The American Spectator

Reader Mail

Winning and Losing

12.13.06 @ 12:01AM

THE CATHOLIC NATIVITY
Re: James Bowman's review of The Nativity Story:

James Bowman, whose reviews I generally enjoyed over the years, I think missed one salient point in the new movie The Nativity Story. It is potentially very offensive to Catholics -- at least those Catholics who take their theology and faith seriously. I know the general script and dialogue are based loosely on the Gospels, and that the director Catherine Hardwicke attempted to make the Mother of God more approachable to post-modern teenage girls; however, the content of the movie itself I find very offensive.

Catholic Mariology is based on two thousand years of Sacred Tradition, and it always stressed that Mary was never just a normal peasant girl. When the angel Gabriel announced she was "full of grace" (full, meaning she had all of God's graces), Mary had to be different. The fact that God chose her to carry his Son logically implied -- if you believe what was written in the Old Testament about God's demands concerning the building of the Arc of the Covenant -- that Mary had to be sinless. She carried God's new Covenant with Man. Her body would infuse her humanity to the Savior. Christ's humanity was hers. Christ's DNA came from hers. As Simeon would later say, Christ's physical sufferings would become her sufferings. By overshadowing Mary the Holy Ghost became her spouse. Mary, betrothed to the Holy Ghost, conceived Jesus without Sin. Again, Gabriel announced that she possessed all of God's graces. Her Fiat, or total acceptance of God's Will, was evident in the Gospels, and this was always understood by the Apostles, who knew her best. Yet somehow this is totally missing in the movie. Hardwicke's depiction of Mary was an obvious attempt to bring Mary down to our level. It was in this sense, the movie begins to lose it. Mary is depicted as just another petulant teen suffering teen angst, and is so totally self-absorbed that she rarely realizes that she is carrying the Son of God. Despite being in total communion with Christ (how many people can say they were in direct physical contact with God 24X7?), Mary doesn't quite figure out what's going on.

The virgin birth, and perpetual virginity of Mary, of course are not written into the script. Mary's labor and birth to Christ are painful and bloody just like a normal birth. St. Augustine believed that Christ passed into the world like light passing through glass. Most if not all Protestants believe that Mary and Joseph had other children. For Catholics, the Holy Ghost is Mary's spouse. If Mary and Joseph had other children, Mary would be an adulterer. The supernatural union of the Holy Ghost and Mary could only come by if Mary was sinless. Mary's womb, the 2nd Arc of the Covenant, would have to remain perfect and undefiled -- that is her virginity would have to remain intact even after the conception and birth of Christ. It was written in the Old Testament that even touching the Arc of the Covenant by unclean hands resulted in instant death by those who touched it. For Catholics, it is even more so concerning a woman whose body would bring forth God's final Covenant with Man. Hardwicke's script fails completely to bring this aspect of Mary's birth of Christ to light. Mary's perpetual virginity is not some piece of useless trivia long forgotten. It is central to the Nativity Story.

I understand what Hardwicke was doing. For over 50 years, the Nativity Story has become a piece of civic tradition. Both Catholic and Protestants celebrate the incarnation of God into the World. The Catholic understanding of her isn't necessarily the easiest to convey via the cinema. I'm sure Hardwicke had no intentions of directing the movie with a copy of the Catechism in one hand. However, for Catholic parents the movie totally undermines what they believe and wish to convey to their children. The Nativity goes directly against the Joyful Mysteries that are regularly prayed by Catholics. For this reason, I wouldn't recommend the movie to Catholics.
-- JP
Indiana

DEPENDS ON THE MEANING OF "WON"
Re: William Tucker's Bush Needs to Pull a Nixon:

My word, Mr. Tucker, I never thought of things quite that way! Nixon actually "won" Vietnam by losing it. Why, all we had to do was abandon all those people that we'd made all those promises to. I mean, so it cost the lives of hundreds of thousands of South Vietnamese who'd stood with us, to say nothing of the millions of Cambodians who were 'in the way' of our delayed economic victory. How shortsighted of us!

And speaking of our "victory," look where we are today. China and Vietnam are still Communist. Cambodia is still a fourth or fifth world country. And Nixon is hated even more than ever. I can see where Mr. Bush would want to emulate him. If only 'W' were as forward thinking as you and Mr. Baker.

Has it not occurred to you that the players in the Middle East aren't comparable to the Chinese and Vietnamese leaders we faced 40 years ago? You say, "...it would give Iran, Syria, Egypt et al. a chance to act like mature nations, which they just might do." Or, they might just keep trying to blow us off the face of the earth. Sir, Iran will have nuclear capability, oh, any day now. Syria despises us, and fully supports and funds terrorists groups throughout the area. Saudi Arabia takes our oil money with one hand, and doles it out to radical America-hating Wahabbi imams around the world with other. The Arab world hates us, and despises the Jews. No amount of diplomacy has changed that since Jimmy Carter and Bill Clinton did everything but cede Israel to the Palestinians.

Even the most rabid Chinese leader would have quailed from the thought of attacking the U.S. then. Islamists today can't wait to do so. Remember 9/11, sir, and the celebrations throughout the Arab world in its wake?
-- Tim Jones
Cordova, Tennessee

The United States had things going for it during Nixon's trip to China that is lacking today: a united West (Europe and the United States were united in their opposition to Russia), and something of value that China wanted from the West (commerce), and strength. The USA showed China its might even though it's generally thought we lost Vietnam (political but not militarily).

Today the West is fractured, China and Russia complicate matters with their Security Council vetoes, and the United Nations is anything but a friend of the United States.

Why would the tin-horn dictators deal with the West when they misbehave with impunity. They have built their foundations railing against the USA. Plus they also have their own mass media to use against their own populations and our own media. Why would they want to change a course of action that has been working for them?

If the State and Federal governments sat down with the KKK does anyone think that would have solved anything except to legitimize them? Does anybody honestly think that trying to rationalize with a country that is holding a conference of Holocaust Denial can truly be a reliable partner? Mao was not a tin-horn dictator compared to these modern day dictators. These dictators will see the West as weak. Smoking a hookah with them will reinforce the perception just delivered via the recent elections.
-- Diamon Sforza
Bartlett, Illinois

William Tucker writes: "By swallowing his pride and treating Mao as an equal, Nixon achieved two things -- he accomplished our policy objectives in the Far East and he won the Vietnam War. "

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