Vatican calling for Boycott of Da Vinci Code

[Details]

To suggest that Jesus may have fathered a child and had a wife may be seen as "talking trash" about the Son of God, at least.

To focus on the aspects of Opus Dei such as the secrecy and self mortification practices, whipping oneself and wearing barbed wire on your thighs is kinda "trashy sounding" to me.

Interesting - I didn't know any of that about Opus Dei, so how I'm working on the 'trashy' aspects of them is a mystery to me. I was thinking of the aspects that are part of the plot of the movie, and they mystery, of keeping secret the truth about Jesus. But even if they were - if they're true or not, it's not blasphemy to search for the truth, and if that's the truth, it can't possibly be 'talking trash' - now if their actions are trashy - well, I think that'd be even more proof they aren't god.

How on earth is it trashy to talk about the truth about Jesus? That's all they're working on in this movie - not slandering, but the characters are researching to find out the truth. Married with a child hardly sounds like trashing someone! Even the church seems to think that's a good thing to do.

 

[BillyGoatGruff]

For all the media forth about the movie and the varius cries of blasphemy, boycotting,etc. I've noticed that the Christians of the Western world haven't poured out into the streets, rioted, killed people or set fire to cars and houses in order to express their 'outrage' at The Da Vinci Code, unlike the insanity of the Mohammed cartoons a couple of months ago. Why? Perhaps because Christianity as a religion got that kind of insanity out of it system & mainstream practitioners a couple hundred years ago. Now it's only the acknowledged lunatic fringe that over-react so viciously.

 

[Dark Knight]

If this is the girl I remember, they found a wafer that didn't have the ingredient in it that caused her allergic reaction, but was acceptable in all other ways. I think it was made by some nuns, somewhere, for this kind of thing.

 

[Details]

Still seems silly to me - anyone really think that when Jesus said, "Do this in memory of me", he was explicitly saying that celiacs were automatically lesser christians? What if they can't have wheat or grapes (or must it be wine - I think that was the precise item, right?) - condemned to hell? I'm sure any form of bread, any form of juice is fine - it's about the spirit of the act, the intention. When I have a bit of wheat bread, and some grape juice, consecrated or not, it's meaningless, because I am not a christian. When someone who believes has a rice wafer and apple juice, in memory of the last supper - that means something, even if made with modern ingredients.

I just think they're being too literal, turning a casual statement, a coincidence about what happened to be eaten at that time into a rule that ignores the spirit of all of Jesus's teachings (he said plenty about children being allowed to be brought to him too!).

Celiacs can have absolutely no form of wheat, if they found a wafer that was acceptable, it did not have wheat.

 

[BarnGoddess]

I heard Reggie McDaniel, a movie and food critic in Denver on KOA radio say he loved the movie. Reggie started as a caller on the afternoon drive and now has his own show. His great aunt was Hattie McDaniel of Gone With the Wind fame. He's booked as the "Every Day People's" critic. He looks at movies more as the public would, not picking apart every little piece looking for something wrong. He said he enjoyed the movie, even though it wasn't Tom Hanks best one. He even said the length didn't bother him.

I've been watching all the shows on the History, A&E, Biography, Discovery channels. There was a good 2 hour special "Angels & Demons on last night and today on A&E. Very interesting viewing.

I'm keeping a very open mind on all this. I absolutely refuse to take for "gospel" what someone tells me I must believe. I know the Catholic church and others have decided what their parishoners are supposed to believe. I simply can't do it. Organized religion is so full of intrigue and mysteries and "men" seeking power. Just like big business.

 

[Dark Knight]

DVC made an estimate $77 million in ticket sales this weekend, making it the #1 movie at the box office, naturally. We'll see how it holds up next week and beyond, especially with X-Men 3 coming out.

 

[Details]

Discovery has been having a ton of very interesting shows on the DaVinci code and the like - talking about what is real and what is fiction, and what is unknown - and trying to solve some of the unknowns. They pretty well eliminated one concept in the DaVinci code - the Merinvonian queen who was supposed to be one of the descendants turns out to have pure european DNA, and no linkage to the DNA of people from the area Jesus and Mary Magdalene were from. It was the first time that DNA had been found, and tested (so no saying the writers knew it was a lie when they wrote about it!).

Some fun stuff - I love watching the science and methods they use to try to figure out what happened so long ago.

 

[close_enough]

Da Vinci Code debut rakes in $224 million in world sales...2nd biggest $ maker on record, since Star Wars...


http://movies.yahoo.com/mv/news/va/20060521/114824077300.html

 

[close_enough]

i'm glad i didn't make it, this opening weekend, like i had planned...i don't like real crowded theatres.....i'm having lunch with a good friend, i haven't seen in awhile, on Thursday...we plan on seeing the movie afterward...on a weekday it shouldn't be crowded...

