Last Sunday, my family and I ventured to the movie theatre. I must admit that my favorite part of any movie is the 15 minutes of previews that precedes it. However, on this Sunday, I was irritated to see a trailer for Mel Gibson’s upcoming film “The Passion of the Christ,” a movie that some would consider a beautiful portrayal of the last hours of Jesus Christ. For those who do not know, “The Passion of the Christ,” opening on February 25th (Ash Wednesday), is being financed and directed by Mel Gibson with his interpretation of the Bible as the guiding creative impetus. While the Rev. Billy Graham was “moved to tears” by the “moving presentation of Jesus’ death,” a review in the Telegraph asked: “Who would want to see a film this violent?” As a member of the “sedevacantist” sect of Catholicism, Gibson rejects the Second Vatican Council of 1962, which, among other things, rebutted the doctrine that the Jewish people were guilty of killing Jesus. I do not know if “The Passion of the Christ” is anti-Semitic; I have not seen it. But I am highly suspicious of this film. Gibson’s rejection of the Second Vatican Council means the Catholic beliefs to which he ascribes were last formulated in 1869 at the first Vatican Council. I do not know why Gibson rejects Vatican II; it could be because of some other and entirely different result of the council. However, when asked by Diane Sawyer if Jews killed Jesus, Gibson responded: “There were Jews and Romans in Israel. There were no Norwegians there. The Jewish Sanhedrin, and those who they held sway over—and the Romans—were the material agents of his demise.” I read this as a very thinly veiled affirmative in the belief that the Jewish people killed Jesus. What I find even more distressing is Gibson’s connections to Holocaust denial. Gibson’s father, also a sedevacantist, questioned the number of Jews killed in the Holocaust in a New York Times interview. When asked to clear up his own views on the matter in a Readers Digest interview, Mel Gibson stated, “I have friends and parents of friends who have numbers on their arms. The guy who taught me Spanish was a Holocaust survivor. He worked in a concentration camp in France. Yes, of course. Atrocities happen. War is horrible. World War Two killed tens of millions of people. Some of them were Jews in concentration camps. In the Ukraine, several million starved to death between 1932 and 1933. During the last century, 20 million people died in the Soviet Union.” Gibson clearly recognizes the existence of concentration camps. However, as George Mason University law professor David Bernstein points out, many Holocaust deniers do not contradict the death of Jews in World War II, but instead play down the organization of the killing and the number murdered compared to the total number killed in the war. Bernstein declares, “Gibson is skirting pretty close” to the type of minimization spewed by revisionists and deniers. If Gibson truly believes that the Jewish people killed Jesus, despite rejections from the Vatican and dismissals from scholars (noting that the Gospels that describe Jewish participation were written decades after the fact and by Christians frustrated with the failure to convert Jews), then that is fine. I probably will not change his mind. However, we must remain vigilant when watching his film. Serious questions must be raised about Gibson’s ability to accurately portray one of the most influential events in human history. How can anyone expect him to get a 2000 year- old story right if he cannot get 1945 straight in his head? And with Fandango reporting that “The Passion of the Christ” is accounting for 40% of advance ticket sales for February 25th, I have no hopes for planned boycotts of this film. Millions will see it and many will believe it to be a beautiful film about their God. But I ask all who see this film to remember that it should not be taken as historical fact. My best advice would be to save your $10.50 for “Dirty Dancing: Havana Nights.”
