First the glorification of paganism in The Da Vinci Code, and now this:

Eclipse prompts meditation at Egypt's pyramids

"We are all made of light. Light is what binds us all and makes all us humans one, so this is a very important time to be here," said the Dutchman while standing barefoot in a circle of people meant to symbolize the sun.

My first impulse in reading this was to laugh and respond with "Light?  And here I thought it was the Force!"  But then I stopped short, remembering an experience I once had in the Egyptian room at the British Museum…

My friends and I were talking with a large group of seemingly average professors when, in the middle of the conversation about their trip, one of them threw out this comment in passing:  "You know, the Egyptians came from the sun, but they don't teach you that in school...."  He then moved right on to his next topic as my friends and I cast furtive, questioning looks at each other.  Had we really heard what we thought we'd just heard?  Yes.  It turned out this "international club" of "professors who just love learning about the ancient Assyrians" was meeting there to experience the energy vibrations as they passed single file in slow motion between the walls of an ancient Assyrian temple.

I wasn't laughing then.  The incident was, in fact, extremely spiritually disturbing.  These things take on a whole new level of gravity when you're face to face with the people who are deceived by them and (even worse) are attempting to deceive others (they were actually able to persuade a couple of my friends to join them).

Francis Schaeffer, in his book The God Who is There, comments on our impulse to laugh at expressions of absurdity from hearts rooted in false beliefs.  He was speaking specifically of art like this as a result of postmodern despair, but we could just as easily apply this to books like The Da Vinci Code or people who visit pyramids at an eclipse, hoping aliens will appear.  Here is his exhortation to us as Christians when we encounter such expressions:

These paintings, these poems, and these demonstrations which we have been talking about are the expression of men who are struggling with their appalling lostness.  Dare we laugh at such things?  Dare we feel superior when we view their tortured expressions in their art?  Christians should stop laughing and take such men seriously.  Then we shall have the right to speak again to our generation.  These men are dying while they live; yet where is our compassion for them?  There is nothing more ugly than a Christian orthodoxy without understanding or without compassion.

I've been doing my apologist's duty, reading The Da Vinci Code the last few days, and it's saddened me to the point of tears.  Not because the history is laughable, not because of its insulting portrayal of Christians, but because of passages like this:

The quest for the Holy Grail is literally the quest to kneel before the bones of Mary Magdalene.  A journey to pray at the feet of the outcast one, the lost sacred feminine.

And this one:  Remember the temple prostitutes of the Old Testament?  According to TDC, the Church's suppression of ritual sex (part of its attempt to gain power in its struggle for dominance over paganism) was disastrous for those who wanted to "become spiritually whole":

Holy men who had once required sexual union with their female counterparts to commune with God now feared their natural sexual urges as the work of the devil....

I knew this book would be an attempt to discredit Jesus and Christianity, but I wasn't expecting the glorification of goddess worship and rituals.  To me, this is a bigger concern than any of its historical fabrications.  The idea that impressionable young readers out there would be moved by the negative picture of Christianity and the positive portrayal of paganism to pray to a dead woman's bones--or the "sacred feminine" in general--and reject the true, powerful, loving, beautiful, good God is a sadness beyond belief.

The characters of TDC decry the fact that "the pagans lost" the power struggle with the Church, but the pagans lost for a reason--this reason:  the pagans were drawn to the beauty and freedom of the reality of Christ's forgiveness, love, and goodness; and they rejected their previous lives in service to chaotic, unpredictable gods, human sacrifices, and enslavement to endless rituals.  As I'm reading TDC, I can't help but think of St. Patrick who worked tirelessly to rescue spiritually oppressed people from paganism, thereby earning their undying devotion and gratefulness for centuries.  How devastated he would be to see this book today falsely enticing his people and so many more into harm, away from the true God who loves them!

Our culture is now moving in the direction of paganism once again.  After a few days of immersing myself in the world of TDC, I was driving to work, grieving for those--including some of my own friends--who have embraced paganism in belief of the lie that the Christian God is evil and oppressive.  I see their lives--their emptiness and continual searching, and I can't help but grieve to think that more will join them because of TDC.  As I was driving, I saw that the bumper of the car ahead of me displayed a fish symbol.  Because of the rarity of this in West L.A., I always get a little thrill of joy, comfort, and brotherhood when I see the fish.  This time, though, after that thrill, when a stoplight brought me up close, it gave me a sock in the stomach.  The word written boldly inside the fish was PAGAN.

John Piper's words were ringing in my ears:  "The salt of the earth does not mock rotting meat. Where it can, it saves and seasons. And where it can't, it weeps."