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Angels and Demons the Movie

3
Jun
posted by Andrew Dragos               filed under Movies

A lot can be said about this film.  The struggle I face is deciding how to introduce it since I didn’t review The Davinci Code, this film’s prequel.  Maybe an appropriate place to start would be to briefly mention that if The Davinci’s Code was offensive to many Christians since it was a story of an academic uncovering the greatest conspiracy of all time-the Orthodox Christian church’s cover-up of Jesus’ marriage to Mary Magdalene-Angels and Demons is less about undermining the historic Christian faith and more about the relationship between science and religion.  Considering it’s less controversial, you may notice me trying to beef up the content of this entry with cenematic/artistic commentary, though I by no means claim “movie-critic” status or even a working knowledge of the field.

I will skip the plot summary and just encourage you to view the film when you have the opportunity (click here for IMDB’s page).  And for my Christian readers, I assure you your Pastor has no good reason to discipline you for viewing!  I enjoyed it enough that I saw it in theaters twice (once while trying to subtly type notes on my phone, and the second time for pleasure with a couple of friends).  The theater experience was worth it even if only to hear, at loud decibels, the genius soundtrack work of Hans Zimmer throughout the movie!  The music was truly epic and suited the scenes so perfectly.  If you buy the soundtrack, notice the climactic crescendo at 2:28 in “God.”  One of the reasons I feel Angels and Demons did a better job than The Davinci Code at capturing its audience is because the soundtrack was written so well, was generously laden through the film, and cooperated with a better written script in creating moments of suspense.  Two examples of this, which amounts to being two of the best scenes in my opinion, were the discovery of the burning and drowning cardinals.

There are other elements that made this film a success in comparison to its prequel.  The script had some good one-liners (“Faith will not protect those in St. Peter’s Square”), it included a mysterious, aggressive secret society called the Illuminati who were bent on purging the Roman Catholic church, and had some shocking moments like the tearing of a page out of Galileo’s notes (stored in the Vatican’s archives) by Robert Langdon’s co-protagonist.  Some further irony that made this scene even more enjoyable to watch was their using a cart full of ancient books in the Vatican archives to ram a glass wall.

Since the plot revolved around the electing of a new pope for the Roman Catholic Church, it was intriguing to hear some of its history and church procedures; things the Protestant layperson isn’t exposed to much.  One term that stuck with me was “election by adoration.”  To be fair, some procedural & historical details were not in fact accurate.  But Dan Brown did a good job at presenting them in a way to contribute to the story.  Besides the thematic details, the visual work was truly amazing.  Included were (both real and computer-generated) images inside the Vatican and of Rome from a bird’s-eye view.  This again was one of the film’s strong points.

In conclusion, it should be noted that with mysteries like The Davinci Code and Angels and Demons, it’s difficult to pack into a film what flowed so naturally in a long novel.  Too many twists and turns can tire a viewer.  As with its prequel, this too began to feel a little slow about half-way through the film.  But it quickly realigned itself and brought itself to focus on the main direction of the plot.  Though something can be said about its portrayal of faith, science, and the relationship between the two, Angels and Demons did a good job at remaining neutral in matters concerning the RCC, Christianity, and faith in general.  It was a rather fun watch as a mystery/thriller, the music was excellent, and the visual elements were well done.

Rating: 4/5

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The Mourning Dove Caws on Twitter

2
Jun
posted by Andrew Dragos               filed under Updates

I’m going to start experimenting with micro-blogging using Twitter.  I’ll have a lot more thoughts on there- the kind I think are worth sharing (most of the time) but don’t have the time to write an entry on.

Http://twitter.com/cawnotcoo

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Truth & the Church

22
May
posted by Andrew Dragos               filed under Bible, Church Life, Theology

In John 18:37 Jesus reveals why he was born:

“You are a king, then!” said Pilate. Jesus answered, “You are right in saying I am a king. In fact, for this reason I was born, and for this I came into the world, to testify to the truth.”

