"Angels & Demons" Fueling Religious Wrath, Conspiracy Mongering

"ANGELS & DEMONS" FUELING RELIGIOUS WRATH, CONSPIRACY
           MONGERING, AND BIG BUCK$$$$ AT BOX OFFICE

(From AANEWS)

When the controversial film "Angels & Demons" opens Friday at
theaters across the country, seats will likely be filled thanks
not only to an aggressive advertising campaign, but a veritable
war of words -- and threats --percolating throughout the news media
and cyberspavce.

The Catholic League for Religious and Civil Rights has probably
done as much as any Hollywood ad wizard to promote this latest film
based on a novel by writer Dan Brown.  You remember him, right?
His book "The DaVinci Code" and the subsequent movie starring Tom
Hanks and directed by Ron Howard drew accusations that both were
"anti-Catholic" in suggesting that Jesus Christ married, had a
family and, well, was not quite the character we read about in the
New Testament.  Brown cooked up a literary brew mixing speculation,
fact and a good deal of imaginative if not colorful pseudo-history.
By the time the film climbed to the top of the charts, the Vatican
and the Catholic League were urging a boycott and coming dangerously
close to suggesting that the movie should be censored.

After all, said some Catholic leaders like League President William
Donohue, would we tolerate a similar film that re-wrote the history
of Islam and savaged its prophet and founder, Mohammed?

"Angels & Demons" is already prompting a debate over the limits of
free speech and exactly how far one might venture in questioning
history and, in the process, raising doubt about -- or even insulting
-- religion and religious institutions.  This time, Brown and
Howard resurrect hoary conspiracy theories of an 18th century
group founded in Bavaria known as the Illuminati.  Along with the
Freemasons, the Illuminati have been convenient fodder for conspiracy
buffs linking them to the French revolution and efforts to
manipulate governments everywhere, including the United States.
The real Illuminati eschewed violence, and believed that only through
moral reform and incremental influence could humanity rid itself of
the twin evils of abusive government power
and clerical authoritarianism.  They were nevertheless a sidebar
in the more complex and nuanced history of the Enlightenment era.
In salons, literary societies, coffee shops, Masonic lodges
and even the churches of liberal and latitudinarian clergy, the
spirit of this era was leading to widespread changes in thinking
as well as the emergence of novel political, economic and cultural
institutions. The power of both the absolutist church and state was
being challenged.  A new "social space" developed fostering values
such as toleration, social conviviality, the Newtonian scientific
revolution and Republicanism.

Political revolution, especially the developments in France,
fostered a cottage industry of conspiracy theorizing.  The Bavarian
Illuminati, and later the lodges of the Freemasons, were identified
as centers of heretical dissent and political intrigue.  There was
some basis for this; but conspiratorial plotting and secret
handshakes fell short in being a convincing explanation for the
wider changes sweeping across Europe and the Americas.  Religious
absolutists like the Abbe Augustin Barruel, author of the multi-volume
History of Jacobinism, saw Illuminism and Atheism as enemies of
God-appointed regents and ecclesiastical institutions.

Governments, often spurred on by powerful clerics and the Roman
Pope, did all they could to combat the wave of convulsive changes
sweeping their realms.  The Illuminati eventually fell victim to
state retaliation.  More moderate expressions of Enlightenment
wisdom manage to survive and thrive, if only in an imperfect form.

Beginning with the controversy between Federalism and anti-Federalism
in the new United States, fears of the Illuminati, Masons or
other alleged "hidden hand" cabals were widespread.  Clerics linked
nefarious groups to efforts at "disestablishing" organized religion,
or creating a Bill of Rights, or other measures which eroded the
power of the churches.  George Washington, a Freemason, would have
no part of allowing his family to become the basis of a new American
royal lineage.

Throughout history, the Illuminati have been the lead characters
in lurid conspiracy theories linking everything from the French
and American revolutions to the civil rights movement, erosion of
religious prerogatives, and yes, whatever it is that takes place
in a part of the Nevada desert known as Area 51.  Popular fiction
like Robert Anton Wilson's Illuminatus Trilogy, pokes fun at
this self-validating paranoid style.  In a more serious vein,
historian Richard Hofstadter detailed how conspiracy mongering has
been a thematic element in our national history.  When complex and
inexplicable events occur, it is psychologically and politically
reassuring to identify a cabal of "insiders" and manipulators
who secretly have their hands on the levers of power.  The "enemy"
is often foreign, evil, Atheistic and incredibly astute.  Indeed,
the absence of evidence of such cabals is tendered as proof that
they exist!

"Conspiracy thinking" is deeply rooted in our popular consciousness;
we often have trouble distinguishing between the real article and the
fantastic claims that are the grist of the internet.  The former are
exposed through evidence.  The latter blend a kernel of truth with
generous portions of speculations, paranoia, misrepresentations and
outright fabrication.  Indeed, the test of distinguishing between the
two is how contravening evidence is presented.  To the conspiracy
monger, such evidence is an inconvenience, and rarely attenuates
the unusual claims being made.

