Here’s my two cents on Mel Gibson’s The Passion of Christ, which I saw just before Thanksgiving. The movie, which is still in not-final form, comes out for real on Ash Wednesday in the new year, which is the most appropriate time. It’s an experience, not just a movie. No one in the theater I was in could sit still. You felt it. And again. And again. Which, considering the subject matter, seems quite appropriate.
One thing that struck me about the anti-Semitism controversy surrounding it is that I think an straight, honest viewing of it makes one wonder, “What would I do?” “How does a crowd get so riled up about something so wrong?” Perhaps it is instinct on my part—after 20-something years of reading “Crucify Him! Crucify Him!” during the annual reading of the Passion story at Mass, as Catholic churches do, but Gibson does anything but focus on the culpability of “the Jews” specifically.