VATICAN CITY, (Reuters) – The success of books and films like “The Da Vinci Code” and “Angels and Demons” should make the Catholic Church rethink the way it uses the media to present itself, the Vatican newspaper said yesterday.
The newspaper, L’Osservatore Romano, ran two editorials on last Monday’s premiere of “Angels and Demons” in Rome, ending an official institutional silence on the film. The editorials neither panned nor praised the film but rather offered up a mix of positive and negative comments.
One of the editorials called the film “ephemeral” but also conceded that it was “gripping” and called the camera work “splendid”. It called the film “pretentious” but added tht Ron Howard’s direction was “dynamic and alluring”.
One of the editorials, headlined “The Secret of His Success,” said the Church should ask itself why such a “simplistic and partial” vision of the Church as portrayed in Dan Brown’s works is so successful, even among Catholics.
“It would probably be an exaggeration to consider the books of Dan Brown an alarm bell but maybe they should be a stimulus to re-think and refresh the way the Church uses the media to explain its positions on today’s burning issues,” it said.
