The Human Experience: A Review

A young man is tucked in the back seat of a car, looking up and often out the window. He is reflecting on his life, his experiences, his hopes and frustrations. Outside the world blurs past. Jeff is searching for meaning, for purpose. He is on a journey, and we the viewers are invited to join him.

I recently attended one of the many screenings of Grassroots Films new work “The Human Experience.” I’ve been waiting a long time for this one, ever since I caught the trailer a few years back and saw viewings popping up across the country. It was well worth the wait.

From Grassroots Films of Brooklyn, New York comes THE HUMAN EXPERIENCE
– the story of a band of brothers who travel the world in search of the answers to the burning questions: Who am I? Who is Man? Why do we search for meaning? Their journey brings them into the middle of the lives of the homeless on the streets of New York City, the orphans and disabled children of Peru, and the abandoned lepers in the forests of Ghana, Africa. What the young men discover changes them forever. Through one on one interviews and real life encounters, the brothers are awakened to the beauty of the human person and the resilience of the human spirit.

The story unfolded with a gritty, youthful sincerity and passion that only the boys from Brooklyn could execute. This gave the film a fresh quality, and the feeling that we were tagging along on their quest. They asked the same questions we all ask (or once asked before the cloudy air of cynicism breathed into our days; Why am I here? Where am I going? Is there any point to this life, any meaning in the movement of my heart through it all?

They come to their conclusions, though, in a way many of us, I would suppose, do not; by engaging the questions head on (or should I say heart?) These are men of action, and this is the charm of it all. They move through the questions, literally. And with each encounter they come a few steps closer to the answers. The film is Catholic and catholic – with touches of the particular Faith and universal motions that will attract any heart searching for the truth of the human experience.

Keep your eyes open for its release in theaters. This is the hope, that these screenings will build a strong interest and allow for it to hit the big screen. God knows we could use a human touch in cinema today, and an honest inquiry into the mystery of who we are. The Human Experience does just that, and we should all…. experience it!

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Inspiration for the New Evangelization
http://www.missionmoment.org

The End is Here!

How many times have we seen a movie or a TV show with the iconic “crazy” person on a street corner wearing a placard with “The End is Near” scribbled on it? And how many times have we quickly dismissed that person as extreme, ludicrous, ultimately sad? But have you ever gotten the itch that invites you to scratch and see below the surface? What if it was true?

It seems Hollywood has the itch…. really bad. She can’t make the budgets big enough for these gloom and doom dramas about the End of All Things, from Armageddon and Deep Impact to The Day After Tomorrow and last weekend’s latest installment “2012.”

The box office seems to be saying something as well; people love it. People want to see it. It may be out of a morbid desire to see historic landmarks crumple under a 900 foot tsunami, but behind that, I think there’s a bit of good ‘ole fashioned Catholic spirituality at work.

Memento mori, as the saying goes. “Remember death.”

As creepy as it sounds, we’re invited to reflect on our death many times throughout the liturgical year. We’re actually entering into the season for this right now. Advent is beginning, and it is more than just a glance backwards to the Birth of Jesus two thousand years ago. It’s a glance to the future, to the End, when we believe He will return. This story, History, will indeed end… and simultaneously…. begin.

The readings from this week’s Mass matched up quite perfectly with the debut of “2012.” (I wonder if Hollywood was reading the lectionary?)

Jesus said to his disciples: “In those days after that tribulation the sun will be darkened, and the moon will not give its light, and the stars will be falling from the sky, and the powers in the heavens will be shaken. And then they will see ‘the Son of Man coming in the clouds’ with great power and glory, and then he will send out the angels and gather his elect from the four winds, from the end of the earth to the end of the sky.

– Mark 13:24-32

The twist however is that Christians look to this End with, now get this, joyful expectancy. “Lift up your heads, Scripture tells us, for your redemption is near at hand!” Now this doesn’t mean we sit around with hands up high like kids waiting for Daddy to pick them up and take them to his warm chest and carry them home. (Although that sounds like the orans position of prayer and a great way to live to me!) It means we keep our feet on the ground and keep working. And we whistle while we work, too, like little dwarves, keeping the Palace of our hearts clean for the arrival of our King and Queen. St. Francis was once approached by a nervous brother friar, who was a bit stressed about the End and perhaps more so, about his conscience. Francis looked up from the patch of earth he was tending in the garden. “Brother Francis, what if our dear Savior were to return this very day. What would you do!”

“I would keep gardening, until He found me” smiled the saint. Now that’s peace.

For the believer, the End is not at some remote or proximate point, not a number like 2012, or 3012 for that matter. The End is… here, now. The Kingdom of God is within you, here, now. It is already, and not yet. All of the world that we see is simply a veil pulled over the Eternal Now where God abides. Why should we be afraid?

