The Holy Grail

I have recently finished reading "Angels and Demons" and have now moved on to "The Da Vinci Code". Similarly to "Angels and Demons", this second installment has my mind filled with all sorts of things I never knew before - they are all swirling around inside my head. As I keep reading, what I keep thinking is that I'm not surprised the church would hate this book. First of all, it mentions that the Holy Grail is not a chalice, as some people thought, but refers to Mary Magdalene's role in Christ's life. Secondly, it points to the fact that Mary was not a whore (as most people have been led to believe), but is actually Jesus' companion and that she became pregnant with Jesus' child before he was crucified. The whole reason that there was a fundamental shift in views of women (Mary included) was because Constantine realized that Christianity was spreading so quickly and that there would have to be some sort of compromise between the values that were in place before the rise of Christianity (which was Paganism), and the Christianity we know today.

I'm not writing this blog to argue what really did or did not happen, but to express my fascination with the fact that this is the first time that Paganism has been presented not as the worship of "dark" or the "devil" or "satanic", but actually just refers to a group of people who were non-Christian (but who followed the "earth-centered" path). This view simply is grounded in the belief of the "goddess" and the role of women in the world (which was more positive until Christian views were adopted). Even though I was raised Christian (although not in a church), I am also a feminist at heart. The idea of women being revered as the givers of life (and not evil temptress fruit-peddlers) has certain appeal to me. One point that was brought up in the book, and is very true, is that history (including the Bible) was written by the "winners". The Bible did not fall down to the earth from the sky from God's pen - it was written by man. It's the exact same premise that other books are written from, like "People's History of The United States" - it tries to drive home the fact that real events (unlike history) are multi-dimensional and not as black and white as a conqueror would have you believe. I like when the grays are accentuated - it makes for a much more interesting, humane, and believable story.