Moving at the Speed of Creativity by Wesley Fryer

Da Vinci Code online quest

Google is sponsoring a new online game based on the book and movie The Da Vinci Code. Prizes are available, but you have to answer 24 puzzles to win. A Google login (free) is required to participate. After linking to the site you are prompted to login to Google, and then provided with an opportunity to add the Da Vinci Code Quest to your Google homepage. The day 1 puzzle is a logic problem using symbols from the book and movie. Each day a new puzzle is available, the contest started April 17th.

Obviously the main purpose of this website is to get people excited about the movie so they’ll go see it in the theater. I am looking forward to discussions which I’m sure will result because of it. Tomorrow our pastor at church is starting a sermon series focusing on the Da Vinci code, which I am really looking forward to. I enjoyed the book, but of course it is a work of fiction– the way some people are getting upset about the movie and the book, you would think they took it as an attempted work of historical documentation. Of course there are many, many things about the history of the Christian church that are worthy of objection– the selling of indulgences, the Inquisition, the Crusades, etc. I think it is great for more people to learn about the history surrounding the early church, and I am not among those (some who live in our area of West Texas) who think the mere existence of the book and the movie is a blasphemy.

The announcement of the “Gospel of Judas” (which I think could more appropriately be called “the Heresy of Judas”) by The National Geographic Society and others is generating hubbub as well. Clearly there are many agendas at work in all of this, but amidst these competing agendas I think there is plenty of room for people to learn and grow in both their intellectual as well as spiritual journeys.

I will not write and reflect at length on this now, but will mention that gnosticism (the spiritual worldview advanced by this alleged writing of the disciple Judas) has been a source of debate since the earliest days of the Christian church. I write a bit about this in a December 2005 post titled, “Modern day gnosticism.” I have taught several times on gnosticism and Elaine Pagel’s book “Beyond Belief: The Secret Gospel of Thomas.” The announcement of this “heresy of Judas” essentially raises the same questions Pagels does in her book on alleged writings of the disciple Thomas.

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On this day..


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One response to “Da Vinci Code online quest”

  1. phil Avatar
    phil

    All answers can be found at http://ozphilc.googlepages.com/davincicodequestongoogle

    all comments welcomed