"Did you like it?" is not a question should be asked of "The Passion of the Christ," because that would, to me, be reducing it to its entertainment appeal or aesthetic/artistic value when the "point" is the personal response it evokes. That is why this is not a review or analysis of "The Passion" but rather an attempt to express how I felt and feel about it.
But before I begin talking about the movie itself, I think I need to explain some of the things that were going on in my head and heart going into the theatre. I realized at the beginning of the week that I have difficulty accepting other people's love and care for me. In my devotional blog, I wrote this:
In most of my relationships I've never managed to erase that seed of doubt, never been able to stop thinking of myself as a mere friend of convenience, circumstances, similar interests, or sometimes even as a "project". And that little distance I reserve for myself, the belief that I'm not that important to a person is a great excuse. As lonely as it is, in some ways it's easier to believe that I don't mean much to people because if that's true, it won't matter as much when I let them down. I suck at being a friend. I get jealous and hurt easily, and distance myself. I'm self-centred and self-absorbed, and I don't make enough of an effort to keep up with people, to love them or to look after their needs.
I've always consoled myself with the fact that as far as I've fallen, as down and depressed as I've felt, I've never doubted God's love for me. But now I wonder. Oh, not at God's love, but my belief in it. Could I really feel as forlorn and alone if I believed that God loves me as much as he does? It seems rather improbable, and I only wonder how I managed to delude myself for so long. Geez. Two weeks ago in Denver I really thought I was ready to trust God enough to put him first, but now, I realize that I haven't been able to trust in him in the most important aspect, to trust in his love for me?
The one belief that had sustained me throughout all my other troubles was very badly shaken, and I felt very much bereft, lost and adrift. I prayed to God, that he would help me to believe, to fully accept his love, but I didn't know if that was something God could do for me. I mean, if I managed to believe that he died on the cross for me while still not accepting his love, what more could he do?
His answer to my prayer(s) was "The Passion." To me the film is not about Christ's death and suffering so much as his great love for us. His determination to lay down his life for ours is so apparent in the scenes of his torture, his carrying the cross, and his crucifixation.
During the first round of scourging, the pain forces Jesus to his knees, to rest against the stone. It seems like the whipping will stop. But then he looks into the crowd and sees his mother and John and Mary Magdalene and stands up. His standing seems to say that even though the pain is tremendous, he will endure, he will bear the torture for the salvation of those whom he loves, to atone for our sins. More than that, he will even submit himself to harsher punishment for our sakes, because he must know that standing will make those in charge of his punishment angry and therefore more harsh than they might have been otherwise.
And it is excruciating. They switch from slender rods/switches to flails, with barbs that sink in and tear into his flesh (I don't really know the names for any of the things they used, so correct me if I'm dead wrong). His back is completely shredded and he falls against the stone he is manacled to, unable to support himself. They release him and he lies there on his stomach until they turn him onto his back to work on his front. I cringe, just trying to imagine the pain of lying on that torn and bleeding flesh, the nerve endings screaming with his weight forcing the wounds open to be filled with dirt and rocks, nevermind the pain of the whipping on his frontside. As he lies there, being tortured, he looks at the blood spattered feet of his torturers and flashes back to when he washed the feet of his disciples, an act described in John 13:1 as "[showing] them the full extent of his love." And so he looks at the feet of his torturers, loving them, submitting himself to them, serving them even as they whip him mercilessly. He does not even once cry out, as if he is taking all of the pain, absorbing all of the punishments of sin meant for us, and carrying it deep within himself.
Then, when he takes up the cross, one of the robbers also going to be crucified yells at him: "you fool! why do your embrace your cross?" And I know that it is for me, for all of our sins. His determination to "embrace his cross" is portrayed in his every movement, his every expression. He staggers and falls from the weight of the cross, but forces his battered and bleeding body back to it. Again and again he pushes himself to return to it, to bear the cross that they will nail him to, that they will leave him hanging upon to die.
He falls yet again, and it is clear that he will not survive the journey to Golgotha without help. The Romans command a man standing nearby to carry the cross from him. His grudging agreement to the task--"Alright, I will do it, but I want everyone to remember that I am innocent man being forced to carry the cross of a condemned man"--seems a bitterly ironic echo of Pilate's futile claim to be "innocent of [Jesus'] blood" to me, for who can be considered innocent of Jesus' death when he paid for the sins of all?
Golgotha is near, but it seems impossible that Jesus will make it. Simon encourages him, saying "We are near. It's almost done." Who but a man determined to lay down his life for others would be encouraged knowing that he is approaching his death? Who but Jesus could draw strength and resolve from such words to take those final steps to his death? His strength is spent, but he still drags himself onto the cross, when it is finally laid down, ready, and willing to be nailed onto it, to die.
It was agonizing to watch. The tears flowed uncontrollably down my face and I did not even try to wipe them away. Nor did I try to turn my face away. I could not spare myself the pain of watching when he suffered so much more going through it all for our sakes. And I as watched, the one question kept screaming in my mind: "How? How?! How?!? How could he love me so much?!?!" But it was not really so much of a question as it was an acknowledgment, an affirmation that this, this is how much he loves me. What could I do but accept it? That last resistance, the final seed of doubt that kept me from accepting his love is cleared from my heart and mind by the images, the heightened understanding of Jesus' love for me in his suffering and death.
I leave the theatre in silence, not wanting anything to intrude on the communication between God and myself. Even though I had thought it necessary to debrief after the movie, to discuss it afterwards, I am loathe to talk about it. I don't want to talk about the symbolism, the portrayals of certain characters or anything so technical and objective when the movie has moved me, spoken to me in such an intensely personal way.
Even this post feels "off," too inadequate to describe all the things that went on in my heart and head during and after the movie. But I need the record, the remembrance, as incomplete as it may be, for the time when the emotions have faded.
And I suppose I need to share too. Not that my experience can be anyone elses, but maybe, hopefully it will foster the idea that "The Passion" is a film about Jesus' enduring and great love. Because I don't think the film has any meaning without the context of his love for all mankind.
