The latest Dan Brown atrocity has hit the silver screen.  Though I am myself a lapsed Catholic waiting for the Tridentine Latin mass to return in force before being born again, I find that I am offended whenever someone is out there making a buck by bashing Holy Mother the Church.  “Angels and Demons” preceded the Da Vinci code and is, if anything, more appallingly written.  If you enjoy Harvard professors leaping out of exploding helicopters and using a piece of cardboard to glide down to a safe landing in the Tiber River you will dig it.  As I lasted only about six minutes into the Da Vinci cinematic feast before putting my foot through the television screen, I predict that my tolerance for Angels will not even last that long.

What offends me most is that the books were marketed as being meticulously researched to suggest to the potential reader that the tales of skulduggery in the Church are all too plausible.  Anyone who has actually lived in Rome would quickly note that Brown and his alleged art historian wife get the city’s topography, monuments, history, and art all screwed up on numerous occasions.  Brown clearly does not know how to get from point A to point B in Rome, possibly because he spent too much time on the Piazza Navona knocking back Bellinis instead of actually hoofing his way around the city to explore the places that he writes about.  Why isn’t there some serious examination in the media about the crap that Dan Brown writes?  Why isn’t there a serious examination in the media about anything?