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/
I wish that I was a puppet on a string that God could pull. I would undoubtedly be less rebellious and arrogant to Him.
And, you're right. God has determined when we are to die.
Is sin beyond the authority and sovereignty of God ?
Did sin accomplish something which God did not desire ?
Did not God allow sin to 'shape' us ... so that we would be set at variance to Him ?
Sin is not beyond God's sovereignty - for He will judge the quick and the dead. God allowed free will - knowing that we would choose sin. The choice was ours though. You can not blame God for sin.
With fear and trembling, I venture to disagree. But not being a Luther Scholar I will cast my disagreement in terms of my own experience.
When I come down from the temple, I catch myself saying, "Wow! I bet I was as humble as the publican! No trace of Pharisee here! I am PROUD of my humility! As Click and Clack say,'It's my humility which makes me great.'
"Oops!
"Oh darn, WHEN will I EVER be able to do ONE thing, just ONE thing, right, without looking over my shoulder and listening for angelic applause? When will I be able wholeheartedly to trust myself to the love of God? How can I free myself from always asking, 'Was that sincere enough? Will God like it? Did I do it right?'"
And what I hear Luther saying is something like, "For crying out loud, Dawg, get OVER yourself! You are going to mess up. God is not surprised and not disappointed. He still loves you and will accept your half-hearted and insincere repentance and even your poor substitute for humility as a down payment on the good He plans on enabling you to do. Be bold when you sin, of COURSE not in the sinning, but in the moment of realizing that once again you blew it, because 'a broken and contrite heart He will not despise'. And don't let the very high probability of your sinning again real soon cast you into despair. Pick yourself up, commend yourself to God, and keep on trucking."
Against such, I think, there is no law.
So, Blogger, am I more or less on trck wwith Luther here? And kosta50 whether Luther said it or not, is what I just said okay? And if not, why not?
Okay, just give me a minute to get back into the bunker here.... Okay, fire at will.
He would agree. Please try to understand what he was saying rather than focusing on a narrow interpretation of his choice of words. As humans, we are ALL sinners. Luther went through torture trying to purge himself of sins. He confessed CONSTANTLY (Drove his confessor crazy over it) and then stayed up worrying that maybe he had forgotten to confess something. He was consumed with the thought of displeasing God and not being good enough.
Then, Luther found out the truth about God's grace & realized that there was no sin that was so large as to separate the Christian from God's mercy. Christ's sacrifice was not inconsequential. It covered ALL of our sins. Obliterated them.
He was not saying go out an be a big sinner. That's why I posted his other writings to show that he had a true desire to please God in all things and prayed for protection against sin.
In the quote from his preface from Romans, he says "Thus, even as faith alone makes just and
brings the Spirit and the desire to do good external works, so it
is only unbelief which sins and exalts the flesh and brings desire
to do evil external works. "
Thus, in the context of Luther's thinking - and the entire quote from is letter to Melancthon, an appropriate paraphrase would be "dont spend your time concentrating on whether or not you have lived up to God's standards. You are a sinner. Even a bold sinner. Go ahead and live your life as a bold sinner. BUT, have belief in Jesus Christ which is even stronger than your bold inclination to sin. For his Work has covered it all."
I believe that is a good translation of Luther's thoughts. Only difference I would add is Luther is really focussing also on the sufficiency of Christ's sacrifice to cover all of our sin. That' why the "believe more" is added. Luther believed that the more you committed yourself to Christ the more He would keep you from sinning.
Sin is not beyond God's sovereignty - for He will judge the quick and the dead. God allowed free will - knowing that we would choose sin. The choice was ours though. You can not blame God for sin.
So ... Adam had free will.
But we don't have free will ... because of the sin of Adam ?
So then ... does God's grace restore to us free will ... akin to that of Adam ?
Whom the Son makes free is free indeed.
Adam had truly free will. Today, human beings aren't truly free unless Christ makes them so - but this does not imply that God is holding them back from himself. Lost man is bound by his own will so that he will NOT choose God. God offers. Man refuses. Romans 3. Christ's work restores the will of man to its original state so that He will always come. The Christian is truly free. We are free to do good. we are free to do evil. If we are truly saved, our desire will be to please God even though we do sin in life. No true Christian life will be without evidence of their faith in the form of good works.
Why waste time...IMHO, the veneration of Mary is nothing more than a closet form of worshiping a dead person, and building roadside shires to that person nothing more than idolatry-pure and simple. Shrines are an object of religious worship and pilgrimage. They are sinful and in complete disobedience to God's laws. If you want to trace this to tradition I would suggest looking in the Old Testament where people were prone to worship "the temple" and the "high places". As for Mary, the book of Jeremiah tells us where the people were prone to pray to the "Queen of Heaven". Instead of posting shrines to Mary, it be more appropriate to post reminders of Christ. Everyone has their priority who they wish to remind people of and desiring to emphasize Mary over Christ is telling to say the least.
While I appreciate my Catholic (and Orthodox) friends, I would suggest to them they are in grave error over this matter. The difference between Shinto and the Catholics is one doesn't profess to be Christian. What's the difference between traveling to Mecca or traveling to the shrine at the local bus stop to say a prayer? It is not my place to judge anyone (including Catholics and Orthodox) but it is my place to warn them. If I wasn't certain that this was in error I would say so. It is an error and if this sounds "anti-Catholic" so be it.
I hope I'm a bit clearer on my position.
The following quotation is from his Lectures on Romans (1515-16).
