If you actually read what I wrote you would find I did not make reference to all of Islam, I mentioned specifically the extremists of Islam, as your faith like the Christian faith does have extremists. There was nothing hypocritical in what I wrote, but I do question your motives for such a comment or are you just blowing hot air because I was making a comment, any comment about Islam. Have you heard of free speech? If you do not believe in free speech, then I would have to question your motives for looking at this website.

My comments in my article state “extreme Islam”, if I had written “Islam”, then you may have had cause to complain, but I did not, so get your facts straight. You can try and deny such things have happened in Islamic history, but I think you would expose yourself to a certain amount of ridicule as I can think of many examples of this throughout history.

I have many Moslem friends and I respect their beliefs as much as they respect my freedom to choose. While I do not share their beliefs I know enough about Islam to be informed and make a choice based on this and my friends do agree with me that extremists in any religion are bad for everyone. Perhaps you should consider that.

I am glad you liked the movie and I agree with those comments you made about it. The books are excellent and well worth a read.

Perhaps in the future, before launching into a sad attempt to be personally insulting, you may consider what you have read before writing, particularly on a website called “The Freethinker”.

To recap at my view on religion as a whole: I was raised by Catholic parents, dad that rarely attended Church, and the most open-minded Catholic of all-time, my mom, who went to Church regularly. Through a bout with what I thought was a serious condition, I found myself thinking a lot about death and through this I have questioned everything about the Church. Reading history on their past, the biggest piece of fiction of all-time, the bible, I have began to think of myself as a “religious agnostic.” While I’m Cathloic and believe in God, I truly find myself closer to the spiritual teachings of the Buhdists, not the narrowminded, hypocritical view of the Christians.

I understand the last two installments of the series being met with Cathloic protest but the first book was very tame, only vague symbolism. Yet even as being tame, New Line took out of thirty minutes of film (google it) reordered sequences, placing the ending shots at a climatic middle sequence where they are out of place, and flat out removed the book’s ending, which greatly dissapointed me and my mom who saw it with me and enjoyed it reasonably, laments whenever I mention it “The ending was simply horrible.”

So now I see the horrible fate of this series has ended, possibly putting an end to the career of what I thought to be a very good young star, Dakota Blue Richards, and I now find myself even further pushed away from the Church. Through this you realize all the Catholic Church wants is your loyalty, not what you do after you pledge. They don’t protest movie that display violence and prostitution (Departed, American Gangster) yet make sure any movie questioning them (Da Vinci Code, Golden Compass).

Basically they attempt to get us (the youth) to join them even closer, and end pushing people like me even farther away. Anyway, this my rant. I hope that if these sequels truly never do get made (still I hope) I am sure eventually there will be a remake/reboot in the next decade or so, and give this series new hope. I sure hope so. TO be honest though, the first book was the best so they saw the greatest chapter. Thanks for listening and remember lawlolawl

Yes, a religious group (CATHOLICS) have slated the Golden Compass movie and condemned any sequels. It is THEM that have a huge problem with this, so there was ABSOLUTELY NO need to mention Islam or anything even remotely related to Islam. I’m a Muslim (or “Moslem” as you would understand it) and I thoroughly enjoyed the movie, and believe that anyone who didn’t is still entitled to their opinions but should not impress it on others.

If you only knew anything true about my religion (and not what you think you already know, which is not very much at all), you would know that it is most certainly not oppressive and everyone has the right to their own beliefs.

I saw this movie as pure fantasy and had nothing to do with any religions. You want people to view these movies open-mindedly, yet you are so ready to criticise what you know nothing about! So wake up and stop being hypocritical!

I loved the movie and hope there will be sequels. In the meantime, I’m going to keep busy by reading the books.

In short, the Catholic Church need to take care of their own business, and start doing some housecleaning of their own before they start trying to force other people to see to stay away from anything. They could start by warning the Parents to tell their Children to stay away from these Pedophile priests the Church knows exist, and where most of them are, and turn them over to the law!

I can only imagine what the Catholic Church thinks of Harry Potter. The Bible tells us that the Creation was done by God, by “Fiat”. That’s a very old world term for “Magic”! I think the Catholic Church is more concerned that People might get the idae that the Church is very much like the magisterium in the movie!

John

a sad sad sad situation