Hollywood after the Passion, Pt. II

The Rev. Mac Brunson recently took his kids out and, while the movie was forgettable, the pastor of the First Baptist Church of Dallas was hooked by one of the coming attractions.

It was a trailer for the comedy "Raising Helen," in which Kate Hudson plays a hot New York City fashion star whose life changes when she has to raise her sister's three children. Five-hankie chick flicks require hunky love interests and, lo and behold, this time the blonde falls for a handsome, charming pastor.

"I thought, 'No way Hollywood will get that right,' " said Brunson, senior minister of the 12,000-member Southern Baptist superchurch. "You see a pastor in a movie today and he's almost always going to be an idiotic, dangerous, neurotic pervert or something."

Brunson aired some of these views when interviewed for a People magazine cover story called "Does Hollywood Have Faith?" What happened next was a parable about studio insiders trying to do their homework in pews and pulpits. It's a trend that predates "The Passion of the Christ," but is surging along with Mel Gibson's bank account.

After reading Brunson's remarks, publicists working for Disney called and made the preacher an offer he couldn't refuse. Before long, Brunson was sitting in the Tinseltown multiplex in suburban Dallas, watching an advance screening of "Raising Helen" with 200 church members.

The tough Baptist crowd was pleasantly surprised, said Brunson. Yes, the Lutheran pastor was played by John Corbett of "Sex & the City." Yes, this is the rare pastor who never mentions Jesus, faith, church and the Bible with a woman who has three children in his Christian school. But it's clear that Helen is seeking moral stability and she ultimately decides to embrace her children, rather than worship her career. And the romance was clean.

"It was just a normal movie, or what people used to call normal," he said. "This pastor is a moral guy. He falls in love. He gets to be natural. He's romantic and he kisses the girl. ... At the end it's clear that he's helped stabilize things and they're becoming a real family.

"So hurrah for Disney, on this movie. They got something right and we ought to praise them for that. Let's hope and pray that they do it some more."

But bridge-building efforts like this are tricky. While Disney is making progress with one powerful Baptist -- remember that the Southern Baptist Convention has been boycotting Disney for seven years -- MGM is traveling a rocky road trying to evangelize church groups on behalf of its edgy satire called "Saved!"

An online mini-guide for youth leaders says the movie presents "Christian teens who make poor choices, have a crisis of faith, seek answers and ultimately emerge with a genuine faith." Studio executives say it contains a pure Christian message of tolerance and love. Meanwhile, producer Michael Stipe -- the androgynous REM lead vocalist -- has said it's a high-school vampire movie, "only here the monsters are Jesus-freak teen-agers."

The movie's American Eagle Christian Academy has a giant plastic Jesus figure (in running shoes) and born-again gunners practice at the Emmanuel Shooting Range ("An eye for an eye"). One girl has a vision to sleep with her boyfriend to cure his homosexuality. The pseudo-hip Pastor Skip has an affair with a troubled mother (the area's top Christian interior decorator). The villain is a true believer who rules the popular girls ("The Christian Jewels") with an ironclad Bible.

The executives behind "Saved!" simply haven't done the "cross-cultural homework" required to reach religious believers, said Walt Mueller, head of the national Center for Parent/Youth Understanding in Elizabethtown, Pa. While much of the movie's satire is accurate and even constructive, it's the actual theological message that will offend most Christians.

"If you're into a real postmodern, smorgasbord, all-tolerant blend of Christianity and every other conceivable faith in the world, then you're going to love this movie," said Mueller. "What is amazing is that the people marketing this movie don't seem to realize that they are attacking lots of people's beliefs. ...

"The bottom line is that there are good Christians and then there are bad Christians and Hollywood gets to decide which is which. We're supposed to buy that?"

Movies after the Passion, Part I

When it comes to judging Hollywood, critics in pulpits and pews have been chanting the same mantra for decades.

All together now: There's too much sex and there's too much violence. Amen.

Then a strange thing happened. An evangelical named Randall Wallace wrote "Braveheart," which a Catholic named Mel Gibson turned into an Oscar-magnet about freedom, faith, sacrifice and truth. It was bloody violent and its wedding was followed by a nude wedding night. Many conservative believers cheered and began to have second thoughts about their R-rating phobias.

Then Gibson made "The Passion of the Christ."

