Film Review: 'Just Mercy'

Dear Parish Faithful,

Earlier this week, Presvytera Deborah and I saw a deeply affecting film that explored themes as important as justice and mercy within the wider context of racism and the systemic injustice and deplorable inhumanity that racism can generate. 

Just Mercy Show Times

The film we saw is called Just Mercy. This was a cinematic dramatization of a notorious murder case that takes us back to the world of the 1980's- 1990's in the state of Alabama. The setting is actually in the small town where Harper Lee lived, and where she set her American classic, To Kill a Mockingbird. 

In the film, an African-American man by the name of Walter McMillan (played by Jamie Foxx) is arrested and convicted of brutally murdering a young white woman, though there was no real evidence to convict him other than an unreliable witness who was pressured to testify against him. Mr. McMillan was sentenced to death for this crime and spent about eight years on death row. His case was eventually taken up by an idealistic Harvard-trained lawyer, an African American by the name of Bryan Stevenson (played by Michael Jordan). 

Stevenson has devoted his life to defending convicted criminals on death row who either did not receive a fair trial, or did not have competent legal representation. A credit at the end of the film informed us that he has helped spare the lives of 85 men wrongfully convicted of murder and eventually spared the death sentence through his legal intervention. That is an accomplishment of heroic dimensions.  

Just Mercy was based on Stevenson's memoirs of the case that he published in the past. From what I have been able to read about the case, the film appears to be a reliable presentation of the case as it unfolded over time, though again in an engaging dramatized form. The case gained some real notoriety when it was the subject of investigation on the popular 60 Minutes series. Both presvytera and I would highly recommend it. 

In a film market flooded with either excessive action, sex, or just plain inanity, this is a good example of a film with genuine moral content that will make your "blood boil" over such crass injustice; and will also make you think out the implications of such themes as justice and mercy captured by the film's title. Such a film can have a good impact on our "young adults" and both broaden and deepen their own emerging moral sensitivity. Whenever justice and mercy are the subject of a work of art, one can justifiably reflect upon it theologically. There are deep Christian themes embedded within this film that are easily discernible and worthy of reflection and discussion. Issues of sin and redemption, the workings of the conscience, guilt and forgiveness, are some of the more obvious ones that come readily to mind and which receive thoughtful consideration throughout the film.

What is sobering about Walter McMillan's case is that it occurs about a quarter of a century after the passage of Civil Rights legislation in the 60's. Racism - either systemic or personal - can be so ingrained within any society that it becomes "natural" and something of a "way of life." Legislation will combat racism but cannot eradicate it. Ultimately, it is about a change of mind and heart. Then again, any attempt to combat it is met with mistrust, or simply contempt and hostility. In the racially polarized society that continued to exist in rural Alabama at the time of the film - again the 1980's - 1990's - we see how this led to the arrest and conviction of Walter McMillan. In the film this is all the more egregious as it is painfully clear that Walter McMillan was not even remotely involved in this tragic murder case.

What is equally troubling was the fierce opposition that any attempt to reopen this case was met with. And this opposition was organized from the top down, so to speak: law enforcement, the legal community, the judiciary, etc. This was further intensified by the not-so-hidden threat of violence that persons involved with seeking justice in this case were threatened with, beginning with Bryan Stevenson himself. 

At the same time, there were other decent (white) people who had moved far beyond such ingrained racism, and who also worked with the black community to seek justice in this case. At one point, a disheartening legal judgment, after a well-crafted appeal, had placed Mr.McMillan back on death row. But this decision was overturned by the higher State Court of Alabama, so that here you sensed the gains of the Civil Rights movement that served the cause of equal justice. And, of course, Walter McMillan is eventually given his freedom without even needing a new trial. This is not meant to be a "spoiler" because this was a very high-profile case that received national attention and one that can be studied from a variety of sources. Even though one may know the outcome of the case ahead of time, the tension and uncertainty that the film maintains, is dramatically very convincing.

The film itself is well done. One of the challenges of a film that is portraying actual people, many of whom are still alive, is that of being one more "bio-pic." At least for me, bio-pics often just don't succeed in being that attractive. These can be either overly-dramatized or overly-sentimentalized. I believe that the director of Just Mercy, Destin Daniel Cretton, maintains a good balance between both of those tendencies. 