Can the unborn child in its dark and watery womb imagine the vibrant life that moves about just past that veil of mommy’s flesh? Can it be so near and yet seem so distant? Perhaps our End is closer than we think. Maybe our true birthday is about to begin, as it has for the saints. Their death is remembered as their feast day, their birthday into Eternal Life.

In the meantime, as we close off another liturgical year, and step closer to 2010, 2011, and 2012 (wink wink), let’s not panic, let’s pray…. and keep smiling, with our heads and hands busy in the garden of this world, preparing a harvest of good deeds and much love for the World to come.

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Inspiration for the New Evangelization
http://www.missionmoment.org

The Human Experience – Screening Oct. 8th

Dear Friends in the local Philadelphia area,

Please help me to get the word out about a remarkable movie produced by Grass Roots Films called “The Human Experience.” I have mentioned it before on the blog, and still anxiously await its debut on the big screen. It’s getting closer!

Grassroots produced the Fisher of Men Video that was shown through out the Archdiocese of Philadelphia a few years ago to promote vocations. The films produced by this wonderful ministry (two brothers from Brooklyn, NY began the work) are inspiring, filled with truth, and captivating. In The Human Experience, a group of men in their twenties go on a quest into the world and into the heart of humanity to find what’s universal in our human experience. In their quest they find themselves on the streets of New York City, the Coast of Peru, and the African Continent, as well as face to face with the mystery of their own hearts. This film opens up for us the fruit of their quest for this basic and universal human experience – a discovery of our need for the transcendent, for a living relationship with God.

There will be a viewing of this film at Archbishop Carroll High School on October 8, 2009 at 7:00 PM in the auditorium. The planners are asking $10.00 per viewer at the door.

FLASH! I JUST FOUND OUT THAT THIS VIEWING HAS BEEN POSTPONED!

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Inspiration for the New Evangelization
http://www.missionmoment.org

On Angels and Demons – Fr. Barron’s Review

When will it end? More DaVinci Load served up on the silver screen to distort the truth, history, and real relationship between the Church and Science for millions of movie goers. Let’s all grab a hot cup of coffee, kick back, and watch this excellent unpacking of it all by Fr. Robert Barron, and then read this beautiful letter – On Faith and Reason – by Pope John Paul II, and THEN (refill your coffee, grab some cookies) and peruse this “illuminating” website that shows the harmonious relationship of faith and the sciences – http://stoqinternational.org/

“Science can purify Religion from error and superstition; Religion can purify Science from idolatry and false absolutes.”

– Pope John Paul II

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Inspiration for the New Evangelization
http://www.missionmoment.org

From Palms to Poison – A Flashback Episode

(I’ve begun watching with my freshmen students at Malvern, The Passion of the Christ, Mel Gibson’s blockbuster movie from 2004. The following is a “flashback post” from last year at this time. I’d like to post a couple this week, as well as, I hope, some fresh content.)

SNAPSHOT:
There’s a scene in the movie where Jesus first takes up his Cross, and in those first few steps, surrounded by a swirling, spitting, angry mob, we see his eyes, swollen and bloodied, looking out to see palm branches being laid at his feet. For just a few seconds, we see what he saw just five days before. Palms laid out before a King. Cheers and cloaks and green palms falling before the grey, stiff ears of the colt He’s riding. Then, in a flash, we’re back to the painful, poisonous glare of the crowds.

Five days. Just five short days was all the difference there was between praise and utter rejection. How fickle we can be. “How torturous is the human heart, who can understand it,” one of the prophets once wrote.The crowds quickly turn, like leaves in the wind, blowing from one side of the street to the other. No rhyme, no reason. The powers that be, the molders and shapers of the thought of the masses have declared that Jesus is no longer “in.” Jesus is “out.” And so he is.

I wonder if they ever talked to Jesus? Did they ever look for Him for themselves? Actually seek Him out? Or was the connection merely based on hearsay…

“They” say he’s the Messiah.
“They” say he’s John the Baptist. He gave us bread and fish and miracles.

It’s easy to go with the flow, to talk “about” Jesus and the Church at the watercoolers and in the cafeterias of the world. It’s harder to talk “to” Jesus. To get beyond the shallow surface. To look him in the eye and ask him “Who are you?” And to wait for the answer.

We are too often like animals; we find safety in numbers. We give in to the herd instinct. Afraid of the great dark, cold, alone of standing up for someone, we huddle up in the warmth of compromise and comfortability. We’d rather “read the Times than read the eternities,” and trust the most untrustworthy source for giving us the truth about anything (or anyone): the media monster.

But there were some in that crowd on that via dolorosa, that Walk that Remade the World, that stood out, and stood up for him. Unlike the faceless, nameless crowd, we remember them… Veronica, Simon, Mary, John.

