Thousands attend Plano 'Passion' showings
06:09 PM CST on Wednesday, February 25, 2004
By KIMBERLY DURNAN / Dallas Web Staff
PLANO – Thousands of Dallas-area residents began Ash Wednesday by becoming some of the first in the nation to attend early morning screenings of The Passion of the Christ, Mel Gibson's long-awaited film depicting Jesus’ final day.
Noshing on doughnuts, coffee and traditional film fare like popcorn in the lobby of the Cinemark Tinseltown, the North Texans began viewing the film after midnight. They were there as guests of Arch Bonnema of Plano, who rented the entire theater complex for $42,000 so fellow parishioners at Prestonwood Baptist Church, theology students and others could share the experience.
snip:
The Rev. Jack Graham, pastor at Prestonwood Baptist, dismissed the idea that the film was anti-Semitic. “Mel Gibson shows clearly that Jesus voluntarily gave his life. It’s a sacrifice for sin,” he said.
Graham said he expected the movie to be popular across many cultures.
“We know we’ve never seen anything like this in a religious film. The impact is yet to be seen. I’m prayerful in terms of social impact, Christians will be bolder in their faith and more committed in Christ and the good news,” said Graham, who also is president of the 16 million-member Southern Baptist Convention.
snip:
Headmaster Larry Taylor helped chaperone more than 200 high school students from Prestonwood Christian Academy. He said the parents understood the violent nature of the film and had signed a waiver allowing their children to view it.
“In our opinion, the R-rating stands for ‘real’. It’s a real visual for a true story,” he said.
For all the rest go to:
http://www.wfaa.com/sharedcontent/dws/wfaa/latestnews/stories/022504dnentpassionopens.280026b9.htmlFun little tidbit about this "Mega-Church":
Last year, a few members of the North Texas Coalition for a Just Peace, decided this would be a good place to stage a protest on a Sunday morning (it was shortly after the bombs had started to fall if I remember correctly). There were probably 10-15 people and they had a banner that read "Who Would Jesus Bomb?" One of those gathered in the protest was actually a member of Prestonwood and was a volunteer serving some function with the childrens department.
They arrived early in the am and the Plano Police showed up. The protesters shared coffee and doughnuts with them and everything was okay. No problems. A little while later one of the many pastors' of the church showed up to tell them they HAD to LEAVE. The message and their presence was disturbing those coming to church that morning.
This group did leave, but the most disturbing part of all, was that this one person was fired from her volunteer position and as a result of that action no longer felt welcome in this "place of worship" and sought another church. Great bunch of people here (lots of sarcasm).
View Pictures of this place here (then run as fast as you can, in the other direction). We actually watched this place being built and for some time thought it was some type of airport hangar or big corporate manufacturing place. We worked only a couple of blocks away:
http://www.rogerhoganstudios.com/special_projects/prestonwood.htmlPlano is a truly frightening place in this country.
We mostly just find it incredibly sad. We think those that worship at Prestonwood just might be missing at least a message or two from Jesus. And yes, we have actually been inside. My mother-in-law just had to go. This little church has a really "rich" little history. The pastor that founded this little church wound up being disgraced in a scandal involving another woman (go figure) and I think he may have either died tragically or actually offed himself. Oh, and Mary Kay herself was one of the original major donors in the beginning.
Long before the scandal, when it was not quite yet a mega-church.
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