Jesus didn't die for you so you could be rational

Now that it appears the fabled bird flu global diffusion of death is not coming on the wings of migrating flocks, alarmists are probably going to need something else to squawk over.

Good thing the film adaptation of Dan Brown's "The Da Vinci Code" opens May 19–insecure Christians are now scrambling for a strategy to combat this "blasphemy on steroids" from tarnishing the silver screen, polluting the populace and slandering their savior.

While some are saying the bound-to-be blockbuster film is an opportunity for teaching and evangelism (for Christianity is such a profoundly misunderstood and mysterious religion in this country), others are calling for censorship, boycotts or "othercotts"–seeing different movies to keep the "Code" from opening on top.

Others are worried such measures simply won't do enough to convey just how profoundly offensive the film's storyline is to many Christians, even though a mortal Jesus knocking sandals with Mary Magdalene is one of the most tired "heretical" themes in the post-modern Western canon and hasn't yet destroyed the world or the Christian faith.

Some theologians are really getting their vestments in a twist and are starting to talk abject crazy-talk:

"I think we really have to see it, at least some of us," said Richard J. Mouw, president of Fuller Theological Seminary, a prominent evangelical school. "It's very important for some Christians at least to be able to engage in an intelligent discussion."

Others are wringing their rosaries and making analogies to the recent fervor over the cartoons published in several Western newspapers of the Muslim Prophet Muhammad:

In Rome recently, Archbishop Angelo Amato, the No. 2 official in the Vatican's doctrinal office, told Catholic communications officials: "If such slanders, offenses and errors had been directed at the Koran or the Holocaust, they would have justly provoked a world uprising. Instead, directed at the Church and Christians, they remain unpunished. I hope you will all boycott the movie."

That call to action seems rather lukewarm after such a fiery buildup–how about tapping into some Old Testament vengeance and publicly calling for Ron Howard's eyes to be gouged out, or Tom Hanks' head on a platter?

Religious kooks, don't you see? By treating this talking devil-picture as just a movie with all your talk of informed debate and peaceful protest, you're already letting the secular humanists win!