Ripped From The Headlines!
I love it when Copudramas advertise their shows with that phrase. It seems like they want me to care, but I just...can't, because the acting is still deplorable and their dramatization of police officers is an insult to the process of actual crime scene investigation everywhere. I'm scanning the headlines today and the The Da Vinci Code is getting massive coverage. My wife, Ernie, read the book about as year and a half ago and tried to get me to read it because it was so entertaining. Let me repeat that phrase: she found the book entertaining. As in, she recognized that since she was grabbing a book from the fiction section of the bookstore, the book would be a work of fiction. At no point after reading the book has she ever come to me and said, "Shawn, I'd just like to renounce my Christian faith to you and let you know that I knew I didn't trust those dirty Catholics all along for some reason." Never once has she said that statement.

I think, because as she perceives reality, when you grab a book from the fiction section, it is a work of fiction. It's a nutty concept, but the only reason I bring this up is because in every single article I've read, people are having a real hard time with reality versus fiction aspect of the movie. There is even a poll, which says that people are struggling in their faith because of the movie. I just feel bad that people are this dumb. It's like one of those, Your-Mom-Is-So-Dumb jokes: "Your mom is so dumb that she stared at her orange juice carton for two hours because it said 'Concentrate'." It's that level of tragically stupid. "I saw a movie, Jesus isn't real! They lied to meeee!"

People. If you think you believe in Jesus as your Personal Lord and Savior and you are swayed by a movie that states that Jesus was just a nice guy that settled down in the suburbs and raised a family, and you believe it, then you probably never believed or had faith in the first place. "Shawn, a lot of the things they talk about in the book are real." And Gone With The Wind was a movie based around the Civil War, which was an actual event, but yet I know the story was a work of fiction! How is that?!? Dear Lord, it boggles the mind!!!

"If you are going to take any sort of movie at face value, particularly a huge-budget motion picture like this, you'd be making a very big mistake."
-Tom Hanks in reference to his new movie, The Da Vinci Code

"I think that people's faith is nothing to take lightly. I have a great deal of respect for people of faith, all faiths. At the same time, it is a work of fiction. It's not meant to offend, it's not theology."
-Ron Howard, director of The Da Vinci Code and once played that adorable little character Opie, from the Andy Griffith Show

"I think that if you can see a movie or read a book you get from the fiction section of your bookstore and allow it to change your worldview and destroy your faith, then you should be locked in a padded room and all sharp objects should be taken from your presence because you're officially a dumbass."
-Shawn Passwaters, some guy who will watch the new movie, The Da Vinci Code, because he was too lazy too read the book, but still loves Ron Howard movies, the actor Tom Hanks, and still believes that Jesus is the Son of God sent to die for the sins of man and whose faith has never been affected by movies like The Da Vinci Code, that lame movie, The Passion of The Christ, or the even lamer still, The Last Temptation of Christ