"A movie comes along that is, in the words of one Los Angeles critic, 'a two-hour execution,' and people of faith everywhere are embracing it and being moved to compunction, repentance and spiritual renewal," said screenwriter Barbara Nicolosi, speaking at a global cinema conference last week in Valencia, Spain.

"What we are learning from all this is that the problem is not with violence on the screen. It is meaningless violence that is wrong in entertainment. The Passion reconnects violence to its source in rebellion against God. It never objectifies the subject of the violence, nor does it dehumanize the perpetrators of violence. It shows the effects of violence in all its horror."

Aftershocks continue in the marketplace and in churches, while Gibson's epic keeps climbing toward the $370-million mark at the U.S. box office. Meanwhile, Hollywood is trying to learn how to mine this bizarre demographic Gibson has discovered -- Middle America.

Nicolosi has argued that the big lesson is that masses of the faithful will buy tickets when a talented, name-above-the-title superstar finances, produces and directs a theologically sophisticated movie. But there's the rub. How many celebrities make that A-list?

Meanwhile, debates about the Passion may help traditional believers learn more about the craft of making movies for the modern marketplace, she said, in her written text. Questions about the film's shocking use of violence were highly symbolic.

"This movie will challenge future filmmakers to make the violence in their films just as meaningful," said the former Catholic nun, who leads the Act One screenwriting project. "It will also open the people of God to a broader artistic sensibility. ... My young filmmaking students are very concerned about the place of the artist in the world. They want to talk about an ethics that would go along with the power of the mass media.

"They want to know what is good for people to watch and what might harm people to watch. This is very good."

Anyone can make violent movies, she said. It takes talent, skill and vision to show violence that means something. The same thing is true of sexuality, after 40 "shameless years" in which "cinema has shown us every possible permutation of two naked bodies writhing around." The same thing is true of symbols and themes of faith and spirituality.

There are signs of change in Hollywood. Nicolosi called it the "Don't Show How Things Look, Tell Us What They Mean" movement. Are religious leaders paying attention?

Nicolosi is not the only conservative arguing that filmmakers must stop assuming that safe, squeaky-clean predictability is the same thing as artistic quality.

Even Christian consumers would rather watch "Spiderman" than "Left Behind -- The Movie" and they would choose "Toy Story" over another "Touched By and Angel" rerun on a family cable channel, according to Dallas Jenkins, president of Jenkins Entertainment. He created the company with his father, Jerry B. Jenkins, who is best known as co-author of the bestselling "Left Behind" novels.

At some point, religious critics must humbly study the art in films such as "Taxi Driver," "Traffic" and "Pulp Fiction" as well as criticize their moral content, he said. It is even more important to study edgy films that combine personal storytelling with issues of faith, such as "Schindler's List" and "The Pianist."

"Why can't we make movies like that about our faith? ... Great films, no matter how specific their subject matter, have universal appeal," said Jenkins, writing in Relevant Magazine.

"Where are the thought-provoking, morally important rated-R films? Every year there are dozens of big, successful family films, but only two or three landmark, important films for adults. Can't at least one be made by a Christian?"

NEXT WEEK: Hollywood struggles to understand the church.

United Methodists do the math

From coast to coast, United Methodists are doing the math.

America's third-largest flock just survived another quadrennial General Conference rocked by media-friendly fighting over sex. Now it's time to dissect the numbers.

Delegates voted 570-334 to affirm the historic doctrines of the Christian faith.

Efforts to back laws defining "marriage as the union of one man and one woman" passed on a 624-184 vote. Same-sex union rites fell -- 756-159. Should the church delete its "faithfulness in marriage and celibacy in singleness" standard for clergy? Delegates voted 806-95 to say "no."

The big news was a 579-376 vote against weakening the Book of Discipline's law that self-avowed, practicing homosexuals cannot be clergy because homosexuality is "incompatible with Christian teaching." Delegates also rejected a resolution from gay-rights supporters that said: "We recognize that Christians disagree on the compatibility of homosexual practice with Christian teaching." That vote was 527-423.

After three decades of pain, it seemed the numbers were stacking up for United Methodist conservatives, whose churches are thriving in the American Sunbelt and the Third World.

But a final plot twist remained in Pittsburgh. A key leader caused fireworks by saying it's time to end the war over the Bible and sex -- by separating the armies.

