--- Jesus.
Literally. I will admit I'm not going to go and see this movie. I just
don't want to. I'll wait until it comes out on video. It's a personal
choice for me. I'm not one of those people who likes to hold hands when
I say the "Our Father" during mass, or is big into “getting
involved,†with my church. My relationship with God is more personal
experience for me, rather than communal one. I don't want to run to the
theater with a bunch of other Christians to see this movie, like it's a
football game where I need to show up to root for the home team. It's
just not me. I will see the film, but in the privacy of my own home. I
already said my piece about Mel and the ADL, so it's not worth
revisiting. I just have one comment, though, and it relates to
children. Paul Clinton warns in his review: However, I recommend to parents -- many of whom may be taking
their kids to see this film as part of various church-sponsored
screenings -- that this is a very violent and graphic film, and just
because it is about Jesus doesn't make it suitable for everyone.
Allrighty then. Take the kiddies to church, let them hear the story,
let them walk the Stations of the Cross, tell them how Jesus died for
our sins, tell them that we're all culpable his death because of our
sinning, but for the love of all that is good and holy, don't let them see an account of the crucifixion. It's too violent. It's too bloody.
Keep the message centered on that He died for our sins, but don't let
them see an account of His death because it might scar them for life.
Of all the flaming hypocritical bits that have come across my path.
YEESH! I just don't get this one. Let me revise that: I get it, but
it's still hypocritical. After hearing how violent this film is, if I
had kids, I probably wouldn't let them see it either, so I know
I don't have a leg to stand on here, but it's interesting to see this
collision of today's brand of family values collide with a portrayal of
the death of a man around whom those family values are structured.
Yesterday, the husband was conducting some business on the other side
of town and decided to drop in to see his sister. Now, the sister in
law is a devout Lutheran--- of the Missouri Synod variety. (Just as an
example, she thought Judge Moore was in the right last summer and
wanted to get on a bus to go and support him.) She and her husband have
organized their lives, and the lives of their children, around their
belief in God and what their church teaches. They’re very into
“family values.†One aspect where they follow their beliefs to the
max is that they homeschool their children. Their decision was, in
part, based upon their worries about public schools, which are many,
but mainly reside in the neighborhood of the quality of education the
schools provide. But, on the whole, I would say homeschooling is mostly
a religious thing for them: they want their kids to have a parochial
education. The niece and nephew are nice little kids and I love them to
pieces. They're wonderful children, and despite my original worries
about homeschooling, I think the sister in law is doing a pretty good
job of educating them. So, while they're incredibly sheltered kids,
they are being educated the way their parents want them to be: in a
Christian way, according to their beliefs. This is fine. I'm all for
free choice. According to the husband, they're going to go see "The
Passion of the Christ," on Saturday and they've got a babysitter lined
up for the kids. Now, perhaps this doesn't seem like a big deal to you,
and it's not a "big" deal, but I find it very interesting, and I have
to tell you a story about the nephew to tie it all together. A few
years ago, we were over at their house for Easter dinner. The sister in
law was in the kitchen, finishing things up, we were hanging out in the
living room, chatting with the nephew. He wanted to show us something.
He's a very creative kid with an active imagination, so we settled in
for the show. I should mention their house is pretty small. They don't
have a goodly amount of room to work with, so the living room is filled
with toys and the kids’ bookcases. R., who could best be described as
"scrawny" in terms of body mass, crawls up on his bookcase, like a
monkey climbing a tree, manages to turn himself around, outstretches
his arms and crosses his feet at the ankles and then proceeds to shout
at full volume, LOOK, AUNT KATHY! I'M CRUCIFIED!.
Then he proceeded to jump down from the bookcase. He ran across the
room to where the sofa was and crawled behind it and then covered the
opening with a spare sofa cushion. He gave no explanation this time
around, but it was obvious to us that he was simulating Jesus' body
being put into the tomb, the cushion acting as a substitute for the
rock. Two seconds later, he crawled back out again, said, "It's three
days later! I'm resurrected!" The nephew then ran into the kitchen and
informed his mother of the same. Now, a little kid acting out the
Passion is not disturbing to me, particularly not on Easter Sunday,
where all he'd been hearing for the past few days at church was about
the crucifixion and how joyful the resurrection was. R. is a gorgeous
kid. And I really mean that. He’s beautiful in the classical,
aesthetically pleasing sense of the word. If he had been born five
hundred years ago, he would have been immortalized in paint by
Rembrandt. Blonde hair, blue eyes, fine features---the girls are going
to be mad for him when he grows up. But I don’t think I’ll ever get
over the incongruity of the whole situation: here you have this
beautiful little boy, the widest grin in the world on his mouth, his
big blue eyes sparkling, and he’s up on a bookcase, happy as a clam
that “he’s been crucified.†It was one of the creepiest things
I’ve ever seen. It just rang so absolutely wrong.
But he’s a little kid. It’s not surprising to me that he got the
messages mixed up in his mind. When I expected his parents to correct
him, however, to tell him that the resurrection was joyful, yes, but
the crucifixion was one of the most painful endings a person could come
to, his parents chose not to go that route. Instead, they praised him.
Their attitude was that it was a cute thing, something for them to be
proud of---that he knew the story well enough to act it out. I just
looked at the husband and stared. He stared back. But we kept quiet: it
wasn’t our place to say something. When I told Mr. H. about this, he,
too, was surprised that R.’s parents hadn’t corrected him. He
thought they should have said something and the comment he made that
sticks with me was, “having tie irons hammered through your wrists
and feet is not a pleasant, happy, thing.†R. didn’t have the
context of the crucifixion, and as far as I know, he still doesn’t. I
don’t know that his parents want him to have it. I’ve been to their
church---it’s a pretty happy-go-lucky sort of place where everyone
gets forgiven of their sins without actually having to confess
them---and it’s fairly obvious that they don’t spend a whole lot of
time on the sacrifice Jesus made on the cross that day, but instead
spend the majority of their time talking about how he saved us when he
was resurrected. At their church, in other words, it’s all about the
happy ending, and not the pain and suffering that made the happy ending
possible. I’ll be curious to hear what the sister in law has to say
about the film. Five bucks says she’ll say it’s very bloody and
violent and, undoubtedly, she’ll be shocked at all the kids who were
in the theater with them. Which is odd---don’t you think---for people
who are so into being Christian? People who center their lives around
acting like Christ? People who spent good money buying bracelets with
the the acronym, "WWJD"? Jesus became Jesus Christ because of his
crucifixion and resurrection. If you didn’t have the crucifixion, we
wouldn’t have the ultimate meaning of Christianity. I find it so odd
that ultimately some would reject a film that shows the true extent of
Jesus’ suffering, of what he went through to save us from our sins,
because it’s too violent and they don’t want their kids exposed to
that, even though they center their lives directly around that
sacrifice. Perhaps, if we insisted that kids saw the movie, they’d be
less likely to crawl up on a bookcase and scream, “I’m
crucified!†while wearing a big happy grin.