Is the movie "The Nativity Story" anti-Catholic?

[Julie_A]

My question is: Is the movie The Nativity Story based on Catholic teaching? I read a review of the movie on a Catholic blog that condemned it for Catholics and says that it is totally against our teaching on the Immaculate Conception. Yet our parish priest and school principal sent our 3rd- through 8th-graders to see it. I talked with our pastor and he said it was fine. My husband and I went to see the movie ourselves. My husband thought it was an excellent, moving movie. For the most part, I thought the same, yet after reading the document on the Immaculate Conception I’m questioning my judgment.

 

[Michelle_Arnold]

I have not yet seen the movie but the review in question is a particularly unfortunate example of Catholic puritanism. Because the movie was not specifically Catholic in its presentation of the infancy narratives, it has been harshly condemned. The reviewers could learn much from the Evangelical Christians who embraced Mel Gibson’s The Passion of the Christ, even though that movie contained a specifically Marian and eucharistic theology that the Evangelicals did not share (for example, please see this article).

For **a much more balanced review of The Nativity Story **by a Catholic, I recommend Steven Greydanus’s review from his site DecentFilms.com.

Recommended reading:

Did Mary suffer labor pains?
The Nativity Story and Catholic Teaching by Steven Greydanus