CALL FOR MOVIE BOYCOTT

Cardinal Francis Arinzi, a Nigerian, who has visited Jamaica and who heads the Vatican's Office of Liturgy, not only called for a boycott of the movie, but a church-backed documentary released Tuesday, called A Masterful Deception, said Christians should not just "forgive and forget" insults to the founder of their religion, but should react by possibly taking legal action against the film.

It is by no means a new charge that Jesus and Mary Magdalene had an intimate relationship. Gary M. Burge, professor of New Testament at Wheaton College and Graduate School wrote in www.ChristianityToday.com that this supposed relationship is a claim to be found in two apocryphal writings, namely, the Gospel of Mary and the Gospel of Phillip.

Brian Godawa, the award-winning screenwriter of the movies, To End All Wars and The Visitation, on www.christianitytodaymovies.com said, "When it comes to 'Da Vinci', the real problem is not Dan Brown's fiction. He has the moral and constitutional right to craft any kind of tangled logic and laughable paranoia against Christianity that his mind can devise or 'borrow' from other conspiracy nuts and bigots. The problem is the gullibility of the public and its susceptibility to a well-told story, regardless of its historical veracity.

BELIEVE IT ANYWAY

To anyone who has actually read ancient history, this stuff is on the level of Heaven's Gate UFO abductions, but those with an anti-Christian agenda believe it because it makes them feel better about their prejudice. It reminds me of an editor's response regarding the fraudulence of the Dan Rather memo. It may have been a forgery, but it was 'probably what happened anyway,' so they believed it. So it has been with many who have read The Da Vinci Code, and believed it anyway."

Godawa who is also the author of Hollywood Worldviews: Watching Films with Wisdom and Discernment, said in the same article, "In today's post-modern world, and indeed throughout history, so-called 'historical facts' do not usually persuade the masses, but the most convincing interpretation does. In other words, the culture is guided or controlled by whoever tells the best story. And unfortunately, the Church has been mired in the story of modernity for too long, slavishly devoted to make Christianity utterly logical, scientific and respectable in intellectual terms, while neglecting the equally legitimate story of imagination that the Bible supports through its use of story and artistic imagery, visual, dramatic and musical."

He continued, "Christians need to stop boycotting and protesting entertainment, which helps sales and makes us look like sourpuss complainers. We need to stop seeing Hollywood as a Sodom to flee from, and start seeing it as a mission field of unreached peoples. We need to transcend our propagandistic approach to art and media and begin to value excellence and style as much as content.

"Perhaps the most important thing Christians can do is simply to tell better stories. We need to write better novels, better plays, better journal articles, paint better pictures, film better movies, sing better songs and through this all, tell better stories that include an authentic connection with those who do not see the world the way we do.

ATTEMPTS AT REFUTATION

Church leaders' calls for boycotts and their attempts at refutation via books, and websites are no doubt inspired by the believability of the movie and the book. At least two polls have been done which shows contrasting results on the matter of the book's believability.

The British website, www.christiantoday.com, cited the results of a poll commissioned by a group within the Roman Catholic Church which calls itself The Da Vinci Response Group - comprising priests, theologians and members of Opus Dei. The poll was carried out in the United Kingdom.

Of those questioned, 60 per cent of those who had read the book believed that there was truth to the suggestions in the book regarding Jesus and Mary Magdalene. This compared to just 30 per cent of those who had not read the book.

Readers of the book were also found to be four times more likely to think the Catholic organisation, Opus Dei, featured in the novel, was a murderous sect, than those who had not read the book, with 17 per cent of readers polled believing it had, compared with just four per cent of non-readers. The result was found from a survey of 1,000 people carried out by Opinion Research Business.

45 MILLION READERS

On the other side of the Atlantic Ocean, the California-based Barna Research Group said that in its survey The Da Vinci Code has been read cover to cover by roughly 45 million adults in the United States. This, the Barna Group's website points out, turns out to be one out of every five adults (20 per cent). That makes it the most widely read book with a spiritual theme, other than the Bible, to have penetrated American homes. (See the survey at www.barna.org)

The Barna Group notes that among the adults who have read the entire book, one out of every four (24 per cent) said the book was either extremely, very, or somewhat helpful in relation to their personal spiritual growth or understanding. "That translates to about 11 million adults who consider The Da Vinci Code to have been a helpful spiritual document," the research group said.

The study was conducted among 1,003 persons in the form of telephone interviews. The study also explored whether the book caused people to change some of their religious beliefs. Among the 45 million who had read The Da Vinci Code, only five per cent, which represents about two million adults said that they changed any of the beliefs or religious perspectives because of the book's content.

CONNECTING BELIEFS

"Before reading The Da Vinci Code, people had a full complement of beliefs already in place, some firmly held and others loosely held," explained George Barna, president of the Barna Research Group and author of numerous books about faith and culture. "Upon reading the book, many people encountered information that confirmed what they already believed. Many readers found information that served to connect some of their beliefs in new ways. But, few people changed their pre-existing beliefs because of what they read in the novel. And even fewer people approached the book with a truly open mind regarding the controversial matters in question, and emerged with a new theological perspective. The book generates controversy and discussions, but it has not revolutionised the way that Americans think about Jesus, the Church or the Bible.

In other words, if people did not change their behaviour or adjust their worldview after viewing The Passion of the Christ, they are far less likely to do so after viewing The Da Vinci Code.

CONTROVERSY HEALTHY

The Baltimore Sun newspaper, in a May 17 article, quoted Dan Brown as saying concerning his book, "Controversy and dialogue are healthy for religion as a whole. Religion has only one true enemy - apathy - and passionate debate is a superb antidote."

The paper also cited the Rev. Mark Adams, the pastor of Redland Baptist Church in Rockville, who viewed The Da Vinci Code as "an attack on our faith in many, many ways." But the pastor, the newspaper said, doesn't plan to discourage his congregation from seeing the movie. Instead, the paper noted, he had been leading a series of study sessions based on Discussing The Da Vinci Code, a new book and DVD by Lee Strobel and Garry Poole, and was planning a sermon on the subject for tomorrow.

"I think that this is a chance where God will take something that man meant for wrong and use it in a great way," Adams told the Baltimore Sun. "A lot of people are going to be talking about, well, who was Jesus Christ, and how do you become one of his followers, and what is the church really like, and why do they think the Bible is authoritative?"