"Our culture alone confronts us with more challenges than we can humanly speaking confront and challenge. That struggle, combined with the continuous struggle in the church, is more than we can bear. Our people, who have been faithful and patient, should not have to continue to endure our endless conflict," said the Rev. William Hinson, retired pastor of the 12,000-member First United Methodist Church of Houston, at a breakfast for conservatives.

"I believe the time has come when we must begin to explore an amicable and just separation that will free us both from our cycle of pain and conflict. Such a just separation will protect the property rights of churches and the pension rights of clergy. It will also free us to reclaim our high calling and to fulfill our mission in the world."

To understand the roots of this move -- which parallels divisions looming in other oldline Protestant churches -- it helps to dig a little deeper into the United Methodist numbers.

Hinson is president of the "Confessing Movement," with 1,400 churches with 650,000 members. Gay-rights supporters have a Reconciling Ministries Network of 192 churches, with 17,000 members.

But there are 35,000 congregations in all, with 8.3 million members. Sickened by decades of decline -- membership was 11 million in 1970 -- the last thing Methodists in the institutional middle wanted to hear was the word "schism." Before the conference closed, delegates linked hands, sang a hymn and passed a symbolic call for unity, 869 to 41.

And there was another number that deserved study. General Conference voted by a narrow 455-445 to clarify which Discipline violations can lead to a trial. The list of chargeable offenses now includes failing to be "celibate in singleness or being unfaithful in a heterosexual marriage; being a self-avowed practicing homosexual; conducting ceremonies that celebrate homosexual unions or performing same-sex wedding ceremonies."

But leaders on both sides noted that about 20 percent of the delegates this year came from Africa, Asia and Latin America -- where churches are more conservative. Efforts to enforce the Discipline's teachings might fall short, if left to delegates from North American churches. United Methodist progressives also continue to dominate the church's bureaucracies and seminaries.

So be it, said theologian Thomas Oden, a former United Methodist liberal who now is a conservative strategist. The key during the next four years is for local church leaders to weigh options for how to end the national warfare over the Bible and sex.

"We don't particularly care about the powers that be. What we care about is the doctrine and the Discipline in our church," he said. "That's were our focus is and that's where it will stay. ... But the actual enforcement of those teachings remains a problem for us, as it is for most Protestant churches today.

"We know that we will be struggling with that issue for decades. That's the question: We know what our church teaches, but do we have the will to enforce it?"

Stalking the anti-fundamentalist voter

Any Top 10 list of slogans for abortion-rights signs would include "Curb your dogma" and "If men could get pregnant, abortion would be a sacrament."

At the recent March for Women's Lives, one nurse weighed the tensions between Sen. John Kerry and the Vatican and proclaimed: "I'm a Catholic, I take Communion ... and I'm Pro-Choice." She could have added: "And I vote."

George W. Bush will receive few votes from these voters. They're not fond of Pope John Paul II, Jerry Falwell and other conservative religious leaders, either.

Political scientists Gerald De Maio and Louis Bolce call them "anti-fundamentalist voters" and their rise has been a crucial -- yet untold -- story in U.S. politics. Many are true secularists, such as atheists, agnostics and those who answer "none" when asked to pick a faith. Others think of themselves as progressive believers. The tie that binds is their disgust for Christian conservatives.

"This trend represents a big change, because 40 or 50 years ago all the divisive religious issues in American politics rotated around the Catholics. People argued about money for Catholic schools or whether the Vatican was trying to control American politics," said Bolce, who, with De Maio, teaches at Baruch College in the City University of New York.

"That remains a concern for some people. But today, they worry about all those fundamentalists and evangelicals. That's where the real animus is."

In fact, Bolce and De Maio argue that historians must dig back to the bitter pre-Great Depression battles rooted in ethnic and religious prejudices -- battles about immigration, public education, prohibition and "blue laws" -- to find a time when voting patterns were influenced to the same degree by antipathy toward a specific religious group.

Prior to the rise of Bill Clinton, "anti-fundamentalist" voters were evenly divided between the major parties. Now they're more than twice as likely to be Democrats, forming a power bloc with secularists that the researchers believe has become as powerful as the labor vote.

