Journeys of a Catholic Poster Girl

I post this every year, as a reminder for all of you to run to buy/rent The Passion of the Christ (now available in a two-disc “Definitive version” set!).

note: this is totally unedited and unrevised…I didn’t even read it before I posted it here, so it is my comments unvarnished from the first time I saw it.

February 26, 2004

OK, I am just going to write whatever comes to mind…but here are some of the impressions I have, fresh out of seeing this incredible work by Mr. Gibson and crew:

1) The violence is not, as you may have been led to believe, in surmountable and over-the-top. The violence is there, to be sure, but it doesn’t really hit you until you see it through the eyes of Mary, or John, or the apostles. The violence serves to show us how much He loved us. The scourging is not twenty minutes of constant pain…there are flashbacks to happier times, and the focus switches from Jesus to Mary, and back again. Whenever the pain seems to be too much, Gibson gives us a flashback to better times. There is even humor in the movie…though very little. (Jesus is building a table, and Mary says it’s too high. Jesus says that there’ll be tall chairs to go with it. To this, Mary says “it’ll never catch on.” The other “funny” part is when Barabas is released to the crowd, and you see that he’s a few marbles short of a bag. That’s kind of funny…but not really.)
2) The message is superb. It should be required viewing for the entire human race. It is just superb. Jesus’ love overflows every scene, and the message of love and forgiveness permeates the entire film. You cannot leave this film without being staggered by the sheer weight and enormity of God’s love for us, His children. It is overwhelming. You want to run to a church and thank God for sending His Son to us. You are overcome with gratitude.
3) It brings the entire Passion and Jesus’ message to life. You see everything in vivid detail—not gory detail, but vivid detail. You really understand the sacrifice of Jesus. I have never seen the Stations of the Cross as vividly as I did tonight. You feel like you are there, with Jesus and His Mother, watching everything unfold. It is a tremendous feeling.
4) You want to be a better person after watching this film. You want to pray, and live better, and be better, just to thank God for doing this for us. It is an amazing thing. I left the theater feeling lightheaded and like I was going to faint. The weight of God’s goodness and glory is overwhelming.
5) As for the finer points of cinema, it is a wonderfully done movie in its own right. The music is so powerful and fits perfectly, a mixture of orchestral strings and a full adult chorus, with strong voices that heighten the emotion to an unimaginable pitch. The acting is stupendous. Maia Morgenstern as Mary is masterful in every scene, but especially when she runs to Jesus as He falls under the weight of the cross and says, “I’m here.” She is the perfect Mother of God. James Caviezel, as Jesus, is nothing short of amazing. He is just beyond words. He is the perfect Jesus. While you’re watching it, you’re thinking, that’s Him. The actors who play Pilate, his wife, Claudia, Mary Magadelene, and the apostles are also so tuned-in to their roles that you hardly notice they are acting. The scene between John, Mary, Mary Magadalene, and Claudia during Jesus’ flogging is so well-balanced and so highly charged with energy that it will make you weep. Wonderful acting, just wonderful. The scenery is beautiful, the costumes are accurate, the characterizations and screenplay are beyond wonderful. All of this, as well as Gibson’s magnificent directing, make this a truly wonderful film that is well worth the viewing and moments of discomfort, just for the true beauty and luminous qualities of the film.
6) No one can come out of this movie hating anyone. The idea of anti-semitism is ridiculous. If anything, this movie makes you want to stand up and say, “I love every single person in this theater as my brother or sister in Christ, and I will pray for all of you every day for the rest of my life.” This movie makes you realize how much Christ loved us, that he was willing to undergo that horrible death that you just watched for us. To save us—all of us.
7) As a Catholic, I watched this movie somewhat differently. I noticed that each of the stations of the Cross was done in loving detail, bringing them gloriously to life. I saw saints and a Pope of the church brought to life, including Veronica and Simon of Cyrene. The movie, I think, presents Catholic Marian doctrine in clearly enunciated terms: this is what true holiness is. Mary always leads us to her Son, and the movie shows how she does, indeed, bring all believers to His feet. All of the apostles in the film call her “Mother”, as we all should do. She is the mother of all believers. The movie is also intensely biblical, even beginning with one of my favorite Bible quotes, from Isiah 53, the text that is read on Good Friday.
Watching the film makes you see the real humanity of Jesus and His mother. You see Jesus as a man who has gone through everything a human can go through: abandonment, pain, betrayal, anguish, total desolation, even close to despair in the garden. He is tempted by Satan, who is always present. He wants to get out, but He knows that God’s will is the greater goal. He is the perfect model for us. Mary is seen as a woman who has lost her husband, who watches her innocent son be beaten, tortured, reviled, and eventually killed, all for the sake of others. Her pain is tangible and so painful. She has endured everything a person can endure…they both have. The film brings out their humanity and their pain so beautifully. This is what makes you weep. Mary is a mother, first and last. Jesus is her son, and she watches Him die so that others may live. The scenes between Mary and Jesus, especially while Jesus is carrying the cross, and He says, ‘see, I make all things new,” is especially wrenching…it was here that I really cried, tears running down my face. You can’t help but cry. It is such a powerful moment.
9) The languages and subtitles add to the reality, and you actually learn something…I learned that the word “gubernatorial” (as in, the election of a governor) is actually derived from Latin, which I didn’t know before. Who says Latin is a dead language?

