1st posting
notice no coon skin cap
I have been asked by parishioners to write a blog, I was also inspired by hearing a talk at the LA religious education congress on communicating.
So I am going to clue you in about me on this first one. This will help you understand why I am writing about the things that I am writing about in the blog.
Ever since I was young I liked movies and I liked reading. Watching movies led me to read the books. The first time I started on this pattern was when I was young watching the Wonderful World of Disney. There was a series on that show about Davey Crockett. I was taken up by the life of this historic frontiersman. All of my classmates sang the song, coon skin caps became the fashionable thing to wear for any 6-10 year old. I then went to the Public Library in Joliet and found the “Autobiography of Davey Crockett”. Well I took that book out quicker than you can imagine. I read it and found the book better than the movie.
That led to a pattern all the way up to college. The first book that I read without seeing the movie first was Tolkein’s Lord of the Rings. A friend suggested I read it. In fact I had to wait a long time to see the movie. However, the same principle held, the books were far better than the movies. I remember talking out loud when I saw the Fellowship of the Ring, complaining, “They left out Tom Bombadil.!!” My friends thought I was going to get thrown out.
The real crystal skull
Last week I saw Indiana Jones and the Kingdom of the Crystal Skull. Here again, before I went to the show I went to Google, typed in Crystal Skulls, and found a Wikipedia article about them. What they say in the first part of the movie was true. The best example of a Crystal Skull was the Mitchell-Hedges skull at an archaeological dig in a Mayan temple. Notice the real skull likes nothing like the alien skull in the movie. The original legend has 13 skulls, and when they are united there is supposed to Be incredible psychic power released, but that is the legend. Couldn’t they write an interesting story just around that without connecting it to Roswell ( oops sorry if I spoiled anything for anyone)
So you may ask where does the religious part come in. Well the same is true for movies about religious topics and especially the bible. I felt I was one of the few people who did not like Mel Gibson’s movie, “The Passion of Christ” Why, because it wasn’t based on the Bible, it was based on a book by a 18th century mystic, Sister Mary Katherine Emmerich. I am sorry, but I always felt the orginial stories, in the bible was so much better. Sorry Mel.
Please respond to this blog by emailing me at frfrankv@stjohnwinfield.org
