I don’t know whether Mel Gibson is an anti-Semite or not, but it seems pretty clear that he, or someone working for him, is a liar. At least, the Vatican is strongly denying that the Pope endorsed the film, as Gibson has been claiming.
Not that Gibson and his crew are dumb; the manufatured quotation — “It is as it was” — is simply brilliant.
Wouldn’t you expect, though, that someone as passionately Catholic as Gibson claims to be would have a little more respect for the Papacy?
Update Two readers inform me that Gibson is only dubiously Catholic, being part of the fringe that rejects the authority of the Second Vatican Council and the legitimacy of the line of popes starting with John XXIII. Apparently he’s started his own non-parish church, which is definitely a no-no. That’s asserted in this article, whose accuracy I can’t vouch for. (Note the hilarious assertion that Catholic teaching never changes.)