The truth sets people free (John 8:32).  The truth sanctifies (John 17:17).  Jesus is the truth (John 14:6).  Truth is so important, but besides in philosophical & apologetic treatments, it is not talked about much in the life of the church.  The irony is that after Jesus ascended into heaven, the responsibility of testifying to the truth fell on the shoulders of the church!

“…God’s household, which is the church of the living God, the pillar and foundation of the truth.”
1 Timothy 3:15

If God’s truth is to be revealed to the world through his people, we ought to begin intentionally making the appropriate connections between the Gospel and truth, and teaching on the subject more often.  What is truth and why is understanding it so important in our ministry to the world?

The world becomes endangered when:

  1. Church stops preaching truth.We cannot stay silent.  When there is a void, the world will look for truth in other places where it cannot be found.  This is one of the reasons Islam, eastern thought, atheism and evolution have been on the rise in America.  Though we must engage in lifestyle evangelism, we must accompany good deeds by profession of faith and truth (Colossians 4:3-6)
  2. Church starts preaching lies.Some groups of people who affiliate themselves with Christianity and who refer to themselves as the church are preaching a gospel message that is far from what the Bible presents as truth.  Either purposely or accidentally, they are leading the world astray to believe in cults such as Mormonism & the Watchtower, the prosperity gospel, the social gospel, and legalism.  All of these are examples of people becoming “bewitched” and falling for a lie (Galatians 1:8; 3:1)
  3. Church starts living a lie.The Gospel is so radical and so far from what we would expect for God to reveal as salvation that even the church struggles with coming to terms with it!  Jesus told us that we have to lose our life in order to find it (Matthew 10:39)!  When we preach this truth, but fail to live it, the Gospel becomes less attractive.  Hypocrisy is one thing this present generation cannot tolerate, and it has developed the ability to see right through the lies of a Christian who says one thing but is living another.

A healthy church that is committed to the truth of the Gospel is the only hope for the world.  In the armory of the church we have the Gospel and we have truth- are we making the connection?

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24: A Morally Charged Drama

19
May
posted by Andrew Dragos               filed under Morality, T.V.

These days, unless Discovery & History channels are doing something controversial (like covering who Jesus really was), television isn’t really my thing.  But 24 has managed to keep my Monday nights consistently clear between 9-10pm.  There’s something about a plot that seems to never end, a field agent with overbearing moral convictions, and an entangling bureaucracy that can captivate an audience.

The season finale tonight, a 2 hour special, has me wondering about the TV biz a little.  24’s past seasons really had me glued to the set cheering the good guys on.  The terrorists were internationals and Jack Bauer was constantly engaged in action sequences that reflected his sense of duty.  Now, the terrorists are a band of American corporations set on overthrowing the government, and the thrill has changed to dramatic encounters that has characters conflicted about their moral decisions.  When I first started watching the show, I believed these producers had an ideology and that 24 reflected this ideology.  But what seems to have happened, for better or worse, is that the producers have changed the values and plot to reflect the American people (notice how the White House administrations parallel each other).

Though the direction has changed, a common thread remains: the show is intensely morally charged.  Given that the series is a political thriller, we should be expect this.  The actions of a president, bureaucracy, and field agents have epic implications.  That’s the nature of things involving politics, law enforcement, and the gathering of intelligence.  Tonight’s season finale was especially packed with one-liners that reflect the shift our culture has taken toward moral relativism, religious pluralism, and tolerance.

Consider these morally charged quotes and scenes:

  • “Make a decision you can live with” says Jack Bauer to Renee Walker as she considers “torturing” a terrorist (to gain further intelligence & help prevent a further attack) who will most likely walk because there is not enough evidence to condemn him in our courts.
  • Jack Bauer is told “We live in complex times,” and “Nothing is black and white” as he reflects on his life, lying in a hospital bed anticipating his death.
  • A Muslim Imam serves as Jack Bauer’s spiritual counsel on his death-bed.  Furthermore, the Imam offers a short prayer saying “Let us forgive ourselves.”  I don’t think orthodox Islam would condone this as any sort of significant prayer or as representative of Muslim theology.

