By Michelle Boorstein and Alan Cooperman
New York - Greg Beatty's first look at The Da Vinci Code came when a neighbour reached across his fence in 2003 and handed the Catholic lawyer the book and a question: Is this true?
Beatty read the novel and saw the questioning spread from his yard to his central city office and beyond.
Was Jesus really married? Do some members of the Catholic group Opus Dei really wear self-mutilating belts? Beatty could answer some things but not others.
Now, 45-million copies later, his challenge is about to get bigger: Hollywood will release its version of The Da Vinci Code on Friday.
But Beatty - along with many other Christians - is ready.
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Hundreds of churches have distributed books and DVDs meant to expose what they say are the film's many historical inaccuracies. Pastors are delivering sermons about issues raised by the movie. In classes and seminars, Christians of several denominations are being trained in how to talk about the themes.
Many people in these programmes say they view the movie as a disguised gift: a historic evangelising moment in which Christians will have a ready opportunity to speak with non-believers about God's word.
That's where Beatty, who attended such a seminar, fits in. "This is a chance to teach people a whole lot more than they might have learned if they hadn't read the book," Beatty said.
"And they are bringing the subject to you, so now you are free to really explore it with them."
While some Christian authorities, including top Vatican officials, have urged Christians to boycott the movie, some see it as the religion's growing engagement with mainstream culture.
"This is how young people find things out, through the media," said the Reverend Terry Specht, a Catholic priest.
At least 45 books have come out to rebut points in Dan Brown's novel, as well as more than a dozen CDs and DVDs tied to the film's release that explore the book, church history and the New Testament.
The novel follows a Harvard professor and a Paris police cryptographer who, while trying to solve a murder, stumble across a secret covered up by a centuries-old clandestine society: that Jesus was married to Mary Magdalene and that they had a daughter.
Although the drumbeat of Christian defenders grew slowly after Brown's book came out in 2003, the campaign pegged to the movie's release has been highly organised. The US Conference of Catholic Bishops in March launched a documentary and a website, jesusdecoded.com, and hundreds of churches are using debunking "kits" created by a coalition of non-denominational mega-church ministers.
Steve Weidenkopf, who runs parish talks for the Diocese of Arlington, agrees that the film holds great potential for sparking thoughtful dialogue. He finds it hard to believe that millions of people were drawn to The Da Vinci Code out of anti-Christian venom, seeing instead a spiritual hunger.
"People like it because they think they are learning about Christ and about church history. And modern man has in his heart a desire to know God," Weidenkopf said.
Not everyone takes such a sanguine view. Cardinal Francis Arinze, the Vatican's chief liturgist, who has spoken out against the film, said Christians should consider legal action against the film's makers.
And one Roman Catholic organisation plans protests at 1 000 cinemas across America. - Washington Post
- This article was originally published on page 10 of The Star on May 18, 2006
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