With the story line being what it is, the film is intense and it is heartfelt, but never really overblown or maudlin. Of course, we have fine and nuanced dramatic performances by both Michael Jordan and Jamie Foxx, as well as the cast of other supporting actors. And they are both given some scenes filled with drama and good dialogue. There was a wonderful scene in which Jamie Foxx, playing Walter McMillan, says - after years of being considered and called a murderer, and after he finally was defended in a convincing manner - that "I have got my truth back." And Michael Jordan, playing Bryan Stevenson, is given some fine speeches that attain a level of genuine rhetorical flourish. Hard to say just how true-to-life all of that may be. (Though I recently heard an interview with the "real" Bryan Stevenson and he is very articulate). 

One hopes that the essence of each of the persons they were portraying is not distorted in the process of bringing them to the screen. Yet, how fitting that Walter McMillan, a victim of racism and acute prejudice, accused of a murder he did not commit, and suffering through years of this together with his family, is the subject of a film that captures his dignified suffering in an honorable fashion. (Sadly, he died in 2013 of acute dementia thought to have been the result of the trauma of spending years on death row). 

Finally, the film appeals to our own sense of right and wrong and of justice properly served. As I said earlier, it makes your "blood boil" while remaining simultaneously satisfying on the moral plane when people of goodwill and deep conviction work toward the service of "justice, mercy and unmerited grace." That meaningful expression belongs to Bryan Stevenson, spoken before a United States senate investigative committee. A sense of "unmerited grace" is a fine way to conclude a film concerning justice and mercy.

Again, I would accord Just Mercy a hearty endorsement/recommendation - as would Presvytera Deborah.

As something of an addendum to my review, I would like to briefly explore the very open allusions to Harper Lee's classic To Kill a Mockingbird that are found throughout the film. 

The setting of the film is in the small Alabama town in which she lived for many years. What was the significance of that great novel in relation to the content of the film? Presvytera Deborah and I had a "lively discussion" over its possible meaning. One of us thought that perhaps the director is telling us that now a black man is a lawyer standing where Atticus Finch once stood, and successfully defending another black man; whereas Tom Robinson in the novel, endured no such redemption and was even tragically killed in the end. Were we being told that as a society, we have "progressed" to this point, where justice can be so served? Or, as one of us thought, is the background presence of To Kill a Mockingbird a painful reminder that racism within the judicial system continues to linger on a full half century - including the era of the Civil Rights Movement - later? A rather troubling question. 

St Gregory of Nyssa On Baptism: 'Make It Clear Who Your Father Is!'

Dear Parish Faithful & Friends in Christ,

While we remain in this festal season of Theophany, perhaps we can “meditate” on the meaning and purpose of our own baptism – regardless of when that occurred – through the challenging insights of one of the great Church Fathers, St. Gregory of Nyssa (+395 commemorated on January 10). 

 

St. Gregory wrote the most comprehensive theological work of the fourth century, entitled The Great Catechism. Within this work, St. Gregory discusses baptism and how baptism is meant to be a an act of true regeneration in which our lives are changed to reflect and manifest this “new birth” from above. Yet, St. Gregory makes it perfectly clear that the sacramental life of the Church is not a kind of sanctified magic. The baptized person needs to co-operate with God by consciously struggling to lead a God-pleasing life that is only possible through the grace received in the baptismal font. When that conscious struggle is abandoned, the spiritual consequences are costly indeed. 

In the words of St. Gregory, extracted from The Great Catechism:

Baptism is a spiritual birth, but he who is born by spiritual birth must recognize by whom he is born and what kind of creature he must become. In physical birth, those who are born owe their life and existence to the impulse of their parents, but the spiritual birth is in control of the one who is being born. It is the only birth where we can choose and determine what kind of beings we are to become.

Now it is evident to everyone that we must receive the saving birth of baptism for the purpose of growth and renewal and changing in our nature …

If the essential faculties of our nature are not changed, what then is the change that the grace of baptism must bring about? It is clear that the sinful characteristics of our nature must be changed, and the evil in our life done away with. Undergoing the washing of baptism, we must become purified in our wills and wash away the iniquities of our souls. We must be changed for the better and become different.

If, however, the baptism has only washed the body, and the life after initiation is identical with that life before, then despite the boldness of my assertion, I will say without shrinking that the baptismal water is merely water, and the gift of the Spirit in nowhere in action. This is true not only when anger and hatred deforms and dishonors the image of God in us, but also when covetousness, passion, greed, evil thoughts, pride, envy, jealousy, injustice, lusts of the flesh and adultery continue to operate in us.

