Around St. Blogs right now there seems to be a couple of issues that surface and resurface. One of them is particularly hot at the moment and that is "Whatever shall we do about the new DaVinci Code movie?" This is a troublesome issue from several points of view: (1) it has a major box-office draw (for others, personally, I haven't liked Tom Hanks in anything since Joe v. the Volcano); (2) The director is high-powered with an enormously popular repertoire (here again, I'm out of the loop--I haven't cared for anything since EdTV).
What I find disturbing are those who rail against the people who say that the movie presents an opportunity for evangelism. My own view of it is that people who talk about the evangelism opportunities have been given lemons and are attempting to make the best of it. I'm not wildly enthusiastic about the conversation that might ensue from The DaVinci Code, but if it fires up interest in those unchurched and I'm there to answer questions and direct them to resources, then perhaps I can make the best of a bad thing.
Will some lose their faith over this? I honestly don't know, but if so, there wasn't much substance there any way and such faith needs to be dismantled and rebuilt from the ground up. The best one could say is that it was a jerry-rigged faith that one zephyr or another was bound to topple. It is the disadvantage of living in the age of the poorly catechized church.
However, I do say that we should not be so hard on those who are trying to see the "up side" of the inevitable. Unlike The Last Temptation of Christ which was made by a director who was popular only among the film critics, Ron Howard has a huge popularity base. The only real hope for failure of this film is terrible screen-writing that takes what was always a very cinematic plot and turns it into a boring maundering through the museums of the world. So, I don't think we can hold out a lot of hope for its utter failure. Given that, those so inclined need to consider the opportunities for evangelism and for education. Stock up on the resources out there to combat the serious errors of The DaVinci Code and keep in mind the words of Paul, who says (and I paraphrase), "The sower does not see the seed to harvest; he cannot know what fruit springs therefrom." In other words, your conversations in the wake of this storm are important. Your ability to defend your faith and support Church teaching in a way that is both convivial and accurate are critical elements of any conversation. Your ability to refer truly interested parties to resources that can lead them closer to God can make of this an opportunity for the salvation of souls. It isn't an argument on the best ground, nor is it the way I would prefer to engage those who are seeking; nevertheless, it is what we have been given.
