[Vision2020] Passion

[Melynda Huskey]

Pat writes:

>While I might not take young children to this movie it is indeed just how
>life was then. It is indeed what the gospels tell us happened to Christ so
>maybe we have whitewashed it for too long. It sure is raking it in at the
>boxoffice so their must be something good about it.

Well, by this argument, *Deep Throat,* the pornographic film starring Linda 
Lovelace, is the very best film of all time:  it's the most profitable film, 
and the highest-grossing.  I don't think that's the road we want to go down.

I haven't seen the film, and I'm not likely to--as a Christian, I can't 
imagine going to it.  I believe the Incarnation can only be understood as a 
seamless whole:  the birth, the works and days, the preaching, the healing, 
the death, resurrection, the ministry of the Risen, and the ascension of 
Christ, the promised presence of the Paraclete.  *That's* the story.  The 
torture and death aren't a stand-alone narrative.

It's worth noting, too, that many of the film's most agonizing details come 
not from the Gospels--which don't spend much time on the crucifixion 
itself--but from *The Dolorous Passion of Our Lord Jesus Christ,* the 
visions of the Ven. Sister Anne Catherine Emmerich, a 19th century 
Augustinian nun with a profound hatred of Jews and an equally profound 
connection to suffering--she was herself a stigmatic, with bleeding wounds 
in hands, feet, and breast, who vomited up all food and drink except water 
and the Eucharist for long stretches of her conventual life.  She was also 
noted for sucking the putrifaction from the infected wounds of patients she 
nursed during brief periods of health.  More information and links on this 
interesting figure can be found at:

http://tcrnews2.com/Emmerich.html

Gibson cites her as a profound influence on the film's narrative and 
details.  A very fine essay on the question of the film's fidelity to Gospel 
accounts and to historical fact is at:

http://www.bc.edu/research/cjl/meta-elements/texts/reviews/gibson_cunningham.htm

It's written by Phillip Cunningham, Director of Boston College's Center for 
Christian-Jewish Learning.  A number of very fine links (primarily from the 
Roman Catholic perspective, but with other points of view represented) can 
also be found at:

http://www.bc.edu/research/cjl/meta-elements/texts/education/PASSION_resources.htm

Pedantically yours,

Melynda Huskey

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