RE: Intro to my post on Week 2- Heroes in my life

Introduction to "Week 2: Heroes in my life"

Discussion guideline:
In the glamour indulgent world that we live in, we hold celebrities in high regard because of their good looks and talent. But harboring admiration of such traits alone do not provide for our own spiritual development.Often at times we forget about God’s own band of heroes, whom through his teachings have also changed the lives of others and the world we live in their own ways. Living a Christian life is never easy.

• Talk about one of God’s heroes and why he/she is considered a role model for you and for others.
• Showcase how learning from your Hero might help / has helped you lead a better Christian life

When first reading this new topic for week 2 I was in awe, just after I had written about Madonna and her Buddhism a post had come up on the "glamour indulgent world that we live in" and I have to say what a GREAT topic this is!

I think I must start off by telling how much respect I uphold for the Catholic parish and all other Catholic's for all the negative and postive publicity that has come up over the years in reflection of the Catholic religion and Jesus Christ himself.

In the year 2004, the book The Da Vinci Code was published and struck much controversy because of the fiction novel which claimed facts with even a fact page claiming:

• Jesus is not God; he was only a man.
• Jesus was married to Mary Magdalene.
• She is to be worshiped as a goddess.
• Jesus got her pregnant, and the two had a daughter.
• That daughter gave rise to a prominent family line that is still present in Europe today.
• The Bible was put together by a pagan Roman emperor.
• Jesus was viewed as a man and not as God until the fourth century, when he was deified by the emperor Constantine.
• The Gospels have been edited to support the claims of later Christians.
• In the original Gospels, Mary Magdalene rather than Peter was directed to establish the Church.
• There is a secret society known as the Priory of Sion that still worships Mary Magdalene as a goddess and is trying to keep the truth alive.
• The Catholic Church is aware of all this and has been fighting for centuries to keep it suppressed. It often has committed murder to do so.
• The Catholic Church is willing to and often has assassinated the descendents of Christ to keep his bloodline from growing.

With thanks to- http://www.catholic.com/library/cracking_da_vinci_code.asp

Being a Catholic who did not read the book, I believe that this book was very hurtful and disrespectful to the Church and Catholics. It completely misinterprets the Church as a "murderous institution" and also implies that the Christian faith itself is "utterly false"

I felt this book was very harsh and I personally felt hurt after reading what the book claimed and am utterly sorry if it hurt anyone reading this.

In 2006, the movie of the Da Vinci Code hit cinema's worldwide but as a result was banned in several countries and I personally believe it should never have hit the cinema's and should have gone straight to a DVD or video for people interested to purchase the novel or video.

God Bless anyone who felt hurt, like I did, when reading this post, but I believe that my point should have come across strongly to pass on the respect that needs to be shown to all the parish and parishioners who had to deal with this. However, we all managed to pull through with it in the end and that is what is most important!

I shall begin the "Heroes of my Life" post in the next post.

God Bless,

Kayleigh x