Passion in the Corner

NRO passed along a weird little email under the heading "A CONTRARIAN VIEW OF THE PASSION". I say weird, but mean-spirited and cynical might be more accurate. Ed Kilgore writes

the heavy marketing of Gibson's film to conservative evangelical Protestants strikes me as theologically perverse, if commercially smart. These are people, for the most part, who don't place much stock in the liturgical calendar, and the particular relevance of the Passion to the annual cycle of meditations about Christ. Moreover, these are people who often think St. Paul's comments on gender relations or homosexuality--or for that matter, the entire Old Testament--are as central to Revealed Truth as the gospels themselves. Presumably, most conservative evangelicals would be as interested in, say, a movie about the cursing of the Cities on the Plain as with anything specifically about the Passion.

And third, I'm a bit concerned, though not surprised, by the sort of Popular Front thinking that has so many conservatives from every religious background expressing total solidarity with Gibson's faith, which is by any standard a bit eccentric, and by Catholic standards specifically, heretical or at least schismatic. I realize that many conservatives share the Left's eagerness to transfer political and cultural ideological labels into every realm of life, including religion…conservatives should beware embracing just anyone who calls himself a conservative.

First, note that Kilgore assumes that conservative Evangelicals would be happier watching a movie where gays are killed than a movie about Jesus Christ.

Second, he assumes that Evangelicals and traditional Catholics are more divided on essential matters than either are from secularists. (That's how i read "theologically perverse). That sure doesn't leave much room for ecumenicalism.

Similarly, by speaking of "Popular Front thinking" he implies that the Protestants who have praised this movie are forging cynical quasi-political alliances with Gibson. He rules out that they might actually admire the movie.

The late Francis Schaeffer was a prolific writer much admired by Evangelicals. One of his most influential books was The Christian Manifesto which argued that believers could and should become active in politics. One of his key points was that conservative Protestants, Catholics, Orthodox, and Jews should join together in what he called "an ecumenicalism of orthodoxy." In his view, the matters which divided a conservative Evangelical from a conservative Catholic were smaller than those matters which divided either one from secularists and from many liberals in their own churches.

This book was a huge seller (although it never made the best seller lists because Christian bookstores were not then polled by the list-makers). I'm not certain i knew any Evangelical minister or Sunday School leader who had not read it. Operationally, you see Schaeffer's thinking at work in many grass-roots pro-life groups where Baptists and Catholics work together despite their theological differences.

This type of ecumenicalism is driving a lot of the Evangelical interest in "The Passion". Yes, Gibson is Catholic. But his movie, by following so closely to the Gospel narrative, is orthodox. There is nothing cynical about that.

I also was disappointed that the Cornerites largely let Kilgore's ("an occasional NR/NRO Contributor") charges pass without comment.