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/
My assessment is that it convened over a disagreement among people who were supposed to be inspired, which troubles me. In particular, the dispute arouse between +James and +Paul. One can argue that Halakah was not firmly established yet. Regardless, whether it was or not, Christians in Israel considered themselves Jewish, worshiped in accordance with Judaism, followed Judaic customs and habits.
I just think it's curious that +Peter's 'vision' (under 'trans') is described in Acts 11, and the Jerusalem Council in Acts 15. Coincidence, or neatly packaged sequence of events? I don't know. It is +Paul who speaks of rebuking +Peter for 'living like a Gentile," yet expecting Gentiles to live like the Jews. So, the dispute +Paul had was with more than just +James, although one has to dig a little to find this.
It was +Paul who (together with +Barnabas, and apparently Titus, an uncicumsised Greek), but under +Paul's initiative, who argued that circumcision, "Jewish baptism," can be dispensed with! This is equivalent to someone telling you that one doe snot have to be baptized to become a Christian. I don't know about Protestants, but the Orthodox Church would not consider those people Christian even if their theology was identical to the EO theology (save for Baptism). So, in effect, +Paul was arguing to introduce something that was fundamentally against the Jewish Law.
[NB: the book of Acts shows significant difference depending on which version of the Bible is used; the 5th century Alexandrian version is the one used primarily in the West; the Eastern version is reflected in the 4th century AD Codex Sinaticus. The accounts surrounding the Council of Jerusalem are not identical in those versions]
After +Peter spoke (in words that sound very Pauline to me), +James basically invoked the laws of Noah. But the earliest account of the so-called Council in Jerusalem comes from +Paul. It states that he came to Jerusalem to "lay before them the gospel (he) proclaimed among the Gentiles" (Gal 2:2)! He also claims that this was a "private meeting," and not a Council. According to +Paul's own writing, the three 'pillars' of the Church, +Peter, +John and +James, agreed with him and offered him "fellowship," and and sent him to preach to the uncircumcised, asking him only to remember the "poor of Jerusalem."
So, to answer your question, I think there are a lot of different angles and versions to this, compounded by different copies purporting to be the 'originals.' These e accounts speak of different times, persons, size of the meeting, people ("pharisees who believed"), conclusions, etc. All this somehow seems a little made up to me. The book of Acts, which was written after +Paul's death, differs from +Paul's version in Galatians, and exists in western and eastern versions, both of which differ significantly.
But one thing is clear: the purpose of the account in the so-called 'Council' of Jerusalem was to provide scriptural 'justification' initiated by +Paul to dispense with God's Laws given to Moses so as "not to burden" the Gentiles when Christ never explicitly or implicitly gave such permission or even mentioned such a possibility. Then comes +Peter's 'vision' in a 'trance' a few chapters earlier, just in time for the Council in Acts 15, and a very seemingly choreographed account of that meeting.
First, Christ did speak to the Apostles only when He was teaching. Other sheep refers to other Semitic people, the Phoenicians, the Canaanites, and other Jewish tribes. The word "people" really means clans. The Greek word fulh in the NT refers to the descendants of Jacob, not Gentiles.
Or how about the centurion (Matt. 8:5-10)?
In the context, the centurion converted to Judaism, not some new religion called Christianity. Nothing stops the Gentiles from embracng Judaism. Christ however, never taught that Judaism needs to be modified, by breaking God's Laws, in order to accommodate the Gentiles.
If I could only take 4 books of the Bible to a desert island, one of them would be Romans. It might well be that not all Reformers would agree with me, but I think a whole bunch of them would. Do you think the vast majority of Orthodox would disagree with me?
I am not sure.
The criteria for discernment were formulated by St. Vincent of Lerins. The doctrine is valid if it has been believed historically by nearly all nearly everywhere, and always. If someone reaches interpretations that are widely off the mark in comparisons to what the Church has always taught, then he is not lead by the Holy Spirit, and if he feels strongly that there is inspiration in his views, then it is demonic. Your quotes do not show otherwise. Are all doctors?
By revelation, dear annalex. If you have the Holy Spirit, he teaches you all things and reveals all things. If you have the gift of discernment, you can also tell what's phony and what isn't. Being filled with the HS is the secret (if there is one). Love, Mxxx
Thanks for your well thought out answer. Love, Mxxx
It's happening in politics, too, hosepipe. I've never seen such precise division as I have in the past three elections. Of course we KNOW (haha) who the goats are...
Am doing it as we speak. BE GONE IN THE NAME OF JESUS!
It should not be: ... [2 Peter 1:10, Rom. 2:4-8].
Neither of these passages shutter my assurance, and both are fully in accordance with POTS.
The election before the foundation of the world is foreknown by God who foreknows your works.
Yes. Our difference is whether God elects according to His will or according to man's will.
As you are breathing and working [your salvation] is not secure at all.
That is your free will choice to believe. The knowledge of assurance is available to any believer in the scriptures. I do not think your disbelief will affect your salvation status, it just means that during life you will worry more than your equally-saved counterpart on my side. :)
Your faith should give you hope, not presumption.
