[JessiPollo]

I don't at all mind saying that I intend to see the Da Vinci Code movie, and am curious how much like the book it is. There has been such hype about the book, it sometimes gets forgotten that the basic concept - that Jesus and Mary Magdalene married and their blood-line continued in Europe - is ages old and certainly not the invention of Dan Brown (though neither is he a plagiarist; it was surely right that he won his recent London court case). What is particularly intriguing to me is the type of modern social commentary that he inserts into the old legend, and the kind of reception his text has had in society. It seems, for example, to have gained an immense following on account of dealing with 'the sacred feminine', though having twice read the book I have been unable to determine precisely what this means, even to Mr Brown; and as a larger concept, I actually find the myth itself, and the book's modernisation of it in particular, to demean the place of femininity and the role of women in the history of Christianity - precisely the opposite of the general 'great liberation' that it seems taken by so many to represent.

I really don't think Christians ought to get terribly worked up about the book, its ideas, or its popularity. Such stories are as old as the Church; even the book of Acts recounts individuals re-interpreting the story of Christ to their own ends and mythologies. And I certainly don't think urges for a Christian fatwah against the film are useful. Today's culture seems to work on flash-in-the-pan 'groundbreaking stories' as films and other events; they're rarely ever groundbreaking, they almost universally fade - and quickly.

The fact that the book has had such success is itself an interesting sociological meter. People seem intrigued by any notion of conspiracy, of the secret; as if Christianity is deficient precisely because it is so open about its truth and its heritage. Let it be.

INXC, Matthew