Post by bjorn on May 12, 2009 8:07:48 GMT
The film is as expected storing up controversy, even if the Vatican is very carefull not to add fuel to any fire.
Others, however, seem to enjoy the moment. The movie will provide ample opportunity to propagate the Conflict Thesis (and replying to it, one should even do some preemptive strikes) and generally take it out on The Church.
And it is all rather obvious with "Author, activist and songwriter" Kathleen McGowan www.huffingtonpost.com/kathleen-mcgowan/angels-and-demons-and-dea_b_196805.html
She doesn't hestitate with her rhetorics.
Well, if one doesn't put things in perspective, it is difficult not to come across as anti-Catholic.
However, it doesn't help when she puts things in perspective, that is her own perspective.
Say no more.
Or rather she does say a lot more. And it is obviously present politics, not past history she is concerned with.
Good to get clear on that.
Looking forward to more semantics.
Others, however, seem to enjoy the moment. The movie will provide ample opportunity to propagate the Conflict Thesis (and replying to it, one should even do some preemptive strikes) and generally take it out on The Church.
And it is all rather obvious with "Author, activist and songwriter" Kathleen McGowan www.huffingtonpost.com/kathleen-mcgowan/angels-and-demons-and-dea_b_196805.html
She doesn't hestitate with her rhetorics.
Am I anti-Catholic because I choose to write about the blood-soaked injustices of history that were perpetrated under papal dictates?
Well, if one doesn't put things in perspective, it is difficult not to come across as anti-Catholic.
However, it doesn't help when she puts things in perspective, that is her own perspective.
Let's keep in mind that this is really not the Church as a spiritual institution that we are talking about here. This is the Church as a super power. As a force of economic and political might that has dominated a majority of the history of Western Civilization.
Yet there is one major flaw in this comparison. Those of us who were critical of the Bush administration had democratic recourse. We campaigned for Barack Obama, we marched and chanted for change -- and we were victorious. There is no such recourse for Catholics who disagree with the hard line positions or with the indefensible cover-ups of the Church, both in this century and in ages past. Catholics cannot vote out Pope Benedict XVI, and they cannot demand an explanation into the historical genocides committed with Church authority.
Yet there is one major flaw in this comparison. Those of us who were critical of the Bush administration had democratic recourse. We campaigned for Barack Obama, we marched and chanted for change -- and we were victorious. There is no such recourse for Catholics who disagree with the hard line positions or with the indefensible cover-ups of the Church, both in this century and in ages past. Catholics cannot vote out Pope Benedict XVI, and they cannot demand an explanation into the historical genocides committed with Church authority.
Say no more.
Or rather she does say a lot more. And it is obviously present politics, not past history she is concerned with.
Ron Howard points out that Mr. Donohue's booklet condemning Angels and Demons accuses him of lying because that movie's trailer says the Catholic Church "ordered a brutal massacre to silence the Illuminati centuries ago." This is a neat trick by Donohue, a sleight of hand by a man who is fully aware as he makes this point that the Illuminati referenced here is a fictional creation of Dan Brown. If you are distracted enough by Donahue's histrionics as he shouts down the obvious fiction element, perhaps you won't realize that the rest of the statement is true. The Catholic Church did, in fact, order a series of brutal massacres throughout the Middle Ages which ended hundreds of thousands -- arguably millions -- of lives through torture and otherwise horrific and violent means. The rest is semantics.
Good to get clear on that.
Looking forward to more semantics.