I want to make a few announcements:
I Have the Best Baba Ever!
That may be an exaggeration, but it was incredibly nice to see a pot sitting infront of my door when I came home incredibly exhausted after a long day and a long week! Baba Zorka makes the best food, and her bean soup is NO exception. Having finished up my SPA grant proposal (Small Project Assistance), it was really nice to not have to make something to eat. Speaking of which, let's talk about this SPA thing... I'm not going to say it's been fun. I won't say I did a very good job at it. But it's been a learning experience. If my proposal is not granted, I'll still be glad that I've done it. One of my goals in Peace Corps was to gain some experience in grant writing, as I'd like to end up in the non-profit sector one day, and I realize this will be very useful experience. It's all about learning.
I'm no Idiot, Lemme make my own dern opinions!!
I still haven't read The Di Vinci Code, but I intend to. Further more, I'm incredibly excited to see the movie (I'm a big Paul Bettany fan). I believe two facts: I am an intelligent human being capable of deciding what it I believe is true (note: I'm not saying what I believe is true for me, but True), reading is good for me. NOW, I don't think that it's bad to read things that are not true, I'll even extend that to reading things that are the opposite of what I believe is true. For example, I think reading fantasy novels are not bad... Let me expound:
Fairytales and stories of magic, I believe, are explanations of something within our cultural subconscious. They symbolically address some common problem. They speak to common nature. They teach us to see beyond the surface (the frog prince), to take chances against evil (hansel and gretel), or that the righteous may suffer persecution (snow white). Many ancient and medieval fairytales tell the hearers, now readers, to listen to parents, the value of a woman's sexual purity, or that the greatest reward comes from hard work, ingenuity, and commitment.
I can offer two explanations why I have no qualms with magic in literature and stories. First, the subconscious is an unfathomable mystery which is easier explained in magic. We use a vehicle which is also unexplainable, so much so that we do not believe it, but through this vehicle arrive at an understanding of both unfathomables. Second, to a child, anything beyond understanding is magic. The microwave oven, a science far beyond the mind of a four-year-old, is a magical machine capable of inflating the paperbag into a universe of buttery goodness OR causing your fillings to explode if you're too close. The television set is a show put on specially fo you. A rainbow is a special gift from God. The tooth fairy delivers us money for our fallen teeth. A child left to his own imagination will develop a magical explanation because he cannot conceive of the scientific explanation.
We adults use magic as an easier way to explain tough concepts. We reward children for their bravery through the trauma of losing a tooth with a dollar from the "tooth fairy." We find it easier to explain the concept of a bunny and painted eggs than the persecution, crucifixion, and resurrection of Christ to our innocent children. Look at children's books, children's movies, children's TV shows! They all have an element of the beyond-believable, the supernatural. Not because children have teensy attention spans which must be catered to with techno-color magical bunnies, but because it's on their level, and easier to understand. (internet and game console games are what we do for a child's short attention span)
That said, considering the generally accepted fact that children are pure at heart and are slowly tainted by the world and its foulness, is it really such a bad thing to return to learning like they do? In unpretentious ways?
And another thing. Fine if you want to forbid anything magical or fairytale-ish from your house. But let's be even and fair about it. Please, throw out your Disney movies, you Tolkein books or movies, your PS2 games, you books of nursery rhymes, anything Harry Potter of from the Nickolodeon channel, and any of C.S. Lewis' fiction. Let's just go ahead and forbid the creative altogether.
So what does that have to do with anything? Well, I recently googled "Di Vinci Code" so I could find out when it will come out in Europe. I happened upon a web site offering articles, videos, and booklets on going behind the code and revealing the truth. I'm not very up-to-date with the news, but has Dan Brown claimed that this novel is a work of non-fiction? What's it's Dewey decimal code? Does it start with a number or a letter? I don't know anyone who calls this book a masterpiece of research and detective skill.
I don't think it's such a bad thing that the Church sees something that it disagrees with and takes a firm opinion on it. But this whole Di Vinci Code thing, like the anti-Harry Potter fanatics just doesn't make sense to me. Why would you suggest we can't tell fiction from fact? Why is it a bad thing for me to enjoy things beyond reality? And most importantly,
CHURCH!! HOW MUCH MONEY HAVE YOU SPENT TEACHING AMERICA WHAT BOOKS NOT TO READ, WHICH MOVIES TO SEE OR NOT SEE, AND WHAT MUSIC TO LISTEN TO OR NOT LISTEN TO? and how does that compare with the amount of money you provide to help people have water, food, jobs, health care, literacy, safe homes, education? Why are babies dying of AIDS? How come children kilometers to sleep so they aren't kidnapped? Why are children left in rotten orphanages? Why are children trafficked like last winters potatoes to countries all around the world with a wink and a shrug by governments for the pleasure of sexual deviants around the world? WHY ARE CHILDREN FORCED INTO PROSTITUTION? WAR? PESTILENCE? DISEASE? poverty? invisibility?
Take another look at the "Christian industries." Music, books, movies. They make so much money because we feel more righteous by having Kincade pillows on our overstuffed couches and promises of wealth on our coffee cups and key rings. Listening to God's promises make us feel holier when we can jam to them in our loaded Expedition with the Jesus fish on the back bumper. I'm not saying any of these things are bad, but America, don't just sit there are feel pretty and holy in your opulence. Make a friggin difference and stop wasting air and dollars while you tell me which books not to read. As you tell us what Jesus did not do, I'll try showing what Jesus did.
