Breaking 'The Code...'
Fr. IRENEUSZ SKUBIŚ
Our pilgrimage to the Holy Land was one great experience: we saw the places connected with the life of Jesus Christ, the place of his birth in Bethlehem; Nazareth, which was the town where he lived and taught; Mount Tabor, where his divine nature was revealed; the Mount of the Beatitudes
- the place of some kind of constitution of the Heavenly Kingdom; Capernaum, where he often stayed with Peter; Golgotha, where he died; the Holy Sepulchre, which carried the truth about his resurrection. All those places bear great significance to us, Christians, who believe that Jesus is our Saviour. We take this teaching from the Gospel and the teachings of the Church. We are convinced that Lord Jesus rose from the dead because, as the Apostle wrote, 'if Christ has not raised then our preaching is useless and your believing it is useless' (cf. 1 Corinthians 15: 14. 17).
And now we are shocked by the book and soon by the film called 'The Da Vinci Code', which Archbishop Angelo Amato, secretary of the Congregation for the Doctrine of the Faith, described as 'full of slander, offences and historical and theological errors about Jesus, the Gospels and the Church.' This controversial book was written in our times and its power flows from its being properly publicised and published in huge number of copies. Unfortunately, the film can increase the popularity of the book and popularise the lies that it contains: a mixture of everything we know about the Church and distortion of the figure of Jesus as well as the teaching of the Gospel. Anyone who knows about this falsification realises that it should be rejected and call a spade a spade: the book is monstrosity.
Unfortunately, some people do not follow this reasoning. Young people read this book thinking that it contains some truth. Those who do not know the truth of the Gospel or those who do not believe have no Christian conscience, and I am afraid the number of such people is big. They will see the film that portrays a false image of Jesus, totally falsified, an image of Jesus as only a human being, which is contrary to our faith and created for commercial reasons. We must know that Jesus is both truly God and truly man. We pray to him, we take refuge in him, we ask him for help, and we receive sacraments in his name. The whole life of the Church is in Jesus, through Jesus and for Jesus.
Naturally, throughout the ages there were various images or legends but these have nothing to do with reality. The author of the book in question wanted to convince readers of his 'work' that Jesus did not rise from the dead. And if there is no resurrection, Christ is not God, and the promise and hope to go to a different happy life disappear.
That's why such books and films are dangerous to Christianity, to the faith of millions of people, and it is painful to see that baptised people contribute to the destruction of the faith in Jesus Christ and commit a sin of blasphemy.
We, Catholics, have the obligation to defend the truth about Lord Jesus. We must take into account our faith and the faith of all generations, especially the young people in Poland. We also see that the media promoted the so-called Gospel of Judas some time ago. Some papers took much effort to present the Polish social awareness this apocryphal story as something very important and innovative. The editors and the editorial boards of these papers do not want to know that an apocryphal writing is only an apocryphal writing and there are many apocryphal writings, and in the world there are many circles that want to attack the Gospel, undermine its credibility and weaken its influence. This is an eternal war against Christianity and unfortunately, it is waged on pages of many periodicals in Poland. Therefore, those Polish journalists who work for these papers must realise that it is easy to deprive people of their faith and attack the moral foundation of young people but who is going to give them the truth? As a matter of fact, this truth is in the Gospel, in the teaching of the Church. We must only want to deepen our awareness, our faith and love for Christ. On the other hand, we should boycott these materials that contradict Christianity. Catholics should not see this film. Young people should say 'no' to Satan's designs. This will destroy their faith and love for God.
Some circles in the West have already considered boycott of the film. The above-mentioned Archbishop Amato said that if 'the Koran or the Holocaust had been attacked, they rightly would have provoked a worldwide uprising'. He reminded us of the boycott of the film 'The Last Temptation of Christ', 'This extremely boring and unreal film was not only attacked as being historically false, but was boycotted by people, which had financial consequences'. The film 'The Da Vinci Code', which is proposed to Polish audience, should meet a similar fate. May the Polish people take a stand that is worthy of Catholics. May Polish families, Polish fathers and mothers convince their children not to watch this film because it denies that Christ was God-Man and deprives people of their faith in Resurrected Christ, which is the sense of our lives, the sense of the values the Gospel brings and the sense, which our Christian faith brings.
"Niedziela" 21/2006