The question for us today is the same as it was then, when the palms that praise are turned to poisonous accusation and bitterness: Where will we stand?

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Inspiration for the New Evangelization
http://www.missionmoment.org

Hooked

I’m sure we’ve all had movie moments that stick with us; scenes that combined character, catharsis, music and meaning into an unstoppable force that broke into our world and suddenly, lifted us up into theirs. Like modern parables, a great Truth was conveyed in a story and it bypassed our security systems. “Hey,” we whisper to ourselves, “that’s about me…”

I’ve been hooked on the above scene from Hook for years now. In the movie, Robin Williams plays a much older, stressed, and well dressed Peter Pan; a Peter Pan who has forgotten who he is and subsequently become a merger and acquisitions lawyer (crazy, I know). He’s married to Wendy’s granddaughter and now his kids have been captured by the infamous Captain Hook.

The scene above is Peter’s great awakening. At first we find him utterly confused, ripped from the “real” world of comfort and security into a fantastic place of dreams and magic. But what does he do? How can he live? All is wild and blazingly bright in this world, so unlike the foggy gray and ease and comfort of the world he came from.

The Lost Boys (those perpetual and unsupervised 5th graders) cannot fathom that this is their fearless leader, trembling as he is with fear before them in his suit pants. What’s a suit?

A line is drawn by the new leader of the Lost Boys, and Peter stands alone on the other side. Then, dramatically, one little boy crosses over the line, into his fear. He takes Peter by the hand, pulls him down to his level, and touches his face. Pushing and pulling at his cheeks, peering into his eyes, the Little Boy is searching for the truly Lost Boy, Peter Pan. Robin Williams in this scene, manipulated like silly putty in the hands of a Child, cannot help but smile. A light breaks through his weary eyes and suddenly the Child before him whispers “Oh there you are Peter!” The music swells, the Boys rush to Peter’s side and all begin the process of rediscovery with him. Eventually, after a long training period, Peter learns again how to fly.

Inspirations, insights… how does this speak to me?

I am lost. I need to be found again. I need the Christ Child to take me by the hand and pull me down to His level, to that place of humility, of smallness. I need Him to touch me and to push aside the worry and the anxiety and the sin and the weakness. I need Him to cross over that line and believe in me. And if I let Him have His way with me, I will hear those words “There you are Billy!”

And by His Grace I will learn again just how to FLY!

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Inspiration for the New Evangelization
http://www.missionmoment.org

Flashback – The Nativity Story: A Review

I know, another flashback episode…. sorry gang!
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From a private screening of the New Line Cinema movie “The Nativity Story.”

The film chronicles that year in the life of Mary and Joseph that forever altered the course of human history. It’s the Christmas story, told beautifully in rich, earthen tones. The journey takes us from a windy garden annunciation of Gabriel to the Holy Birth soaked in starlight, ending with the flight of Mary and Joseph with the Child into Egypt.

First Impressions:
For me, the real treasures of this film lie in its attention to detail; the humble village of Nazareth is recreated with such evident devotion that this alone makes the film a joy to watch. We are invited to enter into the daily life of Mary, Joseph and their kin. We move with their schedules, we perform their everyday rituals, and it slows us down. These scenes are so rich with authenticity! Mary’s coarse cloak, handwoven and weathered, brushing past the wheat; Joseph at his wood-working table, layered with sawdust… each speaks to us of the Divine descent into our time, our work, and our sweat; they pull back the glitter and the lights and show us again the gritty reality of the Incarnation, and the time and place in which God ordained that He would come. The olive press and the crushing of grapes for wine, so deeply foreboding of what lies ahead for Jesus; the gleaning of the grain in the fields hints at a “gift of finest wheat” that will soon come to fill us. The tanning of animal hides, the stirring of goat’s milk, the planting of seeds and the tilling of soil. All seemed drenched with light and pregnant with meaning.

Another charm of this film is in the intimate interactions of Mary and Joseph. A favorite scene for me was of Mary washing the travel-worn feet of a sleeping Joseph by a rocky stream. Again, a foreshadowing of what their Son will do for His Apostles. So we see in the parents what will come to be in the Child.

Oscar Isaac was so refreshing in his portrayal of Joseph, the humble blue collar saint. He gave him a weight, a maturity, and a chivalry that is so desparately needed today. Well acted with convincing emotion, Joseph too makes the movie a must see.

There are well placed pieces of humor, of the most innocent kind. The music is stirring, with subtle hints at the classic Christmas hymns and melodies we all know so well. They are woven almost seemlessly into the score and we smiled when we caught them. The cave that served as the birthplace of the God made Flesh was an open invitation to prayer, and that was almost tangible as we sat in the theater.

