Without preface, from the Toronto Star:
Crossan is not necessarily calling for atheism. He really is that upset at Mel, apparently. He finds the film too greatly influenced by an 18-19th century Augustinian nun, and also Mel Gibson: "The movie is 5 per cent from the Gospels, 80 per cent from Anne Catherine Emmerich and the rest from Gibson. If she was copyrighted, he'd be sued, or she would get a major screenwriting credit."
Crossan does hold to that old fear of original sin; Gibson hasn't considered the Muslim world; Gibson hasn't considered the anti-Semitism that is ... and I use this sparingly, and only because it reflects Crossan and I've quoted enough of the article ... part and parcel of being European.
Now, first off, I understand both sides of the Muslim-world argument. And I side with the, "Why should Gibson care?" aspect here. People need to take this film--any cinematic production--with more than a grain of salt. A line of coke, and then the grains of salt that go with a shot of tequila. Above all else, it's art.
But Crossan presumes the worst in Gibson, he presumes the worst in the European psychospiritual and intellecutal climate.
And he presumes the worst in his fellow Christians. Of course, on this occasion he might have reason--Gibson's film seems to resound with many faithful; after all, it was the prayers and perspectives of fellow pastors that seems to have set his fears alight; perhaps only then did the magnitude of the box office receipts and a reasonably absurd episode of South Park become clear to him.
But what if by next year nobody cares? What if the debate rages as such--and perhaps that is part of his point--that everyone's sick of it? And it's just another campy film, only a notch more tolerable than the Zeffirelli . . . really, I don't know how I feel about that film . . . for being modern and glitzy and apparently violent. Jesus Christ is as European as Richard Barthelmess is Chinese. (Note: I've still not made it to see the film, I only point to the notion that this film seems much more accessible to many people than the Zef's Jesus of Nazareth miniseries. Of course, there is the matter of length.
At any rate, I digress . . . apologies for that.
But it's a fascinating little twist. Oh, and who the hell is Crossan? Click here for the essential resume.
So I guess the issue is, "What happens if The Passion reignites faith, but a 'bad faith'?"
_____________________
- Toronto Star. "Christian scholar questions Gison's depiction of Jesus." April 10, 2004. See http://www.thestar.com/NASApp/cs/Co...742&call_pageid=991479973472&col=991929131147
Now, in the words of the most famous Tiassa of all time, "Let us not launch the boat until the ground is wet."For such a solemn, serious scholar, John Dominic Crossan sure is animated — and peeved. He can barely stop fidgeting, rolling his eyes, sighing, and shaking his head in that exasperated way a teacher might reserve for a student who just doesn't get it . . . .
. . . . Clearly, Mel Gibson gets an F — and a bloody thumbs down.
"This is the most savage movie I have ever seen. I've never seen anything like it. It is two hours of unrelenting brutality." That was Crossan's reaction immediately after viewing Gibson's cinematic firestorm, The Passion Of The Christ, in January in Orlando, Fla. along with more than 5,000 evangelical Christian pastors.
"They all knelt and prayed afterwards," he said in an interview while attending the recent annual meeting in Niagara Falls, Ont., of the SnowStar Institute, dedicated to advancing religious literacy and tolerance. "I wanted to pray too, (but) not the same prayer."
The plea to God Crossan had in mind was for a single conservative Christian "to come out and say, `and what did you think of God? The God who came up with this monstrous plan — what did you think about that?'
"I have said that if this is the way God is, this punishing God who takes it out on Jesus instead of us, then we should not worship that God. We're dealing with a savage God and we are in really serious trouble if that's what God is like."
Crossan is not necessarily calling for atheism. He really is that upset at Mel, apparently. He finds the film too greatly influenced by an 18-19th century Augustinian nun, and also Mel Gibson: "The movie is 5 per cent from the Gospels, 80 per cent from Anne Catherine Emmerich and the rest from Gibson. If she was copyrighted, he'd be sued, or she would get a major screenwriting credit."
Crossan does hold to that old fear of original sin; Gibson hasn't considered the Muslim world; Gibson hasn't considered the anti-Semitism that is ... and I use this sparingly, and only because it reflects Crossan and I've quoted enough of the article ... part and parcel of being European.
Now, first off, I understand both sides of the Muslim-world argument. And I side with the, "Why should Gibson care?" aspect here. People need to take this film--any cinematic production--with more than a grain of salt. A line of coke, and then the grains of salt that go with a shot of tequila. Above all else, it's art.
But Crossan presumes the worst in Gibson, he presumes the worst in the European psychospiritual and intellecutal climate.
And he presumes the worst in his fellow Christians. Of course, on this occasion he might have reason--Gibson's film seems to resound with many faithful; after all, it was the prayers and perspectives of fellow pastors that seems to have set his fears alight; perhaps only then did the magnitude of the box office receipts and a reasonably absurd episode of South Park become clear to him.
But what if by next year nobody cares? What if the debate rages as such--and perhaps that is part of his point--that everyone's sick of it? And it's just another campy film, only a notch more tolerable than the Zeffirelli . . . really, I don't know how I feel about that film . . . for being modern and glitzy and apparently violent. Jesus Christ is as European as Richard Barthelmess is Chinese. (Note: I've still not made it to see the film, I only point to the notion that this film seems much more accessible to many people than the Zef's Jesus of Nazareth miniseries. Of course, there is the matter of length.
At any rate, I digress . . . apologies for that.
But it's a fascinating little twist. Oh, and who the hell is Crossan? Click here for the essential resume.
So I guess the issue is, "What happens if The Passion reignites faith, but a 'bad faith'?"
_____________________
- Toronto Star. "Christian scholar questions Gison's depiction of Jesus." April 10, 2004. See http://www.thestar.com/NASApp/cs/Co...742&call_pageid=991479973472&col=991929131147
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