If this sort of sinful life characterizes a man’s life as much after baptism as before, then I cannot see that he has undergone any change in accordance with God’s nature, and he is really of the same corrupt nature as before. Such a man then, who does not change and yet prattles about birth and resurrection … is deceiving himself. He is not what he has not become!

Now the physically born child shares his parents’ nature. If you have been born of God and have become his child, then let your way of life testify to the presence of God within you. Make it clear who your Father is! For the very attributes by which we recognize God are the very marks by which a child of His must reveal his relationship with God. ‘God is goodness and there is no unrighteousness in Him.’ ‘The Lord is gracious to all … He loves His enemies.’ ‘He is merciful and forgives transgressions.’ These and many other characteristics revealed by the Scripture are what make a Godly life.  

If you are like this and you embody the Spirit of God, then you have genuinely become a child of God, but if you persist in displaying evil, then it is useless to prattle to yourself and to others about your birth from above. You are still merely a son of man, not a son of the Most High God! You love lies and vanity, and you are still immersed in the corruptible things of this world. Don’t you know in what way a man becomes a child of God? Why in no other way than by becoming holy.

If you would like to read more of this truly great Church Father, please avail yourself of this link.

https://www.oca.org/saints/lives/2020/01/10/100140-saint-gregory-bishop-of-nyssa

Petitions for a blessed New Year

Dear Parish Faithful & Friends in Christ,

"For I am sure that neither death; nor life, nor angels, nor principalities, nor things to come, nor powers, nor height, nor depth, nor anything else in all creation, will be able to separate us from the love of God in Christ Jesus our Lord." (Rom. 8:38-39)

To follow up on the recent meditation, 'Resolutions or Repentance', I would simply like to point out some key features of the petitions that we recently prayed for a blessed New Year. Specifically, I would like to comment on how we address God in these petitions, for it reveals how we understand, approach, pray to and praise the God we believe in. And here we keep in mind the words of St. Gregory the Theologian: "When I say God, I mean the Father, the Son and the Holy Spirit."

I shared a few of these specially-created petitions in the last meditation, but what stood out for me this year as I chanted them in the service, are the various titles that we ascribe to God in the process. Basically, it proves to be a "variation on a theme." And the theme is: God is love (I Jn. 4:8). As I usually add when I remind us of this most basic of all truths, is that the expression — "God is love" — is not be confused in any way with a kind of religious sentimentalism. The Cross — "You were bought with a price" (I Cor. 6:20) — will always liberate us from any such sentimentalizing of the Gospel.

Be that as it may, in the Augmented Litany for A Prayer Service for the New Year, there are seven of these unique petitions that stand out. They are longer than usual and they cover our prayer for the avoidance of "calamities;" the appeasing of "enmity, discord and civil strife;" for forgiveness of our "innumerable transgressions;" the continued need of "the warmth of the sun;" for strengthening of "Thy Holy Church;" a plea to "root out and extinguish every blasphemous impiety;" and deliverance from "famine, destruction ... the invasion of enemies and civil war ... and every death bearing wound."

This is a list that emphasizes the fragility of our lives and the unpredictability of unforeseen events that threaten the peace of our lives. I would simply guess that these petitions originated in the (medieval) world of Byzantium, a world in which there was a more direct encounter with the realities of the natural world, the havoc of bad weather, lack of medical care and/or an invasion from hostile forces. In our minds, this is a realism that perhaps shades toward pessimism. Or at least for those of us in a world in which taking refuge in technology, medicine or the protection of the law, seems natural, and thus able to relieve of some of the basic problems facing human beings not that long ago; but which may have been quite remote in a large swath of the Christianized Eastern Roman Empire of the past.

I am not saying that these petitions are "dated" and therefore no longer relevant to our current situation. In a fallen world, human nature continues to be what it has always been, and "there is nothing new under the sun" as the Scriptures remind us. "Calamities" may take on a new form in our contemporary world, but we continue to feel uneasy in the face of the unpredictable: the next school/mall/church/synagogue shooting; a rampaging tornado or hurricane; the outbreak of a new disease; or a "cardiac episode." Our contemporary list does not seem a great deal less hazardous, when it gets right down to it. Thus, throughout human history, whether in the pre-modern, modern or post-modern worlds of our creation, "calamities" have always occurred and continue unabated.

