what muslims can learn from the da vinci code

It speaks volumes that the country where the Da Vinci Code film has taken the least money relative to GDP is Nigeria – a country nowadays most well known for its perfection of the internet scam. The Nigerians, obviously no strangers to scams, are not about to be duped by an amateur like Dan Brown.

It is also instructive that the country that has proven the most gullible is Iceland: hardly surprising given this is a country that apparently counts mutton smoked in its own dung as one of its national delicacies. If one will eat such a supposed delicacy, then Dan Brown’s syntactic swill will be a familiar taste.

However, what is most interesting about the film is not the film itself but rather the reaction of the Catholic organisation, Opus Dei. For those Nigerian readers and others who may not have seen the film, Opus Dei are portrayed as a murderous, secretive cult whose albino assassin Silas travels the world murdering people who may be getting too close to the “truth”. Naturally, the figure was not very flattering to albinos or the real life Opus Dei group. However, the offended albino community might take some comfort in the fact that whereas albinos often have very poor eyesight, Silas the Murderous Monk can drive a car and shoot a gun with pinpoint accuracy.

Given the rather negative portrayal of the group, one might have imagined Opus Dei to have responded to the film with a barrage of law suits and chants of ‘vilification’, ‘hate speech’ and a few angry protests at the front of cinemas. However, the reaction has been rather different and provides an interesting lesson to Muslims who often face the problem of equally bad press. It seems that Opus Dei saw the film, and the associated hysteria, as an opportunity to explain to people what they see as the truth about their organisation.

Consider this press release from the group. It is dispassionate, understanding of public interest in the group, but provides people with opportunities to discover an alternative narrative to that offered in the film. The opening paragraphs read:

Many people are intrigued by the claims about Christian history and theology presented in The Da Vinci Code. We would like to remind them that The Da Vinci Code is a work of fiction, and it is not a reliable source of information on these matters.

The Da Vinci Code has raised public interest in the origins of the Bible and of central Christian doctrines such as the divinity of Jesus Christ. These topics are important and valuable to study, and we hope that interested readers will be motivated to study some of the abundant scholarship on them that is available in the non-fiction section of the library.

Jack Valero, the Opus Dei flack in the UK, offers a succint summary of their strategy in dealing with the film and the supposed ‘backlash’.

“We are going to be nice. Nice and positive and friendly. Instead of being the angry placard-waving Christians who spoil everybody’s fun, Opus Dei is going to take a different approach,” he said.

Mr Valero, who joined Opus Dei at the age of 16 after seeing a sermon by its founder, Josemaria Escriva, said the organisation should welcome the success of the book and likely success of the film.

“This has given us a huge exposure,” he said. “We couldn’t buy this publicity. Opus Dei has become the best-known religious organisation in the country thanks to Dan Brown.”

The strategy appears to be working. Opus Dei have actively embraced the media, inviting members of the press to their facilities and answering their questions about the group and its activities. Bishop Javier Echevarria told AFP that the book and film had generated a massive amount of publicity for the group.

“The visits to the Opus Dei website are running at about three million a month. Our strategy is one of transparency,” Echevarria told the Italian daily Corriere della Sera.

Perhaps Muslims can learn something from the Opus Dei response. Both the Catholic Church and Opus Dei were faced with what they see as both an heretical assault on their faith and a gross misrepresentation of the organisation. They didn’t burn down some embassies, set fire to some effigies of Tom Hanks or reach for some boilerplate about the ‘evil media’. They saw an opportunity to use the rush of interest to their advantage and they seem to have, at least in part, benefited from the exposure. They invited people to their organisation, offered speakers to anyone who might want to listen to their side of the story, and actively engaged the media to get their message across.

When faced with a similar crises, there is no reason why we can’t do the same.