'The Nativity Story' Movie Problematic for Catholics, "Unsuitable" for Young Children

'The Nativity Story' Movie Problematic for Catholics, "Unsuitable" for Young Children

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."

A-G, I must commend you on the energy to respond to all those posts, and as always thoughtfully and thoroughly. Very impressive. I am not sure if it's good or bad that I occupy such a large portion of your replies (I am flattered), all I can say I hope I can answer them as well as you did.

Nevertheless, we personally and intimately know God to whatever extent He allows for us, individually

I don't believe God puts limits on how much we know Him; pride does.

Actually, there is no record of a Jewish trial per se in the Jewish Encyclopedia

That doesn't surprise me. I guess Jewish Apostles don't rank prominently in their circles as historical sources to be considered.

Jewish Encyclopedia references instead to a fear of the Romans, that He was inciting an uprising and/or alleged apostasy leading to His death sentence

Christ's followers were hardly a threat to anyone. If Christ was a threat to Romans, Romans would have written something about Him. As it turns out, Romans treated Him as an internal Jewish matter not even worthy the parchment to write a single word about Him.

John's Gospel witnesses to the fear of Rome in Chapter 11, verses 45-57 and to the alleged apostasy in Chapter 5, verse 18.

The Gospels show that the Sanhedrin and the people gathered, not the Romans, wanted Jesus dead. In fact, the Gospels portray Romans ans a moderating factor.

Er, the free part is that there is nothing mere man can do to be "good enough" for God

Wow! And here I read

"But if when you do what is right and suffer for it, you patiently endure it this finds favor/grace ( χαρις ) with God." (1 Pet 2:20)

Sure seems like +Peter believed that doing the right thing does earn you grace (charis) with God!

This is one of countless "if-then" propositions made by God in the Scriptures which so many deny.

God's offer is free. And so is your acceptance. But acceptance comes with conditional attachments. Once you accept, you are no longer free; you have used up your freedom, and you are bound.

Of a truth, dear kosta50, most everything you have to say concerning God anthropomorphizes Him because (a) in your stated view above the words of God are not preserved but rather the Scriptures are a mere collection of fallible ancient manuscripts, and (b) you have not yet testified to experiencing and leaning on the indwelling Spirit of God

Of truth, dear A-G, everything you have to say about God anthropomorphizes Him because (a) you use human words to say it, (b) human words cannot describe the indescribable and (c) because the Spirit does not use words. So whatever any person says or writes about God is by necessity anthropomorphism.

This heaven and earth has elements which shall be purged

What is in heaven is pristine. What is there to be purged? Purge implies impurity, imperfection, corruption. What is there in heaven that needs to be purged?

Since the indwelling Spirit brings words recorded in Scripture alive within me through the indwelling Spirit Â– He is the One IÂ’ll be listening to, not any mortal

That is the lamest possible argument, A-G. It is an attempt to "win" an argument empty-handed. I have already told you: just about everyone claims the "indwelling Holy Spirit" and secret gnosis. I guess it beats actually performing miracles.

I described the prophesy of Daniel concerning Alexander the Greek and the normalizing of the Greek language and word concepts

The Book of Daniel is controversial to put it mildly: its bilingualism, resurrection of the dead, etc. suggest that it was not one but perhaps more than one author, and that it was written in the 2nd century BC rather than 6th (the Jews did not believe in the resurrection until the 2nd century BC), in fact his enitre apocalyptic approach is characteristic of latter post-Babylonian Judaism, when various sects were formed (Pharisees, Sadducees, Essenes, etc.) about 200 years before Christ out of political parties.

Among Christians, Daniel is a contested issue as well because it contains deuterocanonical books. The Orthodox/Catholic read the deuterocanonical sections, which the Protestants reject.

Moreover, when compared to the previously held oldest manuscripts the copies were indeed found to be faithful in various languages, i.e. Hebrew, Aramaic and Greek. Not perfect, faithful

Clever way to put it. Trouble is, there are DSS that agree with pre-Christian fragments of the LXX as well. So, what they do show is that Judaism was a sectarian religion, with different beliefs and different canon.

I do not need the carbon dating because the Holy Spirit Himself authenticates his own words to me, personally, by bringing them alive within

Sure. And I can say the Holy Spirit is telling me you are wrong.

It is not possible to separate the presence of the Holy Spirit from the Holy Spirit Himself

Then His presence is the sign of Him.