Bolce, an Episcopalian, and De Maio, a Roman Catholic, have focused much of their work on the "thermometer scale" used in the 2000 American National Election Study and those that preceded it. Low temperatures indicate distrust or hatred while high numbers show trust and respect. Thus, "anti-fundamentalist voters" are those who gave fundamentalists a rating of 25 degrees or colder. By contrast, the rating "strong liberals" gave to "strong conservatives" was a moderate 47 degrees.

Yet 89 percent of white delegates to the 1992 Democratic National Convention qualified as "anti-fundamentalist voters," along with 57 percent of Jewish voters, 51 percent of "moral liberals," 48 percent of school-prayer opponents, 44 percent of secularists and 31 percent of "pro-choice" voters. In 1992, 53 percent of those white Democratic delegates gave Christian fundamentalists a thermometer rating of zero.

"Anti-fundamentalist voter" patterns are not seen among black voters, noted De Maio. Researchers are now paying closer attention to trends among Hispanics.

What about the prejudices of the fundamentalists? Their average thermometer rating toward Catholics was a friendly 62 degrees, toward blacks 66 degrees and Jews 68 degrees.

To no one's surprise, the "anti-fundamentalist voter" trend is linked to the emergence of energized fundamentalist voters in post-Woodstock American life.

"The subculture of the evangelicals was a pretty safe place to live until the 1960s," said De Maio. "Then everything started changing. They have been fighting a rear-guard operation ever since. Once they mobilized, there was this huge counter-mobilization on the left -- which only built on the counter-cultural trends that affected the Democratic Party so much in the 1970s."

It's hard to learn about this political reality in elite media.

Between 1990 and 2000, Bolce and De Maio found that the New York Times, Los Angeles Times and the Washington Post published 929 stories about the political clout of conservative Christians and 59 about that of secularists. Only 18 stories addressed the religious disconnect between the major parties. They searched abstracts at the Vanderbilt University television news archive for similar stories in 2003 and 2004 and found zero.

"What we have found is a prejudice that is not taboo in our educational, political and media elites," said Bolce. "Anti-fundamentalist attitudes are sanctioned at the highest levels of American life."

Watching the religious left pray

Anyone watching the annual March for Life will see all kinds of people saying all kinds of prayers as that river of protest against abortion flows toward the U.S. Supreme Court.

But as a rule, the Baptist marchers do not pray the rosary with Catholics. Orthodox Jews do not chant the same dirges as Orthodox Christians. It would be rare to see Methodists pray with Mormons, or Presbyterians lifting their hands with the Pentecostals. They are united by a cause, but it is hard to blend their worship.

But the scene was different at the "Prayerfully Pro-Choice Interfaith Worship Service" at the U.S. Capitol's reflecting pool, just before last weekend's giant March for Women's Lives. The small service was led by clergy and laity from various traditions -- Jewish, Buddhist, Sikh, Unitarian and several mainline Christian groups.

"God stands with all of us, regardless of where we stand," said the Rev.

Mark Pawlowski of Planned Parenthood, reading from the "My Pro-Choice Credo" liturgy.

"When women choose to have abortions they are acting with integrity, aware of compassion and in realization of their own wisdom. To doubt the integrity, compassion or wisdom of women is to insult women and offend God."

This flock finds unity in a "broad," "universal" approach to faith, said Daniel Maguire, an ex-Catholic priest and author of "Sacred Choices: The Right to Contraception and Abortion in Ten World Religions." It's frustrating that images and sound bites from these rites are rarely featured in reports about the movement to defend abortion rights and sexual liberation, he said.

Journalists have, with their relentless focus on conservative believers at the heart of the abortion conflict, missed an important story, he said. There are religious people who believe that abortion can, in some circumstances, be a "holy choice" for women. Faith plays a different role in the two movements, but is crucial to both, he said.

"In the United States, I think the whole abortion issue is primarily religious," said Maguire, who teaches ethics at Marquette University. "For those on the religious right, of course, the goal is to legislate their religious beliefs into our political life. ... On the religious left, our goal is to hang in there and say that there is a religious case for our side, as well. We try to de-fang the arguments of the right."

Religious believers on the left, he said, should not hesitate to acknowledge that there are strong prohibitions against abortion in the ancient teachings in Christianity, Judaism, Buddhism and other religions.

But they must do a better job of arguing that these traditions include other voices that -- from his point of view -- provide reasons for women to be able to choose abortion if their reasons are grave enough.

