Conservative Christian blogger La Shawn Barber is up in arms about the upcoming release of the movie version of Dan Brown’s best-selling book, "The Da Vinci Code".

She acknowledges that the book/movie is "fiction", but

that’s hardly the point. In a world hostile to the faith,…

What evidence is there that the world, or even the United States, is "hostile to faith"?  The only evidence of that lies in the fact that we don’t allow faith to mix with government, because that raises the thorny question of . . . whose faith should be allowed to rule.

…we must be prepared to defend the faith when confronted by questions and absurd arguments made on the nonsense within the pages of this book.

That’s a very telling admission.   Note how mere "questions"  "confront" faith — causing a threat from which faith must be "defend[ed]".

Yup.  God gave us free will and an inquisitive mind, but if someone, you know, uses it, that’s an affront to God’s creation.  Go figure.

So . . . "hostile to faith", my ass.  These people are merely paranoid.  They don their sanctimonious suits of armor merely because a fictional movie might cause someone to question their own faith.

But I especially like the comment from one of La Shawn’s readers.

Can you imagine… just imagine… what muslims would do if such a book/movie were made about islam?

-They commit terror in the face of Korans in the toilet
-They riot when someone suggests Mohammad would’ve married a Miss Universe contestant
-They issue a fatwa against Salman Rushdie for the “blasphemous” Satanic Verses

Talk about "hostile to faith"!   Or does "faith" only mean "Christian faith"?  To cast stones against "Muslims" in this way is like commenting that "Christians" are like Eric Rudolph or Fred Phelps. (e.g., "Christians — they blow up abortions clinics and kill people")

Here’s the skinny: every religion has its extremists, whether they be Christian-based or Islam-based.   Don’t attack other religions with a stereotypical and false image, and then whine about how Christianity is under siege.

But our commentator goes on:

I think the DaVinci Code’s movie release may provide an opportunity for Christians to show that we can oppose such a blasphemous work without resorting to violence…

Was there a doubt?  Is Christianity suffering from some bad PR problem because the violent tendencies of its adherents?

Look, I will be the last person to begrudge anybody, Christian or otherwise, not to voice their opinions.  But to protest a fictional movie like "The Da Vinci Code" will only convey the message that Christians are threatened by its " religious" message.

My advice?  Leave it alone.  It’s a movie, for crying out loud. 

And have conservative Christians learned nothing from Schiavo?  Their proselytizing turns people away from Christianity.  In the end, they merely (and literally) are preaching to the converted, and it causes mainstream Christians to wretch.