 

[txsvicki]

The Catholic Church wasn't the one only group around back then. There was lots of groups of Christians who weren't with the Catholics. Surely some of them would have passed down tales of Jesus being married. I've not heard of any stories of this except for the Holy Grail and Moravian issue. Why, there is not even any proof in the Bible that Mary Magdalene was even a prostitute like so many different stories depict her. I believe the KJV and no other accounts of the whole thing.

 

[Dark Knight]

The Catholic Church wasn't the one only group around back then. There was lots of groups of Christians who weren't with the Catholics. Surely some of them would have passed down tales of Jesus being married. I've not heard of any stories of this except for the Holy Grail and Moravian issue. Why, there is not even any proof in the Bible that Mary Magdalene was even a prostitute like so many different stories depict her. I believe the KJV and no other accounts of the whole thing.

And what Christian groups would those be?

 

[windovervocalcords]

The Book of Acts records or reports that there was a special event that took place at Pentecost, which would have been the next pilgrimage festival after the Passover at which Jesus died. And at that time the disciples of Jesus were gathered together in Jerusalem unsure of what their future would be, when all of a sudden the spirit took hold of them and enabled them to speak in tongues, and that speaking of tongues is understood by the author of the Book of Acts to mean speaking in all of the languages of the world. So with the power of the spirit behind them, the disciples of Jesus immediately began a missionary campaign and started bringing people into the fold, converting them to belief in Christ. And from that time forward the mission moved ahead in the rather smooth way, directed by the spirit and by all of the apostles who acted in concert with one another and agreement with one another. That's the picture that we get in Acts. The historical reality is probably much more complex.

Christianity, or one would rather say "Christianities," of the second and third centuries were a highly variegated phenomenon. We really can't imagine Christianity as a unified coherent religious movement. Certainly there were some religious organizations.... There were institutions developing in some Christian churches, but only in some. And this was not universal by any means. We know from, for example, the literature recovered at Nag Hammadi, that gnostic Christianity didn't have the kind of clear hierarchy that other forms of Christianity had developed. They still clung to a charismatic leadership model. And so there was a lot of variety in 2nd and 3rd century Christianity....

There were very different views of Jesus in the various types of Christianity.... Perhaps the starkest contrast was among those who considered themselves as gnostic Christians, and those who considered themselves Christians in the old Pauline view of things. On the one hand, Paul, and Pauline Christianity, would have placed all of the emphasis on Jesus' death and resurrection, and the saving power of that death and resurrection. Gnostic Christianity, on the other hand, would have placed its prime emphasis on the message, the wisdom, the knowledge, the gnosis, that's where the word gnostic comes from, the Greek word for knowledge, the knowledge that Jesus transmits, and even the secret knowledge that Jesus transmits. So one would have on the one hand faith in the saving event of Jesus' life and death, and on the other hand knowledge as the great source of adherence to the Jesus movement on the other hand.

More on the gnostics.
http://www.pbs.org/wgbh/pages/frontline/shows/religion/first/diversity.html

 

[sandraladeda]

That's an incident (and entirely reprehensible). Not quite the same thing as the broad ranging cover ups that have now been documented for the Church.

Hardly. Nor is punishing the perpetrators. What we have not heard so much about is the transferring of school teachers from system to system with the active knowledge and assistance of school boards.

To clarify - not an incident, but 5 incidents that I know of within one board.

Was this directed at me? I think I've been very careful to acknowledge the limits of my experience; I've also been quite careful to mention the many good things done by the Church and the Catholics I know.

Not directed at you, I had just quoted your comment about not seeing such a degree of coverups anywhere but in the Catholic Church (or something to that extent, too lazy to quote it exactly....) From that comment, I then carried on with a thought process directed more at the general lashing out at the Catholic Church by people who, by and large, in my opinion, know little or nothing about the Catholic Church. It's frustrating to see people who are not in the Church, who never have anything to say about the church, and then when they do, it's all negative and based on a very limited grasp of what the Catholic church is all about.

imho

 

[sandraladeda]

"As a very strongly active member of the Catholic church, and not just someone slinging mud from the sidelines because I "think" I have a clue what the Catholic church is all about, I have seen the pendulum swing the other way - even the slightest hint of wrongdoing, whether substantiated or not, can result in perfectly good priest being put out to pasture, just in case, so the church cannot be accused of hushing it up."