The religious left, he said, can make the same case on other sexual issues -- including premarital sex and homosexuality.

"In other words, there is no one tradition on these matters," said Maguire. "The pope has one way of responding to these questions and I have another."

Needless to say, Father Frank Pavone of the Priests for Life network is familiar with Maguire's arguments on issues of sexual morality and totally disagrees -- across the board.

But Pavone agrees that abortion is not all that separates these two flocks of believers. They are separated by radically different beliefs about the very nature of belief itself.

This can be seen in their prayer services, he said.

"I think we mean something different when we say, 'I believe in the scriptures,' or 'I believe in the Catholic Church,' or 'I believe in the creed,' " said Pavone. "On the pro-life side, we really believe that what we are saying is objectively true and eternally true. So if that's the case, Baptists have good reason not pray the rosary with Catholics. They cannot act as if their prayers are all the same and that they believe the same things."

Pavone paused for a moment, and then concluded: "The people on the left truly believe that choice defines reality and that their choices are the ultimate reality. We don't believe that. We believe that we're supposed to make our choices conform to reality -- eternal reality. ... "These are two completely different approaches to faith and that shapes everything."

Life in the Methodist Minefield

The Rev. Julian Rush watched the headlines as 13 United Methodist pastors in the Pacific Northwest judged the fate of one of their colleagues.

Few, if any, facts were in dispute. The Rev. Karen Dammann was living openly in a lesbian relationship and leveled with her superiors. And everyone knew, after a generation of bitter strife, that their Book of Discipline banned "self-avowed practicing homosexuals" from ministry, because gay sex is "incompatible with Christian teachings."

Rush wasn't surprised by the trial and he wasn't surprised by the verdict -- not guilty.

After all, he survived a similar ecclesiastical minefield two decades ago in Colorado.

"What surprised me was the way the news reports brought it all back," said Rush, 67, who rocked the whole United Methodist Church when he left the closet in 1981. "It was spooky, like a flashback. ... I remembered that whole feeling of powerlessness and total vulnerability.

"I think that's probably a good thing. No matter how much progress we've made, we need to be reminded that things aren't settled yet."

Rush eventually retired with his clergy credentials intact. In the mid-1980s, his peers in the Rocky Mountain region twice ruled that there was "insufficient evidence" to bring the AIDS activist and former youth pastor to trial. After all, church law focused on "self-avowed practicing" homosexuals and Rush simply declined to answer questions about his sex life.

"I remember my lawyer saying, 'Make them prove it,' " said Rush, whose easy-going manner still betrays his Mississippi roots. "What were they going to do, hire a private investigator? No one wanted to do such an unseemly thing."

The Dammann jury found a similar technicality. While the Discipline says "the practice of homosexuality is incompatible with Christian teachings," the jury ruled that it never formally, legally, makes a "declaration" of this. But the jury did find this declarative statement: "Inclusiveness means openness, acceptance, and support that enables all persons to participate in the life of the Church, the community and the world. Thus, inclusiveness denies every semblance of discrimination.''

Based on decades of experience, Rush knows what will happen next. Furious conservatives will, on April 27, arrive at the two-week national United Methodist General Conference "with their nostrils flared and breathing fire," he said. At the same time, the confidence of the church's progressive establishment will "move up a notch or two" after a much-publicized victory. Both sides will go to Pittsburgh "with their guns loaded," he said.

The Internet is buzzing with drafts of resolutions to fix the Discipline and to force the bishops to get their flocks under control. Leaders on both sides acknowledge that the evangelical, growing churches of the heartland and Bible Belt hold a clear majority. Some of their leaders will call for repentance and reform in the Pacific Northwest.

"Fact is ... we don't need anything more in the Book of Discipline. We just need folks who are willing to abide by it or enforce it," said the Rev. James V. Heidinger II, president of the Good News renewal movement. "We could tweak and tighten, but unless folks are willing to abide by the will of General Conference, they will always find some words to parse or interpret differently."

Strangely enough, Rush basically agrees with this legal opinion. Laws cannot hide the fact that the United Methodist Church contains two radically different approaches to the faith, he said.

Traditionalists believe there is an "established," "infallible" and "permanent core of doctrine that people have to believe if they are going to be Christians," said Rush. But the "liberal side of the church sees itself as open and expansive and its doctrine, quite frankly, is not as well defined. It sees faith as a kind of process and it is constantly changing. ...

