so far away from their life that it had no meaning for them. I wanted them to see Mary as a girl, as a teenager at first, not perfectly pious from the very first moment. So you see Mary going through stuff with her parents where they say, 'You're going to marry this guy, and these are the rules you have to follow.' Her father is telling her that she's not to have sex with Joseph for a year-and Joseph is standing right there."
Comments Fr. Geiger, "it is rather disconcerting to see Our Blessed Mother portrayed with 'attitude;' asserting herself in a rather anachronistic rebellion against an arranged marriage, choosing her words carefully with her parents, and posing meaningful silences toward those who do not understand her."
Fr. Geiger adds that the film also contains "an overly graphic scene of St. Elizabeth giving birth," which is "just not suitable, in my opinion, for young children to view."
Despite its flaws Fr. Geiger, after viewing the film, also has some good things to say about it. "Today, one must commend any sincere attempt to put Christ back into Christmas, and this film is certainly one of them," he says. "The Nativity Story in no way compares to the masterpiece which is The Passion of the Christ, but it is at least sincere, untainted by cynicism, and a worthy effort by Hollywood to end the prejudice against Christianity in the public square."
And, in addition to a good portrait of St. Joseph, the film offers "at least one cinematic and spiritual triumph" in portraying the Visitation of Mary to St. Elizabeth. "Although the Magnificat is relegated to a kind of epilogue at the movie's end, the meeting between Mary and Elizabeth is otherwise faithful to the scriptures and quite poignant. In a separate scene, the two women experience the concurrent movement of their children in utero and share deeply in each other's joy. I can't think of another piece of celluloid that illustrates the dignity of the unborn child better than this."
See Fr. Geiger's full review here:
http://airmaria.com/
TRIAL BALLON ALERT: I reserve the right to say "An enemy wrote this while I was asleep." I am just trying to figure this out here.
The non-confrontative answer to your closing question is, I think, that we all know that WE reading the Bible need a context of God-given Faith and of prayer. We need the ecclesia to have preserved and handed down the Scriptures to us. And whether or not we, strictly speaking, "need" them, we certainly profit from the scholars and their tools, dictionaries, concordances, etc.
I remember the Bible came alive for me when I was reading Genesis and came to the Terebinths of Mamre and SAW Abraham and his courtesy. That seeing was the gift of God.
Oh, man ... It's a good question, the "what is lacking". I have no clue how to answer it. Let me take a stab:
If you read some hymns without the music, you think, Wow, what tawdry poetry! But WITH the music, sung in Church, it can be a great hymn both objectivley and in terms of how it prompts one to look to God in Love. Check out this hymn which just totally blew me away at Mass this weekend. Being a very manly man, as I'm sure you've observed, I am rarely overcome with tears in Church, since I don't feel pain, I inflict it. Yeah, right. So I'm in my wheelie-chair saying to myself, this is absurd! IT's a HYMN! You can sing it!, Trying, and crying.
I think tradition and the Church is like the music. You all have good concerns about idolatry and a diversion of attention away from GOd. But (it's like) I can't hear you because I am dancing before the Lord. And If I dance away it is as if to gesture at a flower as if to say, "Look at this wonderful thing" and then dance back to Him and say, "And YOU made it from your wonder which surpasses that of the flower more than diamonds surpass mud!"
So while part of the fuel of our feelings when people diss our Lady is, "Uh, That's my mother you're taking about, watch your mouth!" Another part is frustration that because we dance to the flower, our friends rebuked us for dancing away from the Lord.
And if I were to say what the Bible lacked in a set of doctrinal propositions, I think it would be to miss the point. It is not disrespect to rhythm to say it lacks melody and no disrespect to melody to point out its rhythm (or lack thereof). I think likewise the Church needs the Bible, clearly. But the Bible needs the Church.
You guys really make me laugh.
It seems that you never get around to explaining what Paul is saying in Rom.4 and Gal.3.
Paul makes it very clear that salvation is by faith alone in Christ alone (Rom.3:25).
As for James, he is not talking about salvation, he is talking about bearing fruit and the context bears that out.
If you do not bear fruit your faith will not save you physically since your faith is dead and God will 'prune' His tree (Jn.15:2, 1Jn.5:16) by taking those 'home' who are not bearing fruit via an early death.
Now, if you are going to post me again, deal with Rom.4 and Gal. 3 since that is what you asked me about, where in the Bible does it say that salvation is without works.
James 2 is not speaking about salvation, it is talking about the Christian walk-bearing fruit as is 1Jn.3:18 'let us not love in word and tongue but in deed and in truth
SO what it comes down to is you're sure. Okay.
You've read the entire thread? Good for you!
