Commentary

Casting the first stone

SOMETIME THIS WEEK I was browsing on the web when I came across a news report about a Roman Catholic cardinal who blasted the Dan Brown novel The Da Vinci Code claiming that the novel's phenomenal success is proof of growing anti-Catholic sentiment. He urged the few who are yet to read it, not to. I scratched my bald pate and wondered what the hell is wrong with these people? What? Can't anyone inside the church take a joke? Are we not in a world where we are free to form our own opinions about religion? The book is a novel - a work of fiction. It's the work of a brilliant writer who took some fact and mixed it with a creative imagination and came up with a body of work that has been a bestseller for more than two years.

Ironically, it was just a day or so after I finished reading The Da Vinci Code and found it an excellent read, that I came across the cardinal's rants. Every time someone says something that is not in favour of the church, there is a reaction of sorts that suggests that it should not have been said just because whatever is being said is in reference to the church. What I'd like to know is whether or not we are still living in the dark ages, when people were tied to stakes and burnt because their beliefs differed from those of the church. It's a work of fiction for Christ's sake! Oops. I guess I shouldn't have said that. It would seem to me that there are much more serious issues to consider than a well written novel.

Carnal desires

I guess it would be a bigger deal if someone wrote a novel suggesting that Catholics slaughtered millions of people ­ accused them of being heretics, tied to stakes and burnt them all in the name of God. Or if someone wrote a novel that suggested that the Catholic church spirited Nazis out of Germany to safe havens in South America after World War II, those same Nazis who gassed more than six million Jews, just because they were Jews. And I suppose they should really be concerned if someone suggested in a book that countless numbers of young boys have been sexually abused by Catholic priests to the extent that several branches of the church now face bankruptcy for having to pay millions of dollars to the victims of the carnal desires of their priests.

I am as religious as the next guy but the church here on earth is run by men, not by Gods but the Catholics would have us believe otherwise. Okay, so here I am letting the cat of out the bag. Catholic priests or priests from any other organisation for that matter are not gods. They are men, and in many instances, very flawed men. The Pope is no closer to God than anyone else on this earth who has faith. And he cannot heal anyone better than Oral Roberts orJimmy Swaggart could. As such whenever the church does wrong it is not a problem to admit that wrong has been done. And if someone writes a book that may have something in it the church does not like, it's no big deal. Live with it.

One of the great weaknesses of man is that we are so easily consumed by power and as a result we buy into our own hype. We believe we are more than we really are. Sometimes we need to step back and realise that we sometimes have this very human affliction of taking life a little too seriously.

Or if someone wrote a novel that suggested that the Catholic church spirited Nazis out of Germany to safe havens in South America after World War II, those same Nazis who gassed more than six million Jews, just because they were Jews.