stigmata

[chakraman]

has anyone seen this film? i have watched it before but this time now i'm older etc it had new meanings. this is not a subject i am knowledgable so forgive any specific faux pas'.

for me the essence of the film was the fear-based actions of the church in relation to the discovery of the gospel according to thomas - said to be the closest to the word of jesus. (is this the dead sea scrolls?) i looked them up on net and they certainly contain a good degree of agelees truths. in the film the priests, with their rituals and churches, are portrayed as a hindrance to real religious enquiry even the enemy of it. these are thoughts you may have heard myself espouse from time to time.

i get the impression that during christs ministry he was seen as a threat to the religious status quo of spiritual authority, pomp and ceremony. in the centuries following christ it seems that the religious powers embraced the symbol of christ and shaped it to their desires, neglecting what didnt support their view. i.e. anything that questioned organised religious authority by promoting faith etc

at the end of the film it said that the vatican had stated that the gospel was heresy. could it be that any organisational, authoritarian view of religion even personally speaking is the opposite of it and therefore malicious in its entirety, afterall we've had the so called religions for centuries and it hasnt helped. for me the lack of organised religious enquiry that is slated in britain is wellcome. the materialism that has ensued because of it may not be the answer, but when the fear based religion of the middle ages is set free its bound to appear worse at first, but we have to learn the folly of materialism by living it first. repression of this for me is prolonging materialism. organised religious enquiry is to me spiritual materialism.
a great film....

on a poster i saw outside a church ; why sit in the dark when you can light a candle...

krishnamurti ; why sit by the light of one candle, when you can have the sun...

jase

[17th Angel]

I like the bit where, Frankie cuts the priests hair... And she is holding a water spray bottle, then when the angle changes it magically changes into a comb lol.. And when Frankie opens the rosary package, coffee in one hand then rosary in other... then as the angle changes they again magically change around lol... Got to love it.

[Thomas]

Hi jason –

has anyone seen this film?
Yep.

for me the essence of the film was the fear-based actions of the church in relation to the discovery of the gospel according to thomas - said to be the closest to the word of jesus. (is this the dead sea scrolls?)

Well there you go ... the Church is well aware of the GoT, and has no fear of it at all. It treats it for what it is ... a 4th century document purporting to be the Gospel of Thomas the Disciple. As there is no evidence of its existence in the Church prior to this, its existence is unlikely, as other apocryphal texts are discussed by the Fathers and church historians.

i looked them up on net and they certainly contain a good degree of agelees truths.

Indeed there are ... and a fair degree of obfuscation ...

in the film the priests, with their rituals and churches, are portrayed as a hindrance to real religious enquiry even the enemy of it.

I know. It's the 'same old same old'. My 16 year old daughter commented that in the last four TV programmes she's seen in which Catholicism figures, there's always something nasty going on...

I get the impression that during christs ministry he was seen as a threat to the religious status quo of spiritual authority, pomp and ceremony.
Yes.

In the centuries following christ it seems that the religious powers embraced the symbol of christ and shaped it to their desires, neglecting what didnt support their view. i.e. anything that questioned organised religious authority by promoting faith etc
I would disagree with that ...

at the end of the film it said that the vatican had stated that the gospel was heresy.
Not quite (that's movie PR) – although it is generally agreed that some of the content is heresiarch:
114: Simon Peter said to him, "Let Mary leave us, for women are not worthy of life." Jesus said, "I myself shall lead her in order to make her male, so that she too may become a living spirit resembling you males. For every woman who will make herself male will enter the kingdom of heaven."
The Church does not teach that women cannot enter heaven. This text also contradicts the Lucan narrative.

could it be that any organisational, authoritarian view of religion even personally speaking is the opposite of it and therefore malicious in its entirety, afterall we've had the so called religions for centuries and it hasnt helped.
Helped what? Where would we be without religion? How do you know? Things might well be a lot worse.

What I would say is that the paradigm of human conduct has been present and evident, but we still choose not to adopt it. We prefer materialism and consumerism.

organised religious enquiry is to me spiritual materialism.
Really, I see it as precisely the other way round.

Religion is one of the few bulwarks against the desire to measure the worth of man purely as a unit of economic production and consumption. Rudolk Steiner stated that the Roman Catholic Church was the onlty defence against the leviathan of western materialism and consumerism.

a great film....
But a complete fiction. The occurrance of stigmata is very specific, and nothing like the portrayal in the film.

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It's simply too much of an over simplification to say that the Church is against freedom or science ... it just suits the anti-authoritarianism that is the residue of the 60s ... I could offer the counter argument that the pursuit of personal freedom is the ego unchained and leads to a lack of responsibility.

Did you know the Big Bang Theory was proposed by a Dominican monk?

