Just can't leave it alone

[avevale_intelligencer]

We watched the film of The Da Vinci Code today, an amusing romp which serves one or two useful purposes. For one thing, it provides the perfect excuse for never reading the book, if an excuse is ever needed. For that matter, nobody who sees it will ever need to read The Holy Blood And The Holy Grail. That's two birds with one stone if ever there was.

For another thing, it makes obvious, by stating it in its most basic and uncompromising form, the complete asininity, the almost criminal naïveté, of the proposition, which I have seen put forward in other places, that if only Christianity were abolished, mankind would somehow become less greedy, less selfish, less hateful or less intolerant; that Christianity is actually a cause of these things, a stultifying blanket thrown over the butterfly of the human mind to prevent it taking wing into the sunlit upper air of reason, and therefore to be fought and eradicated wherever and however possible. Even in the mouth of Ian McKellen, this argument fails to convince. Because it's wrong.

The impulse that leads to Christianity (taking the most sceptical view possible and assuming that there is no shadow of truth behind it whatsoever) is the impulse that leads human beings to imagine something better than themselves, and to aspire to it; to identify the bad in themselves, and to seek to transcend it. There may be other ways to express that impulse, but this is a way that works for many. Christianity has driven people to be better writers, better painters, better healers, better thinkers and reasoners, and even better scientists. It takes a special kind of mind to see something that can do that as a bad thing.

That humanity is prone to all the failings--all the sins--listed above is beyond dispute. The pretexts on which we indulge in them, which have frequently included one monotheistic religion or another, are unimportant. Those sins have their own justifications, their own origins, independent of any rationalisation we may place upon them. To paraphrase Chesterton, you don't have to believe in mankind being washed in the blood of the Lamb to know, from everyday experience, that he wants washing.

The impulse that leads to Christianity is in many ways like the impulse that gave rise to what we call "the sixties." Both were good and positive at heart. Both were compromised and perverted to evil ends. Both have lost their impetus. And both are wrongly blamed for the evil that defeated them, while the good done in their name often goes unnoticed.

And that's probably enough.

Oh, and the other nice thing about the film of The Da Vinci Code? Leading man and leading lady manage to sustain a dramatic storyline perfectly well without any sexual tension whatsoever, unresolved or otherwise*. It's nice to know that it's still considered possible in a film not specifically for kids.

*unless I missed a sex scene while I was in the kitchen, which is possible I suppose.

Comments

[pocketnaomi.livejournal.com]

I disagree that there is only one impulse which leads to Christianity, or any other religion. There are many reasons people would want to believe any of the vast range of things which are collectively called Christianity, ranging from the desire for transcendence that you mention to a deep self-loathing which needs some form of relief in a faith which claims it knows how an inherently evil humanity can be redeemed of its evil. What one's reasons are for going in have a deep effect on what form one's belief takes and what one gets out of it. Your description is indeed one motive for being a Christian; it's far from the only one. And I think people who have it in them to be great writers, painters, thinkers, etc. will find their own motivation. I don't think Christianity is a bad inspiration for such, only that it's not an essential one; anything which sparks the human imagination will do the same job.

What Christianity does do is a bang-up job of sparking the human imagination. Depending on whose imagination and what they imagine, this can lead to glorious works of art, or Crusades and witch-hangings. I don't consider it either inherently a good force or a bad force, only a force in the mind that is molded by what mind it occupies, and what is already there.

[zanda-myrande.livejournal.com]

That's a fair view. People's motivations are indeed many and various.

[batyatoon]

I think people who have it in them to be great writers, painters, thinkers, etc. will find their own motivation.

Well -- not necessarily will, but certainly can find motivation from any number of sources.

And ditto people who have it in them to be great or petty tyrants, bigots, blacklisters and so forth.

[pocketnaomi.livejournal.com]

Yes. Any focus which can spur the imagination is capable of inspiring any of these. Religion -- any religion which lasts at all, from Christianity to Scientology -- is able to spur the imagination. So are a thousand other things, from nationalism to an individual man or woman.

[keristor.livejournal.com]

"What Christianity does do is a bang-up job of sparking the human imagination. Depending on whose imagination and what they imagine, this can lead to glorious works of art, or Crusades and witch-hangings. I don't consider it either inherently a good force or a bad force, only a force in the mind that is molded by what mind it occupies, and what is already there."

I very much like that summary. Much like any other force or tool, or for that matter the human mind, really, it's neutral in itself and the effects are what people make from it.

[jahura.livejournal.com]

If you're talking about mostly medieval/Reniassance/Reformation period with regard to writing and art, I would say the greater inspiration was likely that the Church was paying for them and assigning commissions, while the local laird might find favor with one - if he was into art or literature at all. I'm not denying the innate passions that an artist would want to share with the world, but it seems to me that's one reason why there are more Madonna and Child portraits than there are Tavern Wench portraits.

[zanda-myrande.livejournal.com]

There is that, of course. The various churches (some more than others) have always been patrons of the visual arts. One could, of course, argue that they were enabled to do that by means of the wealth they accumulated, which could have been used for more practical purposes for the betterment of humanity in general. Whether the people thus bettered would have bothered to have portraits of their favourite tavern wench painted is another question, for another time perhaps. I'd have liked to see it though.