Of course if you haven't read the entire thread and all the other threads, then you don't know what we get around to or fail to get around to. Then who should laugh?
Enjoy laughing.
That catechism is not Lucas's but Philaret's. You are mixing apples and oranges. No Orthodox follows that 19th c. Catechism, at least not as far as Philaret's assertion concerning OT canon is concerned. Like Cyril Lucas, and numerous heresies before him, it was short-lived.
I expect to see Cyril at the Judgment Seat of Christ (Rom.14:10) which is for saved people. I expect many from the Orthodox faith who read and believed what he taught in his Catechism will be there as well
So being saved is now tied to a paritcular Protestant sect (Calvinism), or (Pharisaical version of the) Jewish canon? And here I go thinking all along that Protestants tie being saved with just plain faith in Christ, theology notwithstanding!
I wish you guys would make up your minds. Or does it change with the days of the week and the medications taken?
There are a few things we know about Paul from his own letters and not through the perfumed lens of the Book of Acts. One of them was that Paul did not particularly consider women to be anything as far as the Church was concerned.
Not only did Paul not know Jesus in person, but by the time he died, I seriously doubt he even met Mary or if he did meet her he probably did not take extra time to honor the Mother of the Man he claimed was his God.
Both parts are biblical.
Not even Lutherans follow everything Luther proposed. In fact, they reject some of his teachings outright. What does that prove? You keep harping on this because that's all you have. The major catechism as you call it was a mistake as far as Philaret's stupid claim that only scriptures that exist in Hebrew are valid. That was the position of the Orthodx Church as a whole, and numbers are not important. Concensus is. The Church is not a democracy, but how would you know? You are outside the Church.
Yes, the real church will, that is the church built on the Rock of the Lord Jesus Christ (Mat.16,1Pe.2), not phony man-made ones.(Mk.7:7)
Yes, the Church God gave to his Apostles in 33 AD and not some man-made church by a hysterical rebellious priest in the 16th century.
Nevertheless, the Catechism was a major one, being used in a major branch of the Orthodox faith.
If you knew anything even elementary about Orthodoxy you will find that 'catechism' was and still is an alien concept to the Orthodox. No one uses them! Read up on Orthodox so-called catechisms (they are a very recent phenomenon) and you'll find that they are not binding. What is binding are conciliar decisions, 7 ecumenical councils and all pan-Orthodox councils held since 1054.
Yes, you are correct, but Satan and his angels know better!
I agree. They, too, believe and tremble.
Harley, what I wrote says that the Protestant translators were writing in opposition to what they saw as Romish spin, not that they supported it.
Are you willing to say the Catholic Church will not make Mary co-redemptix? Are you as sure as I am?
Doesn't this seem to be an odd statement especially the way Mary is now revered? Paul, btw, often refer to many women in his writings and how they were great supporters of his ministry.
Ohhhhhh....it took me a couple of times reading your statement to see your point. Perhaps had you written it in Greek it would have been clearer. :O)
Just kidding.
Considering protestantism's angle on what St Paul said with regard to head covering while praying and women not leading worship I'm amazed at the interest in what St Paul said on other topics...
Have bookmarked the links.
Though I'd RATHER TRY to herd cats
or get 3 root canals . . .
because you, a friend and bro, have asked, I'll try and get to it in the next 2-3 weeks. Please ping me if I seem to have forgotten. I may have.
That teachers are useful, Biblical,
is not the point.
The point is, SCRIPTURE ALONE IS SUFFICIENT TO INTRODUCE SOMEONE TO A RELATIONSHIP WITH CHRIST/GOD AS WELL AS TO HELP THEM WELL ON THEIR WAY TO MATURING IN CHRIST AS HOLY SPIRIT LEADS THEM INTO ALL TRUTH.
IF there were ONE case of such--that would be enough to make the point. There have been many 10's of thousands of such cases over the centuries.
And, I suspect you'd acknowledge that the Roman lens and the Orthy lens are not necessarily more pure and holy than the Protesty lens. If you wouldn't acknowledge that, then the bias disease is well entrenched in your lens as well.
Because the word she received asked more of her. I am not aware of another mother of God, or mother of another god.
I flag the same people the post I responded to flagged. I just copy the part of the list I can see (some are too long for that). I will try to remember to edit you out, but you will be better off asking Dr. Eckleburg to remove you from her list when writing to me.
Your lense is simply and above all modernity, the "synthesis of all heresies" as Pope Pius X phrased it.
This is only one small part of what works do and of what is written in James.
Huh???
I am not aware of another mother of God, or mother of another god.
Nine months of being pregnant? Is that what was asked of her? As a matter of fact, if memory serves me correctly, Mary wasn't asked but was told.
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