Word: paganisms
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Koestler has discerned a striking parallel between the rise of the Christian Church on the crumbling base of pagan Rome and the advance of contemporary Communism against a civilization which has lost faith in its God and is slowly disintegrating into the resultant void. He is not comparing the moral worth of Christianity with that of Communism; rather he demonstrates regretfully that strong faith of any kind can give impetus to social movements...
...Manhattan gallery had 35 Rubens oils on exhibition last week-enough to hint at the height and breadth of his genius. For all its size, Rubens' genius was not deep in any spiritual sense: the pagan gods he painted were muscular and gay, his goddesses fat and sassy; his Christs were muscular and mild, his Madonnas magnificently maternal. A hearty, happy man, Rubens filled them all with the hot blood and gusty breath of life...
...Pagan Love Song (MGM) casts Esther Williams adrift in the shallows of a musicomedy set in Tahiti (and filmed on Hawaiian locations). Esther plays a well-to-do Tahitian half-caste who meets, loses and finally gets a plantation heir (Howard Keel) newly arrived from Ohio. In the full flush of health, she glows in almost every tint of the Technicolor spectrum, swims not only on the water and under it but also (in a dream sequence) in the sky. In lieu of comedy, Actress Williams and Singer Keel laugh with unconvincing gaiety on the flimsiest excuse. The score consists...
...eyed little (5 ft.) man with the high, fringed dome and the long, lugubrious stage Irishman's face had moved Critic Burton Rascoe to exclaim: "Never have I seen a man ... so easy, free and natural, so untamed by society, so untouched by conventions, so spontaneous, pagan, joyous." Stephens reminded Rascoe of the leprechauns, the gnomelike creatures the poet had written about in The Crock of Gold, along with the god Pan, philosophers, children, wives, cops, fairies and other inhabitants of the bizarre half-world of Cloca Mora...
...that celebration of the Christian Christmas in the U.S. is coming more & more to resemble the pagan behavior that St. Paul warned against in his letter to the Romans. Last week, from pulpits across the nation, came warnings that holiday celebrations-particularly office parties-are getting out of hand...