Overall, this is a tremendous film. The violence is not as bad as you imagine. It can’t be. Everyone has it so built up in their heads that it can’t possibly be as bad as you imagine. Run and see it. You will feel so overwhelmed with the love of God, and His mercy and justice, and you will love everyone you meet. The movie is intensely powerful. What a wonderful tool for conversion. This, my friends, is what Christianity is all about.

Go watch it. Seep in its message. I hope that it makes you a better person, and I hope, if you are not religious, that it makes you be so. It is a profound message it is sending…a message of forgiveness, love, and mercy. It is a film of hope…the movie ends with the Resurrection, Jesus sitting, alive, clean, free of blood, in the tomb, and then He rises and you see the nail mark that goes through his hand, and the film ends. It ends with hope and redemption. That alone is a thrilling moment. This is a film about love and mercy. May its message reach you, and I hope that you find its message as comforting and profound as I did.

(I went on to see it three more times in the theater, since most of my friends were wimps and wouldn’t see it alone.  It is much, much better if you can watch this movie in a nice, quiet, dark room as to totally absorb the atmosphere)

I found these excerpts from an MSNBC interview with Elizabeth Edwards intriguing (she’s being interviewed by Jonathan Alter, a cancer survivor and ESCR-supporting liberal… just for some context here.).

You’ve kept God out of the public discussion of your situation. Why?

I had to think about a God who would not save my son. Wade was—and I have lots of evidence; it’s not just his mother saying it—a gentle and good boy. He reached out to people who were misfits and outcasts all the time. He could not stand for people to say nasty things about other people; he just didn’t want it. For a 16-year-old boy, he was really extraordinary in this regard. I wish I could take credit for it, but I can’t. You’d think that if God was going to protect somebody, he’d protect that boy. But not only did he not protect him, the wind blew him from the road. The hand of God blew him from the road. So I had to think, “What kind of God do I have that doesn’t intervene—in fact, may even participate—in the death of this good boy?” I talk about it in the book, that I had to accept that my God was a God who promised enlightenment and salvation. And that’s all. Didn’t promise us protection. I’ve had to come to grips with a God that fits my own experience, which is, my God could not be offering protection and not have protected my boy.

You didn’t lose your faith, you changed your faith? Or did you lose it for a time?
I’m not praying for God to save me from cancer. I’m not. God will enlighten me when the time comes. And if I’ve done the right thing, I will be enlightened. And if I believe, I’ll be saved. And that’s all he promises me.