“Since the saints are always conscious of their sin, and seek righteousness from God in accordance with his mercy, they are always reckoned as righteous by God (semper quoque iusti a deo reputantur). Thus in their own eyes, and as a matter of fact, they are unrighteous. But God reckons them as righteous on account of their confession of their sin. In fact, they are sinners; however, they are righteous by the reckoning of a merciful God (Re vera peccatores, sed reputatione miserentis Dei iusti). Without knowing it, they are righteous; knowing it, they are unrighteous. They are sinners in fact, but righteous in hope (peccatores in re, iusti autem in spe)...
It is like the case of a man who is ill, who trusts the doctor who promises him a certain recovery and in the meantime obeys the doctor’s instructions, abstaining from what has been forbidden to him, in the hope of the promised recovery (in spe promissae sanitatis), so that he does not do anything to hinder this promised recovery...Now this man who is ill, is he healthy? The fact is that he is a man who is both ill and healthy at the same time (immo aegrotus simul et sanus). As a matter of fact, he is ill; but he is healthy on account of the certain promise of the doctor, who he trusts and who reckons him as healthy already, because he is sure that he will cure him. Indeed he has already begun to cure him, and no longer regards him as having a terminal illness. In the same way, our Samaritan, Christ, has brought this ill man to the inn to be cared for, and has begun to cure him, having promised him the most certain cure leading to eternal life...Now is this man perfectly righteous? No. But he is at one and the same time a sinner and a righteous person (simul iustus et peccator). He is a sinner in fact, but a righteous person by the sure reckoning and promise of God that he will continue to deliver him from sin until he has completely cured him. And so he is totally healthy in hope, but a sinner in fact (sanus perfecte est in spe, in re autem peccator). He has the beginning of righteousness, and so always continues more and more to seek it, while realizing that he is always unrighteous.
Why do you object to the Crucifix?
As I'm reading this, the statement is that we will be Gods. Is this EO doctrine?
That's an interesting question. I think the difference between the crucifix and the empty cross is profound. One shows Christ's suffering, which was certainly unbearable and greater than any pain experienced on earth. And it was all exactly as God ordained.
The empty cross is post-resurrection. The empty cross tells us Jesus has been resurrected bodily into heaven just like He said because He is God and it is all true and it is over. Our sins have been forgiven and the penalty for our transgressions has been paid by Christ in full. We have been redeemed.
The crucifix is only part of the story. To stop with the crucifix is to miss the last chapter that explains the whole work of Christ's life and death. It's the empty cross that embodies the completion of Christ's mission and the culmination of His incarnation. We have been redeemed.
I don't think God wants us to dwell on Christ's pain, but on His victory.
"Looking unto Jesus the author and finisher of our faith; who for the joy that was set before him endured the cross, despising the shame, and is set down at the right hand of the throne of God." -- Hebrews 12:2
" As I'm reading this, the statement is that we will be Gods. Is this EO doctrine?"
You are reading it wrong. We won't become "Gods"; we can become "divinized" which is the meaning of theosis and by which is meant that we become sharers in the divine uncreated energies of God (as opposed to His essence).
54. The Word Incarnate, as is the case with the Invisible God, is known to us by His works. By them we recognise His deifying mission. Let us be content to enumerate a few of them, leaving their dazzling plentitude to him who will behold.
As, then, if a man should wish to see God, Who is invisible by nature and not seen at all, he may know and apprehend Him from His works: so let him who fails to see Christ with his understanding, at least apprehend Him by the works of His body, and test whether they be human works or God's works. 2. And if they be human, let him scoff; but if they are not human, but of God, let him recognise it, and not laugh at what is no matter for scoffing; but rather let him marvel that by so ordinary a means things divine have been manifested to us, and that by death immortality has reached to all, and that by the Word becoming man, the universal Providence has been known, and its Giver and Artificer the very Word of God. 3. For He was made man that we might be made God; and He manifested Himself by a body that we might receive the idea of the unseen Father; and He endured the insolence of men that we might inherit immortality. For while He Himself was in no way injured, being impossible and incorruptible and very Word and God, men who were suffering, and for whose sakes He endured all this, He maintained and preserved in His own impassibility. 4. And, in a word, the achievements of the Saviour, resulting from His becoming man, are of such kind and number, that if one should wish to enumerate them, he may be compared to men who gaze at the expanse of the sea and wish to count its waves. For as one cannot take in the whole of the waves with his eyes, for those which are coming on baffle the sense of him that attempts it; so for him that would take in all the achievements of Christ in the body, it is impossible to take in the whole, even by reckoning them up, as those which go beyond his thought are more than those he thinks he has taken in. 5. Better is it, then, not to aim at speaking of the whole, where one cannot do justice even to a part, but, after mentioning one more, to leave the whole for you to marvel at. For all alike are marvellous, and wherever a man turns his glance, he may behold on that side the divinity of the Word, and be struck with exceeding great awe.
*And, Athanasisus, the Great, is right. Our First Pope, in 2 Peter teaches...By whom he hath given us most great and precious promises: that by these you may be made partakers of the divine nature:...
That participation in the Divine Nature begins in Baptism and is prefected, in this life, in the Eucharist, where we Redeemed Christians consume His Body and Blood, Soul and Divinity, in the Heavenly Banquet of the New Covenant and so our souls possess Divine Life/Sanctifying Grace.
On the Incarnation of the Word 1. Introductory.—The subject of this treatise: the humiliation and incarnation of the Word. Presupposes the doctrine of Creation, and that by the Word. The Father has saved the world by Him through Whom he first made it.
The fact he was also a violent drunk, an antisemite, a vow-breaking priest etc etc really wasn't too helpful either :)
Then you must object to the Creche and the Baby Jesus
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