"One side knows how to lay down the law and the other side knows how to emote."

But the infighting will continue, said Rush, because everyone is afraid to push the scary button labeled "schism." That would be financially devastating.

"Everyone dances around that button," he said. "They really aren't trying to be clear and specific. They have to keep the Discipline vague enough to keep everyone in the tent. You end up with a kind of spiritual schizophrenia, but it holds things together."

Year 16 -- Passionate voices on God beat

The Harvard Divinity School didn't hide its feelings about "The Passion of the Christ."

Mel Gibson's hit is "deeply sadistic" and "militaristic," said history professor Robert Orsi, during a panel discussion.

"Pornographic," added New Testament scholar Ellen Aitken, speaking with what a press release called "biting contempt." The always outspoken Harvey Cox called it a "celebration of apocalyptic violence." Make that "obscene" and "blasphemous," according to writer James Carroll.

The room was packed but, apparently, there were no dissenting viewpoints. Which is interesting, if you think about it. I have found legions of intelligent, articulate people whose views of Gibson's work are all over the map, from ecstatic praise to incisive damnation.

Perhaps it's hard to find such diversity at Harvard. Perhaps there were some people present who liked the film -- even parts of it -- but didn't feel free to speak. It might have taken courage to speak up in such a "tolerant" setting.

Which is quite sad, I think. Every year, I mark this column's anniversary -- this is No. 16 -- by sharing some of the year's offbeat anecdotes that didn't fit into any particular column. If I have learned anything on the religion beat it is that sometimes you have to let people say what they really want to say and then just quote them saying it.

This gets wild, when people start opening up on matters of faith.

Trust me. Here are some recent examples.

* Speaking of the Passion phenomenon, the Glassport (Pa.) Assembly of God caused a stir with its civic Easter program that included the mock scourging of a youth minister in a bunny suit. The goal was to show that Easter is not about a bunny, but the suffering, death and resurrection of Jesus. The Associated Press reported that some viewers were confused. Melissa Salzmann said her 4-year-old son J.T. was "crying and asking me why the bunny was being whipped."

Clearly, the AP showed restraint. Obvious questions remained. Was the bunny in chains? And with what was the wabbit whipped?

* Yes, it's a cheap shot. Addressing the election of gay Bishop Gene Robinson, the Los Angeles Times opined: "The actions taken by the New Hampshire Episcopalians are an affront to Christians everywhere. I am just thankful that the church's founder, Henry VIII, and his wife Catherine of Aragon, his wife Anne Boleyn, his wife Jane Seymour, his wife Anne of Cleves, his wife Katherine Howard and his wife Catherine Parr are no longer here to suffer through this assault on our traditional Christian marriage."

What's next on that story? Keep in mind these words from Karl Marx: "The English established church will more readily pardon an attack on 38 of its 39 Articles (of Religion) than on 1/39th of its income."

* Speaking of the Los Angeles Times, critic Mark Swed called the opera "Die Frau Ohne Schatten" a "glorious and goofy pro-life paean." But some someone changed "pro-life" to "anti-abortion," which would have been a different opera. Or did the editing software do that?

* The British edition of Cosmopolitan has decided there may be more to life than sex and credit cards. The magazine's new "spirituality editor," Hannah Borno, wrote: "I've come to the painful realization that men and shoes are not enough to make me happy. The key to true contentment lies elsewhere."

But not in a pew, she said. "We're looking at spirituality rather than organized religion, because that's where there seems to be a demand from our readers. They want something a bit more alternative."

*A reader sent this: Gilligan equals sloth and the skipper represents anger. Then Thurston Howell III equals greed, Lovey Howell is gluttony, Ginger is lust, the professor is pride and, finally, Mary Ann represents envy. Who knew?

* The interfaith scribes at Beliefnet.com asked religious leaders to complete this statement: "If I were God for a day I would..." Phil "Bob the Tomato" Vischer of the VeggieTales offered this: "I would, with the noblest of intentions, make a monumental mess. Having seen the sort of messes I can create in my personal and professional life with my tiny little powers, I can only imagine what horrific catastrophe I could engineer with omnipotence. I'll leave God right where he is, thank you."

