Insight Scoop | The Ignatius Press Blog

Code hits cinemas on May 19, 2006

From Yahoo! News: "Production will begin next year, and distributor Sony Pictures said Tuesday it plans to release the film May 19, 2006."

Here's betting that Roger Ebert hates it. A friend recently alerted me to this statement by Ebert about TDVCode, made in his review of "National Treasure":

“That I have read the book is not a cause for celebration. It is inelegant, pedestrian writing in service of a plot that sets up cliff-hangers like clockwork, resolves them with improbable escapes and leads us breathlessly to a disappointing anticlimax. I should read a potboiler like The Da Vinci Code every once in a while, just to remind myself that life is too short to read books like The Da Vinci Code.”

Ah, c'mon Roger—it's just a novel!

Just because you call it "Catholic"...

...doesn't make it Catholic.

More anti-Christmas sour notes

From New Jersey, The Star-Ledger reports that the Columbia High School brass ensemble won't be playing any "religious" December-related tunes this year:

A long-standing policy banning the singing of Christmas songs with religious references in the South Orange/Maplewood School District has come under scrutiny after the administration clarified the policy recently, saying that it also includes instrumental concerts.

This means the 40-member brass ensemble, which in years past has played Christmas carols with references to Santa Claus, Jesus, or other religious symbols, will not be played this year.

"Rather than try to respond to all the various religions and try to balance them, it's best to stay away from that and simply have a nonreligious tone to them and have more of a seasonal tone," Superintendent Peter P. Horoschak said.

Silly, yes. And even sillier in light of the fact that since many religions don't recognize a "season" at the end of December, even a vague celebration is—according to PC-"thinking"—an offense to those religions.

And is it really the case (as the article indicates) that songs such as "Winter Wonderland" aren't religious? Perhaps the PC-Police need to look more closely. "Winter Wonderland" mentions "wonder," "love" and "marriage," all of which have some sort of religious connotation. And what about "Parson Brown"? Where's the mention of a "Rabbi Brown"? Or a "Guru Brown"? Where's the diversity? Looks like the cultural totalitarianism is still a little soft....

Colson: Lewis successful because he wasn't an evangelical

Evangelical Charles Colson (a long-time favorite of mine) takes the occasion of C.S. Lewis's birthday to ask, "Why was Lewis so uncannily prophetic? At first glance he seems an unlikely candidate. He was not a theologian; he was an English professor. What was it that made him such a keen observer of cultural and intellectual trends?":

The answer may be somewhat discomfiting to modern evangelicals: One reason is precisely that Lewis was not an evangelical. He was a professor in the academy, with a specialty in medieval literature, which gave him a mental framework shaped by the whole scope of intellectual history and Christian thought. As a result, he was liberated from the narrow confines of the religious views of the day—which meant he was able to analyze and critique them.

It's an interesting argument, but I think Colson is partially wrong here. Lewis wasn't liberated from narrow religious views because he was in the academy; in fact, I think that idea would probably amuse Lewis to some degree (after all, he had many an argument about Christianity with fellow academics). I think it would be more correct to argue that Lewis was a fine scholar who avoided the pitfalls of academic narrow-mindedness because of a combination of things: his great love of truth, the "catholicity" of his perspective (even though he had a certain dislike for Rome), and his desire to reach a broad, popular audience without compromising essentials. Colson concludes:

The problem is not that modern evangelicals are less intelligent than Lewis. As Mark Noll explains in his book The Scandal of the Evangelical Mind, the problem is that our sharpest intellects have been channeled into biblical scholarship, exegesis, and hermeneutics. While that is a vital enterprise, we rarely give the same scholarly attention to history, literature, politics, philosophy, economics, or the arts. As a result, we are less aware of the culture than we should be, less equipped to defend a biblical worldview, and less capable of being a redemptive force in our postmodern society—less aware, as well, of the threats headed our way from cultural elites.

In other words—at least in my mind—Colson is saying the Christians need to be truly Catholic/catholic. And that, of course, includes Catholics, who are often far more dull to the cultural shifts and attitudes than are many Evangelicals. As John Cardinal Newman famously wrote, "To be deep in history is to cease to be Protestant." It is also to be Catholic.

"Knights Templars" seeking papal apology

The Independent reports:

Seven hundred years after they were denounced as heretics and condemned to torture and death, the Knights Templar are calling for a public apology from the Roman Catholic Church.

The secretive organisation which was formed at the time of the Crusades has written to Pope John Paul II requesting that the Vatican officially atone for the persecution of the order.

The formal request for reconciliation to the Vatican has come from an English-based sept and is signed by the "Council of Chaplains, for and on behalf of the acting Grand Master". The letter asks for "an apology from the Vatican for the persecution of our brothers of the Knights Templar and the torture and murder of our leadership, under Pope Clement V during the 14th century AD".

