Reading the Da Vinci Code

There has been too much hype about this book that I decided to buy one to read. Fortunately, even if I could easily borrow one from work, there was a 50% offer by a book company for a collector's illustrated edition. So I got one.

I didn't bother to read the reviews because i didn't want to be influenced by other people's judgments on its merits. I watched a programme on tv about the factual basis of its story, and some news clips and the only thing i can remember is that apparently, there was a cardinal or a bishop who said that no catholic should ever possess or read that book.

I am a Catholic but I read it anyway.

And it was brilliant. It was well-researched although somewhere towards the end of the story, what a reader might think as an all-out attack against the infallibility of the papacy was toned down a bit.

I studied in a Catholic university and have been bombarded with so many religion studies subjects that I thought it was better for me to enter the convent because it seemed like I spent more time learning about church rituals and reading about the lives of the saints than working on my philippine literature assignments. Anyway, the more I practised my catholic faith, the more I questions I have.

I wonder what the movie version of this book would be like and how the vatican and the die-hard catholics would react.

I don't really disagree with the theories of Jesus' apparent marriage with Mary Magdalene. And I won't mind at all if ever Jesus and Magdalene really had children. I would still be a Catholic.

I just wonder how those seminarians who are studying to be priests think about the church after reading the doctrines and the history of this religion outside the realm of the bible. Do they ever study books without imprimatur?

Hmm, I hope it's not a code to crack. I think I better call the Philippines.