Wednesday, October 13, 2004

Living by the Code

I have blogged before about certain Christians' horrified response to the success of Dan Brown's The Da Vinci Code. At least a dozen books are devoted to "exposing" it.

But Curtis White's review essay in the Voice Literary Supplement makes the best point:

"The Da Vinci Code is important as an expression of a desire for a spirituality that cannot be had within the confines of the institutionalized church. More simply yet, it is the popular expression of a desire for a kind of meaningfulness to life that is missing for most of us. And certainly, it is the scandalous expression of a willingness to be disobedient to achieve the heretical end of a salvation outside the confines of the church."

"Excursus religion," in other words, a term of Robert Ellwood's that I always find useful and apply wherever I can.

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