The Nativity Story has its limitations, as all our works of art do. The opening scenes were a little too Peter Jackson-esque. Joachim and Ann seemed a little cranky most of the time. And Mary was overly distant, almost stoic at times. But who could ever come close to conveying the emotion and the love of the Immaculate Virgin anyway?

Overall, I found myself thanking God for the gift of this movie. The timing is just right, in more ways than one.

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For videos of the making of the film click here!

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Inspiration for the New Evangelization
http://www.missionmoment.org

A Little Silliness

Slightly irreverent and very funny… Ron Burgundy Interviews…. J.C. (and how does he keep from laughing?) Thanks Brian Barcaro for the link.

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Inspiration for the New Evangelization
http://www.missionmoment.org

"Embracing" Suffering?

I watch the movie The Passion of the Christ about six times a year; five times with the five sections of freshmen I teach at Malvern Prep, and usually once at home with Rebecca during Holy Week. Needless to say, the powerful images, encounters, music, and ancient languages in this film are deeply ingrained in me the way few things are.

One of those images occurs as Jesus is pushed by the people outside of the walls of Jerusalem (and this image alone speaks volumes) and encounters his cross for the first time. One of other condemned criminals watches the Christ kneel and take hold of this tool of torture and press his face against it, almost lovingly.

“Fool! Look how he embraces his cross!”

I’ve been thinking about that line these days, now two weeks into our own way of the cross. When I was a kid, fresh from my own “awakening” to the reality of God and the call to a relationship with Him, I used to be perplexed by the whole “embrace your cross” mentality. I was reading about it in the lives of the saints, and over and over again I could hear in their voices such a passion for the Passion, a real love for suffering. I struggled with my own attitude towards the cross. I thought… “Well, these guys are saints, I should feel this way too, but this sounds nuts.” It was very unsettling, almost morbid, I thought. “Is this what God wants of me? Doesn’t He want me to be happy? Am I missing something here?”

Suffering is a funny thing. It surrounds us all like air, it trembles beneath nearly every step we take, and sorrow echoes in so many of our conversations every day, but we rarely look it in the eye. Our right to the “pursuit of happiness” as Americans has become an all out mad dash, an arms flailing race towards almost any door that will get us out. Anything but that narrow, cross-shaped Door that seems to lead only to pain.

But here’s the truth we’re coming to see, and strangely it was quoted to me in a movie back in 1986 that seems totally random right now, but perfect. The Man in Black says to the Princess Bride… “Life is pain, highness. Anyone who tells you otherwise is selling something.”

Well, there it is.

Ever since the Fall there has been conflict, pain, death, and war; inside and outside our hearts. So what do we do with it? Most people want to run from it (hedonists), some people pretend it doesn’t exist (Buddhists), a few take a morbid pleasure in it (masochists), and a few, a select few, have come to peace with it by allowing themselves to be nailed to it, trusting in a greater plan.

So the saints weren’t nuts, though some may have been slightly off balance in the penance department. Really they were just…. realists. Just like the One Who came in a body to take on Death like a hero. And He destroyed it. He really did.

So all of this is to say that I think I’m going to pray harder every day facing not fleeing from this cross that Rebecca and I have been allowed to carry. Maybe some will say “Fools! Look how they embrace their cross!” (We’ve already gotten that from the eyes of one of our doctors).

Good Friday has come early again. But we hope it leads to a miraculous Easter Sunday, and we’re imploring the prayers of a man who bore his cross heroically, Pope John Paul II. We don’t know how long this via dolorosa will twist and bend, but I want to feel the wood, let the weight of it sink in. I was encouraged by a good friend to swim into this dark abyss, and keep swimming into Rebecca’s pain as a mother, to swim and not to give up. He said that at a certain moment, if I hold fast like an Olympian, then I’ll make a quick turn, like Michael Phelps, and we can rise again into golden light. I’m banking on that!

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Inspiration for the New Evangelization
http://www.missionmoment.org

Faith, Films, and the Culture of Life – Interview with Tim Drake

My guest on tonight’s radio show was Tim Drake, Senior writer with the National Catholic Register and Faith and Family Magazine. He’s also an award-winning journalist and author, having published more than 600 articles in publications such as the National Catholic Register, Our Sunday Visitor, Faith and Family Magazine, Catholic World Report, CatholicExchange.com, Columbia Magazine, Gilbert! Magazine, This Rock Magazine, and many others.

Our conversation centered on the movies (a personal favorite of topics for me!) and the seemingly pro-life message in some recent works of the silver screen.

Here’s the family friendly alternative to NETFLIX that we discussed:

Faith and Family Flix.com

And the Vatican’s list of the Best Films to date (and growing!)

ClearPlay DVD Player is the resource for families that will “clean up” those movies for family friendly viewing.

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Inspiration for the New Evangelization
http://www.missionmoment.org