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/
self above all else.
= = =
Not at all my theology nor my practice as God knows quite well.
But slick personal attack. Congrats.
From "Just For Catholics:"
Jerome And The Apocrypha
Question: St Jerome was persuaded, against his original inclination, to include the deuterocanonicals in his Vulgate edition of the Scriptures. What are your comments?
Answer: True, yet he classed the Apocrypha in a separated category. He differentiated between the canonical books and ecclesiastical books, which he did not recognize as authoritative Scripture. This is admitted by the modern Catholic church:
“St. Jerome distinguished between canonical books and ecclesiastical books. The latter he judged were circulated by the Church as good spiritual reading but were not recognized as authoritative Scripture. The situation remained unclear in the ensuing centuries...For example, John of Damascus, Gregory the Great, Walafrid, Nicolas of Lyra and Tostado continued to doubt the canonicity of the deuterocanonical books. According to Catholic doctrine, the proximate criterion of the biblical canon is the infallible decision of the Church. This decision was not given until rather late in the history of the Church at the Council of Trent. The Council of Trent definitively settled the matter of the Old Testament Canon. That this had not been done previously is apparent from the uncertainty that persisted up to the time of Trent” (The New Catholic Encyclopedia, The Canon).
The practice of the Church up to the time of the Reformation was to follow the judgment of Jerome who rejected the Old Testament apocrypha on the grounds that these books were never part of the Jewish canon. These were permissible to be read in the churches for the purposes of edification but were never considered authoritative for establishing doctrine. The Protestants did nothing new when they rejected the apocrypha as authoritative Scripture. It was the Roman church that rejected this tradition and ‘canonized’ the ecclesiastical books.
Please read the following explanation from the Roman Catholic Cardinal Cajetan, a contemporary of Martin Luther:
"Here we close our commentaries on the historical books of the Old Testament. For the rest (that is, Judith, Tobit, and the books of Maccabees) are counted by St. Jerome out of the canonical books, and are placed amongst the apocrypha, along with Wisdom and Ecciesiasticus, as is plain from the Protogus Galeatus. Nor be thou disturbed, like a raw scholar, if thou shouldest find anywhere, either in the sacred councils or the sacred doctors, these books reckoned as canonical. For the words as well of councils as of doctors are to be reduced to the correction of Jerome. Now, according to his judgment, in the epistle to the bishops Chromatius and Heliodorus, these books (and any other like books in the canon of the Bible) are not canonical, that is, not in the nature of a rule for confirming matters of faith. Yet, they may be called canonical, that is, in the nature of a rule for the edification of the faithful, as being received and authorised in the canon of the Bible for that purpose. By the help of this distinction thou mayest see thy way clearly through that which Augustine says, and what is written in the provincial council of Carthage." (Cardinal Cajetan, "Commentary on all the Authentic Historical Books of the Old Testament," cited by William Whitaker in "A Disputation on Holy Scripture," Cambridge: Parker Society (1849), p. 424)
The apocrypha are useful for edification, but canonical in the sense that they are the rule for confirming matters of faith, no!
Copyright Dr Joe Mizzi. Permission to copy and distribute this article without textual changes. < BACK TO Q&A
Fascinating perspective.
I think the Mennonites around here are precious in their garb.
Not that I think it makes them a microgram more holy, of course.
Now that's a big hat! 3 levels, you need an elevator
The Church as a whole never supported the distinction between liturgical and educational use, read from the Deuterocanons at Mass and confirmed them as inspired at Hippo and Carthage. If Luther wanted to make these distinctions for himself, as St. Cajetan noted, he could do so and he would be in a good company. Excluding them from the canon, however, was not what the historical Church ever did.
Luther should have taken St. Cajetan's advice and educated himself on the prayer for the dead, for example, from the books of Maccabees. His decision was the opposite, to redact from the Holy Writ what does not comport with his theological fantasies.
there's no scripture commanding that folks never wear hats.
there is however one forbidding men to wear them during liturgy; one that protestants ignore because it doesn't fit their traditions.
Jesus said that to the Pharisees, as well. I think after Jerusalem fell in 70 AD, the only group of religious left were the Pharisees, so naturally, it would appear that early Christians agreed with them. However, the Septuagint already included what we would now call the Old Testament. Christians didn't have to rely on the Jews to tell them the Canon - the first Christians WERE Jews!
As to this:
But there was never any disagreement over the apocryphal books, because they were always rejected by the Jewish church
SO WERE THE GOSPELS... Have you torn them out of your Jewish Bible yet?
Quite simply, the reason the OLD TESTAMENT Deuterocannonicals are not in the Protestant Bible is because of theological points, not the Jews...
Regards
I think if you wanted to read my posts carefully I never stated his decision was made in a vacuum or accepted in a vacuum.
you must have better eyes than me i don't see the mennonites in the photo...
i caught the uncovered women, and the woman muscician out in front with an instrument adding to confusion and probably preaching to boot. dressed in pants no less.
i just don't see a value historical or otherwise to looking at what a single bishop stated; i think we should get a consensus of what a lot of Christian bishops thought at the time.
Let no man therefore judge you in meat, or in drink, or in respect of an holyday, or of the new moon, or of the sabbath days:
2:17 Which are a shadow of things to come; but the body is of Christ.
who's judging anyone here?
It's God who will judge us and know whether we followed the commandments he set forth in 1 Corinthians.
Perhaps the protestant churches should ponder these things before judgement though...
I suppose in the RC system, it would be fitting to race to Mamma Mary and share the discovery and share the outrage. She must be quite up on such things according to that construction on reality.
= = =
Holy Spirit doesn't seem to make it the least bit of a priority, in my observations.
Holy Spirit doesn't seem to make it the least bit of a priority, in my observations.
Evidently Holy Spirit didn't get the memo.
Honestly I know few details of the RC system. Perhaps one of the RC's on this thread could help you with that.
What the heck does this mean? The Catholic Church is more worried about the hymen than about Mary's sexual purity? That seems weird.
Uhhhhhhhhhhhhh
When does a hat become a multi-layered crown?
I think it's a great example of the personal aggrandizement which Christ railed against so fiercely displayed by the religious rulers of His earthly days.
And, which St Paul exhorted firmly against in I Cor 12-14 emphasizing humble, wise old codgers IN THE LOCAL CONGREGATION deciding matters of dispute.
It'd seem more that the Holy Spirit didn't get your memo since it didn't make it to any of you observations.
That said I've definitly observed something which is outside of the Holy Spirit in all these protestant preachers who perform 'miracles' only to be exposed as frauds stealing money from naive folks. A sign that these confessions are nothing but wolves inspired by Satan if ever there was...
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