You can always count on ol' Joe to cut through all of the babble and worthless junk and report on the relevant, important material. It's like I'm sitting here reading the Matrix and only calling you when you need to know something, isn't it?
Anyway, I ran into this the other day. After it's all said and done, this is one of the tools you need in your arsenal to combat DaVinci Code flimflam. Eric Metaxas, a New York writer and speaker, wrote this wonderful essay concerning The DaVinci Code. It is a witty sequel to The Screwtape Letters by C. S. Lewis. Mr. Metaxas has Screwtape describe for Wormwood the way Dan Brown's conspiracy works: ...There is the manner in which the book seduces its reader with naked flattery, holding out the carrot -- or should I say apple -- of "inside knowledge." Make note of this, Wormwood; it worked wonders for us in Eden and works for us still. The author trots out the ageless fiddle-faddle about a parallel "reality" beside the "official" one everyone's been sold. You know, the moth-eaten, bedraggled idea that all of history is a grand "conspiracy" conducted by some hidden elites! But wait, the lucky reader is to be let in on it all, and for the mere price of purchasing this book! He'll learn the "real" story behind the "official" story that all the other saps have been buying for lo! these many centuries. Heady stuff, eh, Wormwood? Transparent as it might seem to us, this temptation has always been too great for the humans to bear. They ache to be part of that "inside" group that knows what's "really" going on, and they fall for it every time. It's not so different from their craving for gossip or "dirt"; only better, since there isn't the pesky nuisance of guilt to deal with. They cannot help themselves; they simply swallow it without a thought. That's the key, Wormwood, for if actual thinking can be prevented, the humans are under our control.
If I had written this, I think I would have substituted "testing" for "thinking." Theologically speaking, Truth is not obtainable just by thinking; it has to be revealed. Otherwise, the entire letter is a "homerun." You can read the reprint at http://churchofthemasses.blogspot.com/. |
Great stuff. I like the link between the book and Screwtape.