"Preach the gospel, and if necessary use words." attributed to St. Francis of Assisi.
Subscribe to:
Post Comments (Atom)
4 comments:
Excellent post!
FINALLY a voice of reason is added to this whole Da Vinci thing.
In my town there have been seminars to explain the fallacy of the Da Vinci Code, and a bunch of Christians trying to get everyone to go to them - even the people who haven't read the book!
I know a bunch of Christians who've read the book. They consider it a romping good (fictional) read, and it hasn't shaken their faith or changed it in any way.
I haven't read it. I've just watched with bemusement as the debates raged. Apparently, Dan Brown does claim that SOME of the theories in his book are based on fact. But, as you said, it's in the fiction section. Personally, if I'm interested in the factual basis of fiction I go look things up in the non-fiction section.
I read the Holy Blood and the Holy Grail about a decade ago (the authors of which took Dan Brown to court but lost because you can't plagerise an idea, and he didn't copy their actual words). I read the theories. I read a lot of other stuff about the theories. I read a lot of other theories. I filtered it all through a critical mind honed by university study, and I decided for myself what was true.
I agree with what you say about fantasy. I also agree that the Christian churchs would do more good focusing all that energy on DOING the work of Christ. And I absolutely object to anyone telling me what to read, or what to think about what I read.
I read Holy Blood, Holy Grail about ten years ago, like the previous commenter. At the time I was reading a lot of esoteric and alternative science books, together with more traditional scientific and philoshpical texts, because I was researching a fictional book on Atlantis, and these sorts of books tend to quote each other. I think it was Colin Wilson who put me on to Holy Blood, Holy Grail and other simliar books.
I always followed up a thread of research that peeked my interest and this idea of an alternative view of Christ and his activities did. At the end of the day, they all fall within the bounds of the 'anceint mysteries' bandwagon.
When I read Dan Brown's book a few years back, I immediately recognised his source, which if it wasn't Baigent et al's book, then I will eat my own foot. The thing was that I had read quite a number of books in the field, including those that were pro occult, and I noticed a definate theme of the desire to humanise Christ and resolve him into a particular occult alterantive world view which had been supressed by the Christian church. These guys wanted to make themselves more legitmate by attacking their detractors. I don't doubt that the writers of Holy Blood, Holy Grail and others in that fieldl actively want to attack the idea of Christ's divinity because they want to feel and reaffirm the legitimacy of their own worldview. Making Christ seem like an ordinary joe with kids is part of this agenda.
Dan Brown however, I doubt gives a rats about this stuff. He is a businessman who has a pretty decent, economical turn of phrase. And he recognised what the Holy Bood, Holy Grail mob did not, the power of a iconclastic idea, the general public was mostly unaware of to sell a lot of books.
I have seen some sites where fiery preachers talk about Dan Brown in on the circle of hell, as if he cares about that. I doubt he does, or about the theolgical implications of his book. To him it is no different that the scientific research behind Deception Point, or research about guns, or a particular world location.
The Da Vinci code is fantasy, because it deals with the sense of wonder and rediscovery about a story the great number of people are familiar with. It is creating a new mythology about Christ, but don't expect it to be a sincere one, or one with any sense of truth.
The idea of Christ having desendants is challenging and refreashing to our expections, it feels and little like opening a mysterious casket, or finding some anceint secret. But it is no more than a device used to create tension and discovery in a best selling novel. It has not legtimacy in reality, it is not based on anything concrete.
But then how far are texts like the bible, which an educated person will know is a text made up of the choosen version of choosen writings condusive to a particular religious framework.
The good aspect of the those who things, for my mind, is that it challenges the catholic church in particular to come forth and deal with a myth as temporarily as least, as powerful as their own.
I do not agree with the ideas in either of these two books, personally I suspect through my own introspetive and spiritual logic that Christ was an immense, deep spiritual personality, not an ordinary joe. In india for thousands of years, there were spritual personalities who forsook marriage and devoted themselves to spritual matters, and it seems very reasonable to me that Christ was just not interested in marrying and having children, he had more important things to do.
BUt I do not see any harm in the Church having to confront questions about their own mythology. It might force them to confront thei own use of smoke an mirrors to distract people from power games and secrecy that have nothig to do with people having a good relationship with themselves and with god.
And surely that is what the church needs to be about, a relationship with divine, not toeing a certain line and upholding daft traditions and powergames with its followers.
Maegen, it's me, the fairy princess! (You know who I am!) You NEED to read the book. I would have sent my copy along with your mom if I had known that you didn't read it yet. It's a definite page-turner and worth the read!
You are still the same old Mee-gan- haha. I was laughing the whole way through as this ranting of yours reminds me of that time we got scolded in Starbucks for talking about the HPotter issue so loudly. Hehehe! Anyways, I saw the movie and it flopped compared to the book. After I read the book, I did want to check out the Holy Blood, Holy Grail book, though. I thought what the 2 previous posters wrote was very insightful and I very much concur. ;)
Hi punkin! I'm glad you're reading my posts! I love you
Post a Comment