A SCENE from an animated film at the new Acropolis Museum which shows Christian priests destroying parts of the Parthenon has been deleted following protests by the Greek Orthodox Church.
The New Acropolis Museum, created by Swiss-born architect Bernard Tschumi
As a protest against his film being censored, the creator of the segment, Greek-born French filmmaker Constantin Costa-Gavras, has demanded that his name be taken off the credits, according to this report.
Costa-Gavras told Greece’s Mega TV channel:
Priests used to destroy ancient temples. Now they want to remove scenes from a film. This is the kind (of censorship) that used to happen in the former Soviet Union.
The 100 second segment shows damage done to Parthenon over the centuries – from marauding Germanic warriors in 267 AD to the removal of a large part of the frieze by British diplomat Lord Elgin in early 19th century.
It also shows figures clad in black climbing up ladders and destroying part of the Parthenon frieze; the scene referred to well-documented episodes of destruction that took place in the early Byzantine period (5th-8th centuries AD), when Christians often demolished monuments and temples belonging to the old pagan era.
Church officials contended the film misrepresented the attitude of the Greek Orthodox Church toward Greece’s ancient heritage.
Greek media reported the segment was excised after the intervention of Culture Minister Antonis Samaras.
Museum director Dimitris Pantermalis said:
The segment that was cut was no more than 12 seconds long and the accompanying narration has been left intact. The film depicted a historical fact – that some early Christians destroyed, or tried to destroy, ancient monuments, and this fact remains. … I cannot understand those who said that (in) showing figures clad in black robes, we depicted priests. That’s what people were wearing in the Byzantine period, not trousers.
Pantermalis later released a statement defending the cuts in the film as:
An effort to eliminate misunderstanding and not censorship at all.
The Freethinker was founded in 1881 by GW Foote, an outspoken critic of religion. After the publication of 
July 27th, 2009 at 5:28 am
The Christians didn't take long to start demolishing pagan temples. Constantine's mother Helena was given a big bag of money to go tour the Holy Land and find Christian relics. Amazingly, almost everyone she dangled the money in front of had Christ's holy toenail clippings or some such squirrelled away somewhere. After a few more bribes, she discovered that Hadrian's temple of Venus was built on top of the greatest relic of all: Christ's tomb.
"…a truly dreadful sepulchre of souls, by building a gloomy shrine of lifeless idols to the impure spirit whom they call Venus, and offering detestable oblations therein on profane and accursed altars."
Eusebius, "Life of Constantine", III, xxvi
http://www.fordham.edu/halsall.....tan…
Helena wasn't bound by all this modern, namby pamby, politically correct, respect for other religions. So naturally she had the temple destroyed and it's foundations dug up. And low and behold, there was the tomb of Jesus.
How did they know they'd found the tomb of Jesus? According to Socrates Scholasticus, the Roman executioners had kindly let Jesus' followers take his cross, and those of the thieves crucified with him, and buried them in the tomb with him. All Helena had to do was figure out which cross was which. Fortunately, they managed to find a woman who was critically ill. They touched her with each cross in turn.
"Nope, number 1 doesn't do anything."
"Nope, number 2 doesn't do anything."
"Hurrah, she's cured, chuck the other crosses away, number 3 is the true cross."
http://www.ccel.org/ccel/schaf.....xvi…
July 27th, 2009 at 9:39 am
The film can be seen here:
http://barthsnotes.wordpress.c.....ene…
July 27th, 2009 at 4:11 pm
When a story is reprinted from an external source, might I suggest that, as long as a passage is not cited as a quotation, the dogmatically Christian dating system, AD, that is insulting to the 84 percent of the human race who do not believe they are living in the "Year of the Master", be replaced by the scientifically neutral CE, "Common Era"?
July 27th, 2009 at 8:45 pm
The one thing that is common to most religions is their total fear of have the light of truth shined upon them. They will always find a way to hide in the dark. i.e. We object to that portrail so don't show it.
Or athiest are bad just look at Hitler, when anyone with a brain knows he was a catholic. And many other tricks to hide the truth.
If they don't like the portrail then stop doing the actions!
July 27th, 2009 at 10:42 pm
Since CybrgnX is not the only person to post, not mere typos (I have done that myself despite at least two proofreadings), but spelling mistakes caused by sheer laziness, I urge all contributors to this site to check the dictionary before hitting SUBMIT. If you lack a home dictionary, and intend to continue publishing your views, then get one.
PORTRAYAL. ATHEISTS. Although "catholic' can be generic, when used as the proper name of a specific cult, it should have been capitalized.