I don't think you would be using the term "slinging mud from the sidelines" in reference to non-catholics ( who have opinions about the truth of how unskillfully the Catholic Church handled the sexual abuse by their clergy) if it wasn't still so incredibly painful for you and all Catholics to remember.

The Church has taken steps to remedy the problem finally. I think it will still be awhile before true healing occurs and all of us can put that unhappy chapter of your churches history behind us.

It must be miserable to be a Catholic and have the issue continually brought up over and over again at this critical juncture in recovering from this collective trauma.

Nova and others have made some good points.

Catholic priests are not inherently more llikely to be pedophiles than others in the general population. The Church has taken and will continue to take flack over the past policy of placing itself outside the law and protecting pedophiles.

Just as Nixon went down for cover up, more than the break in,
the Church has been in the hotseat over the cover-up and protection issue more than the sexual abuse itself.

This issue of the Churches betrayl of the larger community as well as the Catholic community seems a much more serious threat to Catholics faith in their Church than the Da Vinci Code.

I think its a unfair burden for any single follower of any faith to have to defend what is indefensible in their churches. Not only were the children traumatized by the pedophilia, but the whole community was as well.

It is courageous of all of you who practice your faith to the best of your abilities. Take heart in what comforts and sustains you. And maybe allow yourself to be supported by faith, your faith community and all others of us in the extended community who suffer just as you do with times of challenge and confusion.

I have been out of town and away from the pc for a few days or would have responded sooner. I just want to say thank you for your very well-thought out and sympathetic comments. Beautiful post!

 

[sandraladeda]

The Catholic church is big business. Of course they're going to want to publicize what helps them and bury what doesn't.

The Catholic Church is big business?

The only "big business" I see going on is the business of supporting Catholics in their faith, offering a multitude of ministries, from youth groups (4 different groups in my parish), educational opportunities for people wanting to learn more about the faith (bible studies, Alpha courses), grief support, funeral reception, visiting the sick and shut-ins, supporting new immigrants through various programs including ESL, feeding and housing the homeless, addiction support such as AA, job search assistance, marriage preparation, programs for seniors, etc. All this is done, I might add, on a responsibly administered shoestring budget.

Does the Catholic Church have assets? Of course they do. They would be irresponsible not to take the financial assets they have and invest them wisely. But big business? Hardly....

imo

 

[Maral]

The Catholic Church is big business? See, this is one of those silly comments people throw out there about the Catholic church and it drives me nuts.

The only "big business" I see going on is the business of supporting Catholics in their faith, offering a multitude of ministries, from youth groups (4 different groups in my parish), educational opportunities for people wanting to learn more about the faith (bible studies, Alpha courses), grief support, funeral reception, visiting the sick and shut-ins, supporting new immigrants through various programs including ESL, feeding and housing the homeless, addiction support such as AA, job search assistance, marriage preparation, programs for seniors, etc. All this is done, I might add, on a responsibly administered shoestring budget.

Does the Catholic Church have assets? Of course they do. They would be irresponsible not to take the financial assets they have and invest them wisely. But big business? Hardly....

imo

:clap::clap::clap::clap::clap::clap:
Very well put, Sandraladeda.

 

[Details]

They have a ton of money, offices and employees throughout the world - I don't think calling them a big business is incorrect. They're bigger than a lot of other businesses, including many multinationals. And, sadly, sometimes they are overconcerned with negative PR and underconcerned with correcting the actions that lead to negative PR, just like any other business.

Their intentions are good, most of their actions are good - but that's not unknown in businesses either.

 

[Dark Knight]

They have a ton of money, offices and employees throughout the world - I don't think calling them a big business is incorrect. They're bigger than a lot of other businesses, including many multinationals. And, sadly, sometimes they are overconcerned with negative PR and underconcerned with correcting the actions that lead to negative PR, just like any other business.

Their intentions are good, most of their actions are good - but that's not unknown in businesses either.

They are trying to manage the needs of over 1 billion members worldwide, so I suppose they have used a business model to do so, which is fine with me, lol.

ETA: Again, the Vatican audits show them operating in the red many years, so I fine the articles stating otherwise a bit dubious, and the gold and such are simply smart investments to hedge against a financial crash, it doesn't equal revenue, unfortunately, until they have to sell it.

 

[Details]

Sure, they need a business model. I just think it's funny to deny it, when there's nothing wrong about it.

As to the gold and property - yeah, they're not revenue, but they sure are one huge pile of assets they can use whenever they like.

 

[Mira]

most any of us can say bad or good about any organized religion.

i do wonder if the catholic 'threat of boycott' didnt actually help the movie, more than hurt. personally i wasnt interested really, other than the fact that its tom hanks (yum). now i cant wait to see what all the fuss is about.