Indeed. I think of the particle as a "placemarker" in the wave

I am glad we agree on something. But being a "placemarker" on a wave does not make the phenomenon a "particle." So, it's not that radiant energy is sometimes a particle and sometimes a wave; energy is energy regardless which matrhematical box we stuff it in. The uncertainty of the duality is entirely imposed by our working models, and not by the reality of what radiant energy really is.

And all promises will be kept. (Romans 11)

To tje House of Idrael and the House of Judah (Heb 8). God makes no promises to Gentiles.

Indeed. That is the leaning I have in the Spirit as well. Our "free will" is by His permission and we bear the responsibility for our own behavior – for good or ill

I am glad we can end this ona positive note. :)

Truly, evolution theory is a classic type of this phenomenon. For under that paradigm, for every observed thing in present biological life there must be a rational explanation over vast amounts of time since supernatural intervention is disallowed under "methodological naturalism."

Indeed. Scientific method proves only that the model works, not that what it does is based on exactly as things are. Supernatural explanation is treated as "magic," and disallowed. Trouble is, supernatural (shouldmn't it be supranatural?) is what is from God, and cannot be explained, quantified, measured, described, explained or otherwise "made sense of." So, how can it be considered?

kosta50 13775: Then we are helpless and hopeless. But, in Christ, everyone is invited. God knocks on everyone's heart and doesn't bar anyone from coming to Him. The decision is ours, by His permission. Thank God, He offers His love to all. He favors no one

A-G: To the contrary, equality seems right to man but it is not God's way. We are clay in the Potter's hands. Abraham was chosen. So was Moses. Esau was hated. Pharaoh was used

Of course, I used the word favor as partial, that is – favoritism (propspoleptes), and not as grace (charis). Biblical reference to support my statement is a bagful: Deut 1:17, 10:17, Chron 19:27, Matthew's, Mark's, Luke's Gospels, Acts 10:34, Rom 2:11, Gal 2:6, 1 Tim 5:21, etc.

God is impartial. Nevertheless, He does seem to use some for His specific purpose because they are the right tools in His workshop.

All the best and welcome back.

I should have given a "for instance." Here's one: I do not recall that the "if/then" form was ever used in any of the parables spoken by Jesus. I could be wrong; if you find any of Jesus' direct sayings that fit that model, please let me know.

Sure I can. When Christ tells the rich man to sell everything and follow Him. In Beatitudes, when he says "blessed are the merciful, for they shall receive mercy...blessed are the pure in heart for they shall see God...blessed are the peace makers for they shall be called the Sons of God...or when he says to the disciples that we can come to the Father only through Him...all of those are conditional statements.

In 1 Pet 2:20 the author says "if you do the right thing...and suffer for it [then] you will find favor or grace (charis) with God."

All these are strictly conditional statements. If you believe, [then] you will be saved. God makes a free offer of a conditional relationship.

A point of clarification: We were discussing complementarities, which take the form of "either/or," "yes/no," "black/white," "0/1." "If/then" does not have that form. "If/then" sets up a causal relationship. Complementarities generally don't do that.

But I don't see any complementariness in these statements, betty boop. They are mutually exclusive. They are either-or statements. as such they are "switches" leading to conditional (if-then) events.

Something that is complementary is something that embellishes. These statements eliminate. Complementary statements build on; mutually exclusive ones don't.

Going back to your wave/particle example — the "particle" doesn't exist. And the "wave" itself is an artefact as well. We have two models that are useful: one treats radiant energy as a wave (if diffraction effects are important) or as particle (if the position is needed).

The two models provide different data and are mutually exclusive, not complimentary! A particle model will tell me where in the field of view can I expect an image to form. A wave model will tell me what that image will look like.

The so-called "spot-diagrams" used in optics are particle model graphic data that can approximate the size and shape of an image but not the diffraction effects, resolution, etc. In fact, they give completely different (and even misleading) information.

If you attach a dot to a spinning wheel and track the dot's position, you get a periodic sinus (i.e. sine of an angle) "wave" graph. It's all a product of our mathematical models, and not how things really are. Energy waves are not "wheels" but bursts. We use their periodicity to represent these bursts over time as sinus graphs.

We can never know how things really are – and that is (paradoxically) the only certainty we do know.

Thanks so much for writing, kosta!

Same to you, dear betty boop.

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