All those Left Behind Catholics

Catholic writer Carl Olson was struggling as he led his audience through the maze of competing Christian beliefs about the Second Coming of Jesus.

There are premillennialists who believe Christ will reign for 1,000 years on earth. But it wouldn't be fair to lump them with the ultra-literal premillennial dispensationalists, he noted, since these camps contain bitter rifts over the timing of "the rapture." That's when the trumpet sounds, the dead rise and Christians soar to meet Christ in the air. Then there is the ancient amillennial stance, without a 1,000-year kingdom. Oh, and don't forget the postmillennialists.

Rows of middle-aged, cradle Catholics in Salem, Ore., gazed back -- utterly lost.

"I was getting absolutely nowhere," said Olson. "So I finally asked them: 'How many of you have ever heard a single sermon or even some kind of talk at church about what the Catholic faith actually teaches about the Second Coming?' There were 200 or more people there and four or five hands went up. That's what you see everywhere."

These Catholics didn't know their catechism. But, many could quote chapter and verse from another doctrinal source -- the "Left Behind" novels by evangelical superstars Tim LaHaye and Jerry Jenkins. This amazes Olson, who was raised in what he called a "strong, fundamentalist Protestant" home before converting to Catholicism.

The first 11 novels have sold around 50 million copies and that doesn't include the racks of children's books, audio editions, games, comics, DVDs and music products. Now the climactic "Glorious Appearing: The End of Days" is out, complete with a warrior Christ on a white stallion leading the angelic version of shock and awe.

The powers that be at the New York Times were struck by this scene: "Tens of thousands of foot soldiers dropped their weapons, grabbed their heads or their chests, fell to their knees, and writhed as they were invisibly sliced asunder. Their innards and entrails gushed to the desert floor, and as those around them turned to run, they too were slain, their blood pooling and rising in the unforgiving brightness of God."

For millions of modern Catholics, this is more exciting than the works of Justin Martyr, Augustine and the Second Vatican Council. Olson said it's hard to know what chunk of the "Left Behind" audience is Catholic, but publicists say that 11 percent is a good estimate.

This shouldn't be foreign territory for Catholics, said Olson, author of "Will Catholics Be 'Left Behind'?" In every Mass, they say they believe Jesus will "come again in glory to judge the living and dead." Catholics are taught -- along with Orthodox Christians, Lutherans, Anglicans and many others -- that "the rapture" will follow a time of tribulation and happen at the Second Coming, not seven years earlier as taught in the "Left Behind" series.

But it's hard to resist thrillers in which the mysterious Book of Revelation is decoded into visions of United Nations plots, global media, Chinese armies, Israeli jets and, well, Satan running the Vatican.

"Lots of Catholics tell me that 'Left Behind' can't be bad because LaHaye and Jenkins have the pope getting raptured along with the good guys," said Olson. "They don't even notice that this pope is considered a radical because he has started preaching what sure sounds like evangelical Protestantism. In other words, he's a real Christian. The next pope turns out to be Anti-Christ's right-hand man."

Meanwhile, most priests and bishops are silent, said Olson. Many fear being called "fundamentalists" if they even discuss issues of prophecy and the end times. Others may not believe what their church teaches.

The Catholic bishops of Illinois did release a "Left Behind" critique, claiming: "Overall, these books reinforce an unhealthy and immature belief in a harshly judgmental God whose mercy we earn by good behavior." But Olson said too many Catholic leaders refuse to take seriously the content of the books, movies and television programs that shape the beliefs of their people.

"If you want to be a good shepherd, you have to care about this stuff," he said. "These kinds of books and movies are where most Americans -- including Catholics -- get their beliefs and attitudes about faith and spirituality. ... You cannot wish these things away. They're real."

Passover questions for 2004

The lobby contains what security experts call a "mantrap."

Guards monitor these bomb-proof doors, along with exterior video cameras and a device that sniffs the mail. Windows are laminated with plastic, so an explosion would not send glass shards slicing into offices. Massive concrete barriers could stop a truck.

Welcome to the American Jewish Committee's home in New York. This isn't mere "ethnic panic." No, "lethal anti-Semitism" is on the rise, even in places long thought to be safe, noted Gabriel Schoenfeld, senior editor at Commentary magazine.

This will not be an ordinary Passover.

"More synagogues have been destroyed in France in the past five years by acts of desecration