Dids you know more witches were burned by the secular authorities than by the religious during the Middle Ages?

Thomas

[chakraman]

[quote/] I could offer the counter argument that the pursuit of personal freedom is the ego unchained and leads to a lack of responsibility.[quote/]
hi thomas
i agree, pursuit of personal freedom is instigated by an authority within the individual, which for me is the same as an authority like the church acting from without. i'm not anti-authoritarian because thats the same reaction as atheism which contains the opposite it is against, i would also say that the folly anti-auth. was pre 60's. i'm not coming from where you think i am. i seek to be responsible because i desire neither personal freedom nor spiritual gain.

i do know it was fiction, and the stigmata part of the plot was incidental to the point and probably there to give frills.

do you really think things could be worse?

idealistically the church is supposed to stand for man against being a unit of consumerism, but in reality they have swapped material gain for spritual gain- it may sound more noble but its essentially the same, though it egotistically supposes itself to be above it.

the buisnessman and the priest are both hungry for promotion.

so what if a monk proposed the big bang theory they've got brains to. they also said the world was flat. science and religion both have their quota of genius' and idiots.

as for witch burning even the secular authorities would have been acting under a dogmatic religious premise.

my point was that religious authority is based on fear. be a better muslim or you'll get visited by a tsunami. pray and you'll be saved. do this or burn in hell. people obey purely for gain which is not goodness for itself.

you feel organised religion is necessary i don't. i'm not saying leading a religious life is useless, quite the contrary, just not according to the fear/gain guidlines set down by organised religions or my own guidlines which would be a church in themselves.

having said all that i like that buddhist saying - all who speak are wrong.

best wishes jase

[Thomas]

Hi Jason –

so what if a monk proposed the big bang theory they've got brains to. they also said the world was flat. science and religion both have their quota of genius' and idiots.

That's the point. They didn't. This 'flat earth' idea is an invention that has become a de facto truth, and now it's a de facto truth to beat religion with, when it was never a truth in the first place. The church never thought the world was flat. Columbus never thought the world was flat. The Greeks world out the world was round long before Christ, and everybody knew it.

So you're actually basing a judgement of science and religion on a fallacy.

This is the real problem - it's argument based on assumed 'knowledge' – which is not knowledge at all.

Like the film Stigmata - or Dan Brown's Da Vinci Code - there's no truth to it at all, but everyone chooses to believe in it ... ask the question why, and now you're asking 'real' and serious questions.

as for witch burning even the secular authorities would have been acting under a dogmatic religious premise.

Evidence shows in the trials by 'dogmatic religious' institutions, over 98% of the defendants were acquitted. The majority of witches executed were killed under secular law, for reasons jealousy, fear and spite - and the evidence against them was not theological but social – they caused crop failure, miscarriage, etc – invariably the charge was brought by a disgruntled neighbour.

+++

The reason I post is that someone voices a 'fact' that is, in reality an opinion, or simply an error. Three people pick it up and pass it on. Soon it is so widespread everybody knows it, so it is self-evident ... when in truth it is what it always is, an opinion or an error.

The churches labour under a burden of such 'fact' that has accrued over the generations. Much of it is baseless, and most of it propaganda. I could list a contrary view to many things that are the church's 'fault' – but what would be the point? I'd just get the propaganda fired straight back at me as 'fact' – it takes time and effort to research the truth, and it is rarely black and white as people like.

So what do I think of 'Stigmata'? – It's a cheap shot at a sitting target, founded on an illogical premise.

Thomas

[chakraman]

hi thomas..bestist buddy,

i'm right and your wrong so ner

sos if i trod on some sensibilities... the facts on intellectual points are still incidental to my point on authority. it really matters not what the church believes as to the world and the beginning of things in relation to the topic. anything historical is based on someones view and therefore has a possibility of error but not where your facts come from apparently. if i've mistakenly potrayed some physical thing as a fact so what, to say its the opposite could also be mistaken, seeing as its historical you can't be sure it isnt.

we can dispute specifics ad nauseum and neither can be 100% sure on any of it. perhaps none of the church thought the world was flat, can you prove it, of course not, you speak as if its a truth.

what do you mean stigmata is believed to the truth..eh? its a good yarn thats all, the truth only lies in the idea that the church seeks to keep the people down by fear the rest is filler, i see this to be true you don't. i could say there was an actual gospel written in christs hand and burned by the church because it questioned the churches role and blah blah, if i spoke of it as truth you could disagree but you could not disprove it,so would that make it a fact?

religious enquiry doesn't rely on facts of thje physical world

i don't blame anything on the church specifically but rather on the folly of human nature as it is. you defend the church if you like, i believe all authority to be corrupt there and elsewhere - even my own...your turn...jase