Well, like I said, some interesting points. Let’s take them:

• “A God who would not save her son.” While the loss is tragic, she’s not the only mother to have a lost a good child. What about all the mothers and fathers who are losing their toddlers, their seven year olds, their young babies to cancer? These innocent lives being lost day after day are surely in the same league as her son’s death in a car accident. It’s not that God wouldn’t save her son. “My ways are not your ways,” “As far as the heavens are above the earth / so high above our ways / the ways of the Lord.”
• God loves us. He “holds us in the palm of his hand.” “All the hairs on your head are counted.” These bible verses, the verses of comfort that we have all heard so often, do not jive with her talking about God not protecting her son. Of course God protected him. He protects all of us. Just because someone dies tragically doesn’t mean they weren’t protected. If that was true then God must not protect a whole lot of us. I am sure that some of this is grief talking, and as we know, grief is not the most rational thing. But at the same time, all Christian groups espouse the idea that God loves us and takes care of all of us. Death isn’t something that only happens to the bad (see my previous post, “Gethsemane and the problem of pain”). Just because you die tragically doesn’t mean that God doesn’t love you.
• “If I believe, I’ll be saved”: We’ll leave aside the theological quibbles (cf James 2) on this one. But it sounds like we’ve got a bit of cafeteria faith here. Now far be it from us to know. But if she’s changed her faith, then what does she believe? In “enlightenment?” What’s that?

I always find thinking about these things interesting, especially when the idea of suffering and death are involved. Does that make me morbid? I hope not–I hope it makes me more human. As Doestoevksy said, “I am studying what it means to be a human being.”

A lovely post from The Anchoress on G.W.holding fast to his convictions:

Don Surber shows a wonderful picture of President Bush, helping Democrat Sen. Robert Byrd walk as they gather to confer a congressional Gold Medal to the Tuskegee airmen who served in World War II.

Sen. Robert Byrd is, of course, a former Klansman, and as partisan a Democrat as one may find. In the picture, Bush holds Byrd’s hand with great gentleness and compassion, in no way demeaning Bryd or taking away his dignity. But you can see that he is firmly grasping the old man’s hand; Bush is concentrating entirely on serving him safely to his seat.

Surber says that the picture didn’t get picked up by many papers and suggests that it’s because the press is reluctant to remind people that President Bush is an utterly decent, humane and gentlemanly man. Nothing good is permitted to be shown of President Bush, these days. Doesn’t fit the “Bush is evil and moronic” template. I more than suspect that Surber is correct.

It’s been that way for a while, actually. I recall that a year after 9/11, President Bush’s poll numbers were still in the stratosphere; they were very high heading into Iraq. They were still pretty high during the “cedar revolutions” and the “orange revolutions” - the so-called “Arab Springtime” during which time Democracy seemed to be threatening to break out all over the world. It was all happening under Bush’s watch, and Bush was dancing with these folks as they demonstrated their hopefulness.

That was only in two years ago, in May, 2005. Feels like half an age, doesn’t it? I remember writing, a few months later, (and it’s somewhere in my archives, but I haven’t time to look for it just now) that directly after May 2005, it became near to impossible to find “good” press for President Bush. Anywhere. I recall writing that it seemed like a giant foot had simply come down and quashed all of that forward movement, all of that Intention. Suddenly it all simply stopped. Try to find any sort of decent press - or even a simple word of praise - for President Bush within the NY Times or the major news organizations, the wire services, the nightly broadcasts, from that point on.

Moreover, try to find a member of the “loyal opposition” (aside from Joe Lieberman) who has managed in the last two years to treat the president with the courtesy due both his humanity and his office. Lots of vituperate name-calling, but very little willingness to see Bush as a human being, to present him as one. I thought it was enormously funny last week to watch Rosie O’ Donnell carry on about how the terrible, horrible conservatives and the evil American president have “stolen the humanity” of Khalid Sheikh Mohammed. She and hers have absolutely no problem robbing the president of his humanity, every single day, and doing all they can to keep the president’s instinctive, stubborn decency out of everyone’s line of vision.

