The Da Vinci CodeLook who has brokenThe Da Vinci Code, without turning a single page and bothering to watch even the promos in all probability. The movie adaptation of Dan Brown's international bestseller-more than 60 million copies and translated into 44 languages - will be denied an Indian release unless it is okayed by sundry Catholic organisations, for what is at stake is the survival of Christendom and peace in the secular state of India.Pope Benedict XVI has issued no encyclical on how the satanic temptations of storytellers can cause cracks on Peter's rock. Opus Dei, the powerful, shadowy Catholic sect, has sent no albino assassin after the novelist, as in the book, but has opened up and gone for a massive PR blitz. The church hasn't made a bonfire of Dan Brown's blasphemies or asked him to recant. No Christian country has found virtue in banning the movie. Then why is Priyaranjan Dasmunsi, Minister of Information and Broadcasting, behaving as if he is more concerned than the Pope about the future of Jesus Christ? He doesn't want "confusion and instability in the country", no matter that the Censor Board, which included two prominent Christians, has cleared it with no cuts. Do we want the minister- or the state-as film critic and guardian of the Holy Grail?No, unless the secular credentials of the republic are indebted to the cause junkies of religion. There will always be a Catholic activist to fast unto death for the sake of the truth as revealed in the Book. There will always be trident-wielding apostles of Bharatiya Sanskriti to scare away a film crew from Varanasi for the sake of the endangered Hindu civilisation. There will always be a desperate Muslim politician or a merciless mullah to banish novelists and cartoonists for the sake of scriptural purity. And when freedom gets a God-sanctioned copy editor, there will always be an obliging state. India is increasingly becoming one, that too without an argument. In the case of Dan Brown's thriller and Ron Howard's movie version, India is a late entrant, and when it makes an entry, it's invariably with a closed mind. The book has been there since 2003, and no Catholic activist worth his Bible had asked for its ban, no minister as literary critic had organised a book-reading session with churchgoers to find out the truth about Mary Magdalene or the Priory of Sion. Elsewhere, the offended reacted with alternative ideas. The Da Vinci Code is one book controversy where no page was burned but thousands were added.That speaks something about the confidence of faith. The problem is the paranoia of its official gatekeepers. And to be fair, the Church has come a long way from the recantation of Galileo. Every other day someone is writing another Templar story. .preferred-source-banner{ margin-top: 10px; margin-bottom:10px;}Suddenly, the mysteries of Christianity have become a sub-genre in thriller, courtesy The Code. A random selection from the New York Times bestsellers list last week: The Gospel of Judas; The Jesus Papers; Misquoting Jesus; and The Jesus Dynasty. The Church is cool about it; rather it has learned to live with alternative gospels that draw their material from the Gnostic tradition and other ancient texts. No religion remains alive by the devotion of the faithful and the ardency of the zealot alone. Questions and interpretations bring religions closer to the present. Millions outside of Sunday school may have got the first glimpse of "the truth"-or "the lies"-about Christianity from The Code. You may now look at The Last Supper from a different angle and ask unpleasant questions like "Has the church suppressed the sacred feminine?" Forget the least literary Brown and think of masters like Nikos Kazantzakis (The Last Temptation) and Jose Saramago (The Gospel According to Jesus Christ)-or even Gore Vidal (Live from Golgotha). They have challenged the foundations of faith, including the Immaculate Conception. Christianity survived imagination. Any religion will. In the beginning was the Word, and words are unlikely to mark the end.So why is this government listening to the gospel according to the Catholic Secular Forum and other defenders of the faith? It is not that the protest is widespread and violent, and we are not back to The Satanic Verses days. It is not that the entire Christian community is out there on the streets. The protest is rather nominal. It is the response of the I&B ministry that has sanctified the misplaced rage against The Code. It is useful, not to the Church but to the state, though the utility is entirely political. What is at work is the aesthetics of minorityism in which freedom is an abstraction, art is negotiable and gods have voting rights. What next? Maybe an official decree to remove your Louvre print of Mona Lisa from the walls till the smile is altered to suit the sensibilities of those who have been offended by the art of Leonardo da Vinci.Published By: AtMigration Published On: May 29, 2006--- ENDS ---
