{"id":3767,"date":"2005-03-18T10:28:23","date_gmt":"2005-03-18T15:28:23","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.thecarpetbaggerreport.com\/archives\/3767.html"},"modified":"2005-03-18T10:28:23","modified_gmt":"2005-03-18T15:28:23","slug":"a-powerful-edict-two-years-too-late","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/stevebenen.com\/thecarpetbaggerreport\/a-powerful-edict-two-years-too-late\/","title":{"rendered":"A powerful edict … two years too late"},"content":{"rendered":"

Exactly two years ago today, The Da Vinci Code<\/a> was published. I think it’s fair to say that it’s been pretty successful, which is why I found the latest edict from the Vatican<\/a> a little odd.<\/p>\n

OK, so maybe author Dan Brown takes a few liberties.<\/p>\n

Jesus wasn’t divine, after all; he married Mary Magdalene, a woman of possible ill repute, and they had kids. What’s the fuss?<\/p>\n

This now-famous premise shaping Brown’s bestseller “The Da Vinci Code” has infuriated leaders of the Roman Catholic Church and led to demands from a senior Vatican official that the book be shunned.<\/p>\n

“My appeal is as follows,” Cardinal Tarcisio Bertone said this week during a Vatican Radio broadcast. “Don’t read and don’t buy ‘The Da Vinci Code.’ “<\/p><\/blockquote>\n

Bertone is no Vatican slouch either — he’s archbishop of Genoa a former secretary of the powerful Vatican department that enforces church doctrine.<\/p>\n

What’s wrong with the condemnation? On the surface, not much. The church, as far as I’m concerned, can condemn anything it wants. That said, aren’t Vatican officials a little slow on this one?<\/p>\n

The timing of Bertone’s comments, coming nearly two years after the book started flying out of stores everywhere, had a few people scratching their heads. The book has been translated into 44 languages and sold an estimated 20 million copies.<\/p><\/blockquote>\n

First of all, it’s pop fiction, so labeling the book as “untrue” doesn’t tell us much. Second, the Vatican ought to know by now that publicizing a book tends to help sales, not hurt them.<\/p>\n

But forget that. The book has sold some 20 million copies, is an international phenomenon, and will soon be a blockbuster movie<\/a>. It’s a little late in the game, isn’t it?<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Exactly two years ago today, The Da Vinci Code was published. I think it’s fair to say that it’s been pretty successful, which is why I found the latest edict from the Vatican a little odd. OK, so maybe author Dan Brown takes a few liberties. Jesus wasn’t divine, after all; he married Mary Magdalene, […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":3,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[617],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-3767","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-general"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/stevebenen.com\/thecarpetbaggerreport\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/3767","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/stevebenen.com\/thecarpetbaggerreport\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/stevebenen.com\/thecarpetbaggerreport\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/stevebenen.com\/thecarpetbaggerreport\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/3"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/stevebenen.com\/thecarpetbaggerreport\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=3767"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/stevebenen.com\/thecarpetbaggerreport\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/3767\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/stevebenen.com\/thecarpetbaggerreport\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=3767"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/stevebenen.com\/thecarpetbaggerreport\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=3767"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/stevebenen.com\/thecarpetbaggerreport\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=3767"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}