But once in a while - more and more thanks to the internet - you get a glimpse. You get to remember that this president does not return in kind. He does not offer a hand to you only if you’re from the right party, and if you do him fealty.

That picture of Bush with Byrd reminds me that he is - in his own mind, if not in yours - the president of all the people, determined to serve your safety, your infrastructure, your economy and your future, even if you would rather he did not. Even if you wish he were dead. Even if you call him names. Even if you try to destroy his presidency and take him down. Even if you do all that from his own party and not from the “opposition” side.

This president will not return in kind. He hasn’t in six years, no matter how rude others have been.

I was on retreat this past weekend, and praying about and for many people, praying over many issues. When I thought of President Bush, I kept thinking of that line from Isaiah, Chapter 50:

Morning after morning
he opens my ear that I may hear;
And I have not rebelled,
have not turned back.
I gave my back to those who beat me,
my cheeks to those who plucked my beard;
My face I did not shield
from buffets and spitting.

The Lord GOD is my help,
therefore I am not disgraced;
I have set my face like flint,
knowing that I shall not be put to shame.

It is part of the prophecy of Christ, of course, and I am by no means suggesting that Bush is to be compared to the Christ - the savior - except in this way: he follows the example of the Master - the example laid out by Christ - especially as we are to contemplate and learn from Him, this very week.

President Bush drives us crazy. We want him to fight back. He won’t. We want him to “save” himself. He won’t. He won’t “save” his presidency, either. He won’t “save” his party. He won’t “save” his legacy.

President Bush is doing what is unthinkable - he is staying true to the task laid out before him, to serve all the people. He is remaining faithful to that and he is counting on his God to do the rest, as his God has promised.

This is remarkable witness.

In an era when every special-interest group demands satisfaction for real or imagined “slights,” when Christians try to insist upon respectfulness from the arts, and radical Islamists demand blood or force conversions for any perceived “insult,” this Christian man stands before the world and insists only that the course of liberty be pursued and that he be allowed to protect the safety, rights and freedoms of his citizens. He does not insist that you treat him well. Quite the opposite. He looks at something you can’t see and he allows you to say anything about him you want to, and he holds fast to a promise.

He stands before the entire world and allows that world to curse and mock him, to condemn him. He allows himself to be identified as the “cause” of every difficulty - the “biggest terrorist” in the world, the “most vile human” on the planet. Not Khalid Sheikh Mohammed, not Mahmoud Ahmadinejad, not the raping, murdering warlords of Dafur, not Vladimir Putin.

George W. Bush, who started a revolutionary push toward world-wide liberty and democratic process - he’s the vile oppressor. He’s the guy who wants to take away your freedoms, pollute your planet into extinction and silence your internets. He’s the Nazi who is trying to kill the free speech you are ironically spouting all over the place against him, on television, on the radio, on the stage, on the printed page, quite without fear of reprisal. President Bush, you see, is not the one who tries to shut people up.

In the face of that upside-down disorientation that says “good” is “bad” and “truthiness” is enough, President Bush gets up every day and keeps going, and remains steadfast, and lets you hate him all you want. And if you stumble in his line of vision he will not step around you. And if you’re old and feeble, he will help you walk.

Yes, this is remarkable witness. How many of us would be capable of doing the same?

Do not repay anyone evil for evil; be concerned for what is noble in the sight of all.
If possible, on your part, live at peace with all.
Beloved, do not look for revenge but leave room for the wrath; for it is written, “Vengeance is mine, I will repay, says the Lord.”
Rather, “if your enemy is hungry, feed him; if he is thirsty, give him something to drink; for by so doing you will heap burning coals upon his head.”
Do not be conquered by evil but conquer evil with good.
- St. Paul’s epistle to the Romans, Chapter 12: 17-21

Amen sister. Amen.