-To torture or not to torture?
-Is there an objective moral standard against which our actions will be judged?
-Are all faiths equally true and useful?

All of these themes are treated throughout the series in a way that seems to be moving toward tolerance, relativism, and diversity.  Not to say anything of the plot’s value (how “good it was”), the show may come to a point where it alienates its more conversative audience who’ve celebrated the battle between good and evil, not relativism, until this point.  Only time, and season 8 will tell!

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Kingdom Triangle by J.P. Moreland

6
May
posted by Andrew Dragos               filed under Books

At the rate I’m going it seems I’ll be doing about one book review/month.  I wish the number could be higher, but the nature of this endeavor requires revisiting countless highlighted sections of text & notes written in the margins that often take more time to decipher and understand than it did to originally read the book!  Ok, not really, but close.  What is true though is that I want to be as responsible with literature as I possibly can; being objective and accurate in my presentations & assessment is no small task.  My only presuppositions are those tied to a strict evangelical Christian worldview.  So I must approach this task with humility, concern, but also a sense of duty.  I will tend to (without promising not to renig) write about books that I think a) are helpful for you read, or b) you are reading and should be cautious about.  Let’s move forward.

About the Author

J.P. Moreland is a professor at Talbot School of Theology, a division of Bioala University in California.  He is renown for his work in Christian apologetics and philosophy.  Among his other influential works that I particularly enjoyed and found helpful are Scaling the Secular City, Love Your God With All Your Mind, Does God Exist?, and the monumental reference work Philosophical Foundations For A Christian Worldview.  He has founded, co-founded, and pastored many churches and has engaged in numerous apologetic debates.

Moreland, J.P.  Kingdom Triangle: Recover the Christian Mind, Renovate the Soul, Restore the Spirit’s Power.  Grand Rapids, MI:  Zondervan, 2007.
225 pages including bibliography & end notes.

This work is important because he is writing specifically to the church with a call to do what the subtitle directs.  In other words, Moreland feels what he has to say is important, in fact, vital for the church to restore its impact on Western civilization.  The text is written primarily to the Western church because in the third world, as of yet, the church is growing in numbers and influence (he has many statistics throughout).  So the Western church has been losing ground to Secular Humanism, Religious Pluralism, Islam, Eastern thought etc. because following the Enlightenment Christians have withdrawn from academia (“Recover the Christian Mind”), have not been progressing in holiness & discipleship (“Renovate the Soul”), and stopped believing in the supernatural miracles of God as normative in the life of the church (“Restore the Spirit’s Power”).

Let’s acknowledge from the beginning that this 3-pronged packaging is not found explicitly in the Bible.  Nowhere does one passage speak on knowledge, virtue, and miraculous signs & wonders as the necessary compontents for a conquering church.  But to hold this against the book is to beg the question; the case for this is made throughout.  Also, just in case the term “kingdom” somehow seems foreign or unrelevant to you, I encourage you to reread the Gospels and note what it is that Jesus was preaching.  Moreland returns to the use of this term in the spirit of Dallas Willard in The Divine Conspiracy.

