The Passion of The Christ

The reactions of people to the film are very telling. Most people come out of the theaters and praise the film, or the experience of seeing the Passion in a graphic (perhaps too graphic) way. But the anti-Christian bigotry comes out in full force with this movie! Thankfully the Catholic League has been keeping tabs. To read the letters to the editor and some of the columnists makes me realize just how bigoted people are when it comes to Christianity. A good example of this is Paul Vitello, a nasty bigot who writes for Newsday. He has bashed the Catholic Church for years and seems angry and upset that Mel Gibson is using film to portray the Passion. He watched the film and afterwards interviewed people for his column:

"People were saying interesting and heartfelt things, to be sure: One woman said the film reminded her that the Catholic Church was "not about priests, but about Jesus Christ," a reference to the pedophilia scandals. Another woman said Mel Gibson's "The Passion of the Christ" was "the most moving thing I've ever seen." Period.
But I stopped interviewing them because the controversy surrounding this movie is not about what people will say after seeing the movie."

So, after viewing this movie which many have said will cause people to become violent, he finds that people have positive and moving reactions instead. This causes him to........stop interviewing them. Because hey, if what you believe about Christians is not confirmed by the facts, then you must shift gears and come up with another excuse to hate them and the art they produce.

He continues:

"In Gibson's movie, the faces of the Jewish high priests are devious-looking, brutish and unambiguously murderous. Aside from two lesser figures in the Jewish crowd who protest, there is not one priest allowed to show a shadow of doubt, or humanity.... too many of them, from where I sat, bore facial features considered by anti-Semites as stereotypically "Jewish" - hook noses and other such features straight from the book of hate. What was that all about, Mel Gibson?"

Yeah Mel, how dare you find these actors with these features? Where the heck did you film this thing, Italy??

"Why - while we're asking questions - was the role of Satan given to a woman? She appears in key scenes throughout the film. She entices Jesus to renounce his destiny and save himself. Was Satan a woman at the time? I never knew this about her, though woman-bashing has always been part of the fabric of the church, especially in Mel's ultra-conservative branch."

Remember the saying "there are no stupid questions"? Well there are, and this has to be the stupidest of all questions ever asked.


"Does any religious Christian need to be told again what happens at the end of each of the four Gospels - and to be told it by a man who denounces the modern church and all the reconciling spirit it stands for?"

This bigot has bashed the Church for years and now he bashes someone who supposedly renounces it?? This is another positive aspect of this movie- it is bringing out all this bigotry in a way that puts the bigots on the defensive. Finally we can have a movie that we can support and the anti-Catholic bigots have to whine and complain. It will be interesting to see how these same people react the next time an anti-Catholic movie comes out. Especially if that movie is put out by one who "denounces the modern church and all the reconciling spirit it stands for".