"Angels & Demons" will also contribute to the debate over
the limits of free speech.  We are in perilous waters here,
especially when religious dogmas and sensibilities are involved.
Muslims throughout the world rioted a quarter-century ago when Salman
Rushdie's controversial novel "The Satanic Verses" was published.
Bookstores were bombed, Rushdie's life was endangered when the
Ayatollah Khomeini imposed a "fatwa" or sentence of death, and
a number of Jewish and Christian religious leader decreed that
governments should intervene and censor the "blasphemous" work.
This culture war battle has yet to be resolved.  Just last month,
Islamic countries fought to have the United Nations enact a
blasphemy statute which would have curbed freedom of speech least
Muslims were "insulted" or "offended." Mr. Donohue of the Catholic
League comes dangerously close to such authoritarian posturing,
as do many religious and political figures who seek to shelter
organized religion from any criticism or doubt.

Like the case with "The DaVinci Code," Dan Brown is not claiming
to have written a non-fiction book about the Illuminati or Vatican
intrigue.  As for conspiracies and outrageous conduct, the Holy
See, in its indignation over "Angels & Demons," seems to have
conveniently forgotten the banking scandal it was swept up in during
the early 1980s, along with the mysterious death -- murder, really --
of Roberto Calvi, and the attempted fascist coup by the shadowy P-2
group which had ties to international banking, organized crime,
intelligence services and, of course, the Vatican State.  As for
those pesky Illuminati who supposedly endanger our lives and freedom
by working to establish some kind of totalitarian state --goals
that were precisely the opposite of their stated objectives --well,
the various religious sects are a far greater and immanent threat.
The local church or mosque is often the cultural epicenter for
those who impose authoritarian regimes ("One State Under God"),
eviscerate human rights, oppress women and sexual minorities,
and squelch any manifestation of freethought and free expression.
There is no conspiracy here -- they are quite open about it and
their discomfort in living in pluralistic open societies.

We should treat "Angels & Demons" for what it is, a yarn, a work of
celluloid fiction, a thriller to be taken in while sipping on Coca
Cola and indulging in the largest container of popcorn the concession
counter overcharges us for.  For Christ's sake -- for God's sake --
it's just a movie.  The Roman Catholic Church will survive, and
Mr. Donohue will live another day to find some excrescence, some
sign of "anti-Catholic bias" somewhere on the planet.  The church
will also escape the burden of having to show that its theological
claims and historical humbuggery have more substance than what flows
out of Dan Brown's creative and, at times, disingenuous mind.  As for
the Illuminati, well, imagine the possibilities -- a powerful cabal
of progressive, heretical thinkers with great resources at their
disposal laboring constantly to create a Reason-based, humanistic
world free of superstition and despotism.

Where are they when we so desperately need them?

-- Conrad F. Goeringer,
Editor AANEWS

                                                          **

        On-line and Other Resources in Connection With This Article


http://www.atheists.org/The_Enlightenment%2C_Freemasonry%2C_and_The_Illuminati
"The Enlightenment, Freemasonry and the Illuminati," by Conrad
Goeringer

* http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Illuminati
Wikipedia entry on the Illuminati

* J.A. Leo Memay, "Deism, Masonry and the Enlightenment," Newark,
1987, University of Delaware Press.

* Dan Burstein, "Secrets of Angels & Demons," New York, 2004 CDS
Books

* Margaret Jacob, Strangers Nowhere in the World: The Rise of
Cosmopolitanism in Early Modern Europe, 2006, University of
Pennsylvania Press.  Jacob's other works on the Enlightenment,
Civil Society and related subjects are highly recommended.

* R. Le Forester, "Les Illumines de Bavierier et La FrancMaconnerie
Allemande," Geneva, 1974, Slatkin.  The exhaustive history of the
Illuminati and its suppression based on official records and other
historical sources.

* http://freemasonry.bcy.ca/anti-masonry/stauffer.html
Hosted by Grand Lodge of British Columbia.  See also Stauffer's
"New England and the Bavarian Illuminati," New York and London,
1918 Columbia University Press.  This work explores the role of
the Illuminati "hysteria" in early U.S. history, particularly the
period of the Federalist - anti-Federalist dispute.

* http://www.cesnur.org/2005/mi_illuminati_en.htm
The Illuminati and Angels & Demons FAQ - Do the Illuminati Really
Exist?
by Massimo Introvigne -- Center for the Study of New Religions

* http://www.slate.com/id/2206021/pagenum/all
Beethoven and the Illuminati How the secret order influenced the
great composer. By Jan Swafford

http://www.huffingtonpost.com/ron-howard/iangels-demonsi-its-a-thr_b_189053.html
Angels & Demons: It's A Thriller, Not A Crusade Director Ron Howard
responds to William Donohue and the Catholic League.

* http://www.abcnews.go.com/print?id=7405574
'Angels & Demons' Latest of Many Films to Rouse Religion's Wrath
Ron Howard's New Adaptation of Dan Brown's Novel Provokes Catholic
Criticism
By SHEILA MARIKAR

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