Moreland appropriately divided the book into two sections: “Assessing the Crisis of Our Age” & “Charting A Way Out: The Kingdom Triangle.”  He first offers a diagnosis of our current state, making the case that our culture is moving toward a point of crisis (i.e. cannot continue on the way it is) and that the damage is a direct result of naturalistic & postmodern worldviews that have permeated our culture.  His treatments of these worldviews are not new, but that does not matter.  They are weighty, must be followed carefully, and serve as important premises to his thesis.  He ends Part 1 with five steps that facilitated this regression; we have shifted our focus…

  1. From knowledge to faith
  2. From human flourishing to satisfaction and desire
  3. From duty and virtue to minimalistic ethics
  4. From classic freedom to contemporary freedom
  5. From classic tolerance to contemporary tolerance

Part 2 offers the solution to the problem.  Here he rightly argues for the important role that knowledge plays in the life of the believer, demonstrating this through scripture (he quotes 6 straight pages of passages that reveal the importance of knowledge in the Christian faith experience!).  Part of the problem lies in Christian leaders’ creation of a false dichotomy between faith & knowledge, and the theology of liberal Protestantism which attempted to do away with the historical accessibility of scripture’s accounts (especially the resurrection).  Next Moreland discusses the superiority of Christian virtues as opposed to those of atheism and other ideologies, and guides the Christian into ways he/she can grow in obedience to God.  Part of his strategy was demonstrating how denying the self is in fact more satisfactory than the moral theory known as hedonism.  Lastly, the book gets into the subject that is more touchy for evangelicals: the charismatic gifts.  He approaches the issue with grace and sensitivity, but does not back away from his convictions.  An argument is made for the charismatic gifts by insisting they are part of the nature of God’s kingdom & by using personal stories as testimonies.

The book is concluded with a chapter restating his thesis and offers an exhortation for the church.

Strengths

  • Discussion/reflection questions are offered at the end of each chapter
  • Great annotated bibliography divided into beginner, intermediate, & advanced which points the reader to great works on the topics covered (I’ve already book-listed some of them!)
  • Moreland continues to write with a graceful, but shrewd “to-the-point” style
  • Useful discussion of our human craving for “drama,” which can be satisfied in living a virtue of duty and self-denial (p. 26)
  • Good treatment/overview of worldviews & ideologies such as naturalism, postmodernism, and utilitarianism (p. 50)
  • Great tracing of universities slipping into epistemological subjectivity in the chapter on postmodernism
  • Good treatment on knowledge & certainty and how to respond to the skeptic (p. 121)
  • Offers examples of miraculous gifts in operation today that move the heart to glorify God

Weaknesses

  • Does not offer the expected (none, actually) counterexamples in his treatment of minimalistic ethics (p. 52)
  • States that the word “happiness” used in the Declaration of Independence refers to virtue and character, not pleasure, while not presenting a complete argument for this (p. 94)
  • Does not satisfactorily refute minimalist ethics in his second treatment (p. 96)
  • Argues for the physical heart as a center for intellectual reflection (like the brain) with little support besides one end-note reference
  • Uses what I consider to be a weak interpretation of Philippians 4:6-7.  My understanding: the distinction of “heart” and “mind” can be a literary device known as parallelism, which draws emphasis to a term, or Paul may simply be further nuancing the heart (being) with mind
  • Proposes Christians practice a physical heart meditation exercise similar to eastern meditation techniques which might just scare many evangelicals.  Like Mark Driscoll, many may rant “If it’s not biblical, it’s demonic!”  I can see the usefulness of such an exercise, but honestly, I’d rather be doing other things (p. 160)
  • Does little in the way of biblical exegesis when arguing for the existence of the charismatic gifts

If that seemed like a super rigid review it’s because that’s what the book is like!  And the author warns us of that: his writing is heavy, and that’s because we must exercise the use of our mind if we are to regain our footing in this battle for truth (see how that makes sense?)!  Don’t stop reading because it’s hard to understand; press on, investigate its claims, and see how you can apply the teaching he advises to your Christian development.  It’s well worth it.  The most valuable things in life are fashioned by much time, energy, & effort.  Love your God with all your mind! (Mark 12:30)

Moreland successfully showed how the Western church has slipped into an unhealthy comfort zone when it comes to knowledge, virtue, and the miraculous.  He then equips the Christian to be able to join the rest of the church in regaining its influence & impact for the kingdom of God.  Well worth the read.

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