To return to my original point, however, I am struck at how these lengthy petitions end in addressing God. In succession, we pray to God in the following manner, as: "O All-gracious Lord;" "O Tenderly-merciful Lord;" "O All-compassionate Lord;" "O Almighty Master;" "O All-powerful Lord;" and "O Tenderly-compassionate Lord." God's majesty and power are emphasized, but God's mercy compassion predominate. (Not that there is a real conflict between God's omnipotence and mercy). 

Thus, we are not in the hands of an angry God, but of those of a loving God. We should recall that for St. Irenaeus of Lyons, the "two hands of God" are the Son and the Holy Spirit. (That image of an "angry God" that Christians have embraced and promoted for centuries has been profoundly unfortunate, to put it mildly.) We humbly acknowledge in these same petitions that we are "unprofitable servants" (if you are ready to argue against that claim, I would like to hear what you have to say).

We further acknowledge that we are sinners in desperate need of grace and mercy (how refreshing to not feel compelled by a need for self-validation, or the maintenance of a particular white-washed image to others, to defensively claim whenever we do something wrong that I am really a "nice person!"). There is nothing abject about such acknowledgment, but a sobering realism that we, too, are subject to the passions and sinful distortions - or simply unavoidable circumstances - that are both "out there" and "within us." As St. Peter wrote to fellow Christians: "Be sober, be watchful. Your adversary the devil prowls around like a roaring lion, seeking someone to devour" (I Pet. 5:8). The Gospel tells us that God desires to save us from all of this - not to punish us.

The tension may arise when we think deeply on the seeming contradiction between the endless "calamities" that expose us to danger, and the assurance that we are the servants of a loving and graceful God who numbers the hairs on our head according to Christ. That is the tension I perceive within these petitions I keep referring to: a litany of "bad things" closing with the praise of a "tenderly-compassionate God."

Is there a disconnect in all of this that we piously avoid questioning? Why doesn't God solve all of these tensions on our behalf, if he indeed loves us? In our limited understanding, no one has been able to answer those questions when put in that form. As it is, I rather doubt that we will ever solve the haunting questions faced by Job, and cast today rather superficially as: "why do bad things happen to good people?" Yet, once our faith matures to the point where we abandon the image of God as cosmic magician - if not butler - who is supposed to guarantee us a long and prosperous life where nothing serious or life-threatening ever happens - yet, even so, we will still die!- then we can face "calamities" with a hopeful realism that we are always in the hands of a merciful and loving God who desires our salvation.

Jesus teaches us to trust God - not blindly but, again, hopefully with a mature faith. Or, in the incomparable words of the Apostle Paul: "Who shall separate us from the low of Christ? Shall tribulation, or distress, or persecution, or famine, or nakedness, or peril, or sword? ... No, in all these things we are more than conquerors through hum who loved us" (Rom. 8:35,37).  I, for one, am confident that the prayers of the Church in the form of these petitions for a blessed New Year have got it right.

Through faith, intuitively, by inner perception, we know that the God who has revealed Himself in Christ is the "All-compassionate Lord."

Resolutions or Repentance?

Dear Parish Faithful & Friends in Christ,

According to the civil calendar, we begin the year of our Lord (Anno Domini) 2020, on January 1. The year of 2020 is based upon the calculations of a medieval monk who, in attempting to ascertain the exact date of the birth of Christ, missed the year 0 by only a few years. According to contemporary scholars, Jesus was actually born between what we consider to be 6 – 4 B. C. These were the last years of Herod the Great, for according to the Gospel of St. Matthew, Jesus was born toward the very end of Herod’s long reign (37 – 4 B.C.). Christians therefore divide the linear stretch of historical time between the era before the Incarnation; and the era after the Incarnation and the advent of the Son of God into our space-time world. 

In other words, the years before the Incarnation are treated as something of a “countdown” to the time-altering event of the Incarnation; and the years since are counted forward as we move toward the end of history and the coming Kingdom of God. By entering the world, Christ has transformed the meaning and goal of historical time.

Recently, there has been a scholarly shift away from this openly Christian approach to history, as the more traditional designations of B.C. and A.D. have been replaced by the more neutral and “ecumenically sensitive” designations of B.C.E. (Before the Common Era), and C.E. (Common Era). Understanding and interpreting history from a decidedly Christian perspective, I would still argue in favor of the more traditional B.C. and A.D.

Although an issue of more than passing interest, that discussion may appear somewhat academic in comparison to the pressing issues of our daily lives as they continue to unfold now in 2020