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Read any number of reviews of “The Good Shepherd,” Robert De Niro’s fascinating look at the birth of the Central Intelligence Agency through the eyes of a character loosely based on former counter-intelligence head James Jesus Angleton, and you will recognize variations on a theme: the corruption and eventual erosion of the soul. In the…

Last fall, researcher George Barna–the Gallup of the Christian scene–found that Denzel Washington is better known and better loved than any living American religious figure. Lately, it seems as if Washington is running up the score. Denzel got a faith bump this fall, as Zondervan Publishing debuted the first (New Testament) installment of “The Bible…

With the success of the film adaptation of the musical “Chicago,” and to a lesser degree, “Rent,” Hollywood looks to the world of Broadway one more time for a hit–this time with the Motown celebration “Dreamgirls.” Beyonce, Jamie Foxx, and “American Idol” contender Jennifer Hudson shimmy, shake, strut, and sing their way through the 1960s…

Hard to say whether the Catholic-born Kabbalah convert Madonna celebrates Christmas. Last year, she reportedly prepped for the Yule by having four 72-pint firkins of ale delivered to her Wiltshire home: a good sign that Father Christmas was expected at the Ritchie-Ciccone residence. On the other hand, the British tabloids report that Yohane Banda, father…

One more follow-up to CNN’s “Most Controversial Celebrities of 2006“: Mel Gibson, Tom Cruise, Lindsay Lohan, and Britney Spears not only provided non-stop fun and follies on which a starving (or bored) cultural audience feasted, but something else far more newsworthy–and perhaps dangerous–was going on as well. It has probably been true every year and…

While some reviewers panned it, I thought “A Night at the Museum” was full of surprises. The advertising run-up to this movie made it seem like it’d be sort of an indoors version of “Jurassic Park,” and the first several minutes bored me with another (overdone) Ben-Stiller-is-a-good-guy-who-gets-picked-on character. After that, though, things got exciting. Old…

In “Not Everybody Loves Patricia,” Jesse Green of The New York Times writes a lengthy profile of Patricia Heaton–the two-time Emmy Award winner for her nine-season turn on “Everybody Loves Raymond“–and her struggles with being at once a popular actress and a not-so-popular Christian. Raised in a conservative Catholic household where “they attended Mass every…

President Ford’s death has set off a week of reflection and commentary regarding his presidency and predictions about his lasting legacy. I’m sorry that one of the prime stories about his life has not been overly reported, and I understand why. Many of us depend on newsmagazines, short film, bites and comic relief for contributions…

The connection between spirituality and art was once a given: think Dante or even the dark and edgy paintings of Breugel. In our day, art is understood to be secular, and the more edge, the more secular we expect the artist to be. A perfect example is The New York Times’s Sunday profile of David…

While I am still on a movie-watching spree so I can finish my list of Top Ten Films of 2006, I thought I would share with Idol Chatter readers the books and music that are some of the best of this past year, but which, in my estimation, are also the most overlooked. So it’s…
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