The article states that the Templars, in 1307, "had fallen foul of Philip IV of France who needed funds for his war against England. With the blessing of Pope Clement V, the king moved against the Templars on Friday 13 October of that year and had them all arrested for heresy." That's a debatable claim according to medieval historian Sandra Miesel, my co-author, who writes in our book, The Da Vinci Hoax:

On Friday the Thirteenth of October, 1307, French royal officials arrested every Templar in the kingdom, about 2000 persons. At most these included 150 professed Knights, the others being of lower rank. Philip had secured permission for his raid from the national Inquisitor General, who happened to be his own confessor. Only belatedly did he notify Pope Clement V, a fellow Frenchman, who was shocked by the affair.

Later, "Philip coerced the weak, sickly pope into condemning the Order." Of course, it's much more fun and sensational to blame everything on the Pope/Catholic Church, and that course is also taken by Dan Brown in The Da Vinci Code. Sandra writes:

But even Holy Blood, Holy Grail and The Templar Revelation—not to mention more legitimate histories—identify the king, not the pope, as the chief villain. French royal officials arrested the Templars, not papal soldiers. There were no simultaneous arrests across Europe. (Subsequent papal requests for action in other countries weren’t uniformly obeyed.) The prisoners were held in French prisons and tormented by royal torturers, not "an angry Pope".

No word if these modern-day "Knights Templar" will also request an apology from the French government. For some reason I doubt that will happen....

"...in the name of stupidity, ideology, and New Age nuttiness..."

The Catholic News Agency reports that two Australian priests are in hot water for baptizing children using a "New Age" formula:

Two days ago, Archbishop John Bathersby of Brisbane stated that children baptized at the South Brisbane church using non-traditional words – "creator, liberator and sustainer" instead of "Father, Son and Holy Spirit" – would have to be re-baptized.

The priests, as might be expected, have responded with holy calmness and intellectual rigor. One of them, Fr. Kennedy, has stated:

"It's fundamentalism to argue that the actual words are all-important," he said. "That's the trouble with the Church; under the present Pope you're not allowed to have different opinions."

Granted, it isn't quite on the level of St. Thomas (or even Gary Wills, for that matter), but it does reflect well the general silliness and adolescent rebelliousness of the times (even with Fr. Kennedy being 67-years old). I do have to wonder, however, why Fr. Kennedy bothered to change the baptismal formula to those specific words if, in fact, "actual words" are not "all-important." Perhaps he means that the Church's words are not all-important, unlike his timeless utterances.

I don't usually agree with Tim LaHaye

But I think he's on to something here:

Dr. Tim LaHaye, co-author of the Left Behind novel series, says evangelical pastors who advocate sending their Christian youth to public schools are "philosophically out to lunch." He says those pastors and other Christian leaders who look favorably on public education "don't understand the worldview of the secular humanists that's being taught" in U.S. public schools, and they have a tendency to think that we just preach and pray and plug away, and we'll get our kids saved."

Read the entire article over at the American Family Association site. Of course, there are some good teachers in public schools, home schooling isn't for everyone, etc., etc. But since I live in Eugene, Oregon, I tend to take a dim view of public education—as well as anarchists and lesbians-with-an-agenda who would use a young girl in order to attack the Catholic Church...

The most recent book from Peter Kreeft...

...is now available; it is titled The God Who Loves You: "Love Divine, All Loves Excelling". You can read an excerpt from it over at IgnatiusInsight.com.

ZENIT interviews Bennett about the Holy Grail

Janice Bennett, author of St. Laurence and the Holy Grail" talks to ZENIT about the Holy Chalice of Valencia and her belief that it is possibly the cup used by Christ at the Last Supper. A longer IgnatiusInsight.com interview with Bennett can be read here.

"Is Declaration of Independence unconstitutional?"

That's the headline of this WorldNetDaily.com piece reporting that the Cupertino Union School District is being sued by the Attorneys for the Alliance Defense Fund "for prohibiting a teacher from providing supplemental handouts to students about American history because the historical documents contain some references to God and religion." What happened exactly?

Patricia Vidmar, principal of the Stevens Creek School, reportedly ordered the teacher, Stephen Williams, to submit his lesson plans and supplemental handouts to her for advance approval. Aside from Williams, a Christian, no other teachers were subject to the advance-screening requirement, says the ADF.

Just what documents did Williams submit that were deemed unfit for the school's students?

"Excerpts from the Declaration of Independence, the diaries of George Washington and John Adams, the writings of William Penn, and various state constitutions," said the public-interest law firm representing Willliams.

Such politically-correct silliness seems to be run-of-the-mill for some schools and it reveals what I hope will soon be vividly obvious to those paying attention: that such "liberalism" (it's actually an attempt at cultural totalitarianism) cannot and will not engage in true dialogue nor compete in the public square. It is a narrowmindedness that makes even narrowminded Christians (far fewer exist, of course, than the MSM and the cultural elites say) appear openminded in comparison. Christianity can handle competition. It will flourish where a true exchange of ideas takes place. It proves attractive when people see it for what it really is. Political correctness cannot compete, it cannot flourish in daylight, and its hideous nature is revolting to those who see it unmasked.

Okay, this rant is finished. Others to follow at unexpected moments...