Pakistan has banned cinemas from showing ‘The Da Vinci Code’ movie at the weekend, with officials giving the reason that the film contained blasphemous material about Jesus.
Pakistan, a Muslim-majority country, has decided to ban the film to give respect to the feelings of the country’s minority Christian population.Although the film has not yet been shown in any cinemas across the South-Asia country, Christians in Pakistan earlier in the week staged protests in two cities demanding a complete global ban against the controversial movie.
Out of Pakistan’s 150 million people, just three percent are Christian, but the country’s government have been sensitive to the feelings made-known by the protesters.
The Da Vinci Code novel, written by Dan Brown, has caused huge debate across the world, after the fictional book describes how Jesus Christ had children with one of his followers Mary Magdalene. The novel then goes on to explain that the descendants of His blood-line remain living today, causing outrage amongst Christian communities.
Minister for Culture, Ghulam Jamal told AP, “Islam teaches us to respect all prophets of Allah mighty, and degradation of any prophet is tantamount to defamation of the rest.”
One of Pakistan’s leading Christians, Shahbaz Bhatti, gave his thanks to the country’s officials for their decision, and said that the ban would help ensure sectarian harmony.Bhatti said, “The Da Vinci Code is a sacrilegious act in the guise of freedom of expression and fiction. It has hurt the religious sentiments of Christians and Muslims throughout the world,” according to AP.
The prominent cleric in Pakistan then went on to criticise the author of the book, Dan Brown, saying that he had “evil intentions” and had gone about to “undermine the historical as well as theological truth about Jesus Christ.”
In India, the release of the movie has also caused a great stir. Just last week a fourth state in India came out to ban the release of the Hollywood blockbuster just weeks after the release of the film.
The southern Indian state of Tamil Nadu made the announcement in an official statement following appeals from local Christian leaders who feared that the film might hurt the community’s religious sentiments.