It gives me both hope and presumption. "Hope" in the Bible does legitimately connote an expectation of the hope fulfilled, in many cases (elpis).
FK: "Peter is saying that as we do good works in love for Christ, that we may be sure of our salvation. Doing the good works is a confirmation, for our benefit, ..."
You can read it that way as long as we recognize that these works will not come automatically, but must be chosen by our free will, ...
We would say that all of these works come with free will since our salvation set us free to do good works. The difference is whether God granted the power to men to thwart His word or not. If God did grant the power, then sheep will be lost and some of the saved will not do works. If God did not grant the power, then no sheep are lost and all of the saved will do works. The Bible only has any value at all under the latter.
You can laugh all you want about how annulment is practiced, but prohibition of remarriage is an issue of plain scripture and not tradition ...
Yes, it absolutely is a matter of plain scripture, and both of our sides have suffered miserable results over the last few decades. My loud objection is to any Catholic who points his finger at Protestants and says: "Catholics don't get divorced to the level Protestants do". However one wants to parse it, that just doesn't hold water.
A null path is an empty path and can be visualized in special relativity as an object traveling at the speed of light — for the object, no time passes. The observers however sense time passing. In general relativity it is a bit more complicated because of null geodesics (the warping of spacetime) — but that ought to be enough to get the general idea
I don't accept nonCanonical sources as normative for anything about The Christian life, per se.
As is known, the Marian stuff didn't get really horrid until centuries later.
ANNALEX:
Where does 1 Cor 12-14, or any other scripture, say that all can "discern what is authentic"? It says rather the opposite: "Are all doctors?".
QX:
I think it might be better to reread what I wrote and avoid putting words in my fingers.
I did not say every last individual would be 100% accurate in discerning anything in the group. I said essentially that Paul tasked the local congregation to discern and to especially pay attention to the 'nobody' wise old insignificant humble codgers who could be trusted to make wise judgments in such situations.
That's not doctors nor lofty magesterical elitists bureaucrats.
Clearly THE ROT set in early.
I've learned to run from folks who describe themselves in pontifical, lofty, super high, super anointed GOD POSITIONS.
I'd much rather wait for Holy Spirit to supernaturally confirm with signs following God's CURRENT AND ACTIVE anointing as well as observe the CURRENT AND ACTIVE humility in such folks before I put a microgram of trust in them.
INDEED! INDEED! INDEED!
Thanks. Refressing that precious folks like you GET IT!
My own bias, assumption, inference, understandings . . . are . . .
That God knew what was in the heart of man from the beginning. The Old Testament era depicted in vivid detail what happens with RELIGION vs RELATIONSHIP . . . how man compulsively twists everything spiritual into a dead, power-mongering, authoritarian, brutal RELIGION within a rather short time.
So, Paul clearly in I Cor 12-14 is outlining the normative Christian life for the local congregation--and there's not a pontifical office to fill and bow down to.
None.
Humility and wisdom are what's to be sought out and submitted to.
Pure and simple, by Holy Spirit's design, operation and leadership.
Wellllllllllllll, the rubber Bibles, Dictionaries and histories are usually well used on such threads.
But it does amaze me to observe incredibly slippery thinking
And then to pretend that the mother of Jesus would be happy with that!!!! Subtracting glory and adoration due entirely and only GOD ALONE!
Shockingly amazing.
THIS IS MY BELOVED SON IN WHOM I AM WELL PLEASED, Daddy said.
He did NOT say: This is my beloved Son in whom I am well pleased, but first bow and scrape at His mother's knee before bothering about HIM!
Masterful as usual.
Tons of agreement. No disagreement.
Thanks.
Thanks for prayers, BTW, chest feels better though sore from coughing yesterday.
That's the point I was pondering. Thanks very much, AG..
Ahhhh.
You seem to see that as rebellion against God by Moses.
vs
As Jesus said, something The Father tolerated in certain situations, because of the hardness of their hearts.
I don't see it as Moses rebelling against God.
While I would agree that the Orthodox are not as deep in error as the Roman Catholics on this, you still have ZERO standing to accuse us of taking power from Christ. A fundamental definition of our faith is giving ALL power to God. It is you who fervently reject that idea.
= = =
INDEED.
Your construction on reality is much closer to mine; equal to mine.
God grants His power to us but on an individual by indivual AND MOMENT BY MOMENT basis according to Holy Spirit's agenda and goals--NOT OURS--AND CERTAINLY NOT AN AUTHORITARIAN SELF-SERVING BUREAUCRACY'S--of any denomination.
The reason is that ALL we use is the Bible. We don't have to make it match Tradition or anything else. If your faith was really close to the plain meaning of scripture, then you wouldn't need Tradition to interpret it to the degree it does.
= = =
I strongly agree.
Please keep up your excellent work.
Disclaimer: Opinions posted on Free Republic are those of the individual posters and do not necessarily represent the opinion of Free Republic or its management. All materials posted herein are protected by copyright law and the exemption for fair use of copyrighted works.