Denunciation Backfires

There are times I wonder why people or organisations bother to "denounce" books. As far as I can tell, it only brings publicity to that book. I've just read a news article concerning two books: "Mary, The Mother Of Jesus" by Catholic journalist Jacques Duquesne and "Mary, A Dogmatic Journey" by Dominican theologian Dominique Cerbelaud.

If it weren't for this news article, I never would have heard of these books, but after reading it, I've become intrigued, especially by Duquesne's book. I even looked for it on amazon.co.uk, but it's not listed. Hopefully it will be before long because I really do want to read it. This afternoon I watched a documentary on one of the Discovery Channels about James, Brother of Jesus. It just shows how theologically challenged I am that all the information in the programme was new to me.

I don't think that it compromises my Christian beliefs to read books such as this. I believe that it only adds to my existing knowledge. I studied Juddaism, Hinduism, Islam and Buddhism in college, and I don't believe that compromised my beliefs, though I know that some of my more conservative friends and family don't see it the same way. In fact, I always thought I was weird because of some of my personal beliefs. Before I started university, I told someone that I believed God presented himself to different cultures in ways He thought were culturally relevant to those people. Then one of my history professors stated the exact same thing in a lecture, and I stopped questioning myself. But that doesn't mean I stopped wanting to learn and explore these topics more fully.

Unfortunately I haven't had much of an opportunity to read up on world religions, but hopefully I can fix that one day. Perhaps Duquesne's book will be the first in a long list.