Culture and Media Institute Brian Fitzpatrick Eye on Culture — Volume 1, Issue 7 April 4, 2007
Cultural elites launch a veritable blizzard of attacks on religion during Christianity’s holiest time of the year.
Isn’t it simply Easter season, when fresh Gnostic gospels or dubious ossuaries show up like spring daffodils?
- Peter Steinfels, New York Times reporter, in his March 31 article about a supposed secret, homoerotic Gospel by Mark.
Americans are accustomed to cultural elites trying to undermine their religious faith during Lent, Passover and Easter – but it’s never been this bad.
Beginning on February 26, the news media and arts community have fired a stunning barrage of criticism at religious beliefs, religious practice, and religious symbols. Nothing is too sacred to attack this year, not even the most crucial teachings of Judaism and Christianity.
- A History Channel program scheduled for Easter Sunday will question whether the Bible is God’s complete revelation to mankind.
- The current – Holy Week – issue of Newsweek teases readers with the headline “Is God Real?,” and features a debate between a prominent evangelical pastor and an outspoken atheist.
- An April 3 New York Times article dismisses the story of Moses parting the Red Sea as a “myth.”
- Newsweek’s March 19 cover story, “The Evolution Revolution,” showcases the latest evolutionary theories attempting to explain the development of humanity without God.
- The news media have promoted not one but two different Gospel of Judas books in the past few weeks, along with a purported secret gospel written by Mark.
- The arts world has mocked Jesus with a life-sized, nude, anatomically correct sculpture made of chocolate, and a papier mache sculpture portraying Him as Illinois senator Barack Obama.
- On March 4, the Discovery Channel took the prize, by broadcasting a documentary claiming to have disproved the foundational belief of Christianity: that Jesus rose from the dead.
This year’s Easter “Hit” Parade began just five days after the beginning of Lent with a February 26 press conference. Hollywood über-director James Cameron and Emmy Award-winning director Simcha Jacobovici announced to the world that they had discovered the “Jesus family tomb,” and had even subjected Jesus’ remains to DNA testing, thereby knocking the central pillar out from under the Christian edifice. As the apostle Paul wrote, “if Christ is not risen, your faith is futile; you are still in your sins!” (1 Corinthians 15:17).
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