DaVinci

Quite remarkable what a furor can be created by Hollywood PR flacks over a murder mystery that thinks that Leonardo's last name was DaVinci!

AMERICA's churches are nothing if not nimble. You might think that they would be up in arms about “The Da Vinci Code”. Dan Brown's novel has sold well over 40m copies in 44 languages; the film version of the novel, which is being released around the world on May 19th, will reach millions more; and yet Mr Brown's message is about as heretical as you can get. “The Da Vinci Code” holds that Jesus was married to Mary Magdalene and fathered a daughter; that the Bible was put together by a fourth-century Roman emperor with a thing against women; that the Catholic Church is a criminal conspiracy.
Roman Catholics are certainly up in arms. The Vatican has urged the faithful to boycott the film. The US Conference of Catholic Bishops has launched a documentary and a website, Jesusdecoded.com. The American Society for the Defence of Tradition, Family and Property is organising prayer-vigils at cinemas. The film is the most flagrant example of American anti-Catholicism, some say, since the Know Nothings of the 19th century.


But many other Christians, particularly evangelicals, are taking a different approach. For them the film provides a golden opportunity to get people talking about Christian subjects. Some churches are giving away tickets along with Starbucks vouchers to encourage post-film discussion. The Campus Crusade for Christ has printed 1m copies of its guide to the code. This Sunday, thousands of preachers across the country will be addressing Mr Brown's book.
One reason why evangelicals are embracing Mr Brown is that shunning proved such a disaster with Martin Scorsese's “The Last Temptation of Christ” in 1988. All the outrage and marches simply made Christians look bigoted and silly, and brought a tedious film much publicity. But there are two more positive reasons.
First, the churches are determined to engage with popular culture. Today's mega-churches have dispensed with traditional hymns and learned sermons in favour of rock bands and—a recent favourite—pastors who preach from inside mock-up prisons, a reference to Fox's hit show, “Prison Break”. The churches did roaring business on the back of “The Passion of the Christ” and “The Lion, the Witch and the Wardrobe”; they hope to do the same, with the aid of a bit of jujitsu, with Mr Brown's offering.
The churches are also obsessed with “seekers”—people who are vaguely interested in Christianity without knowing much about it. The calculation is that the film will boost the number of seekers—and that the churches will then knock Mr Brown's nonsense out of their heads.
Whether Mr Brown's work brings people to God is impossible to say. But with at least 45 books debunking the code, more than a dozen CDs and DVDs coming out with the film, and seven TV specials airing this month, it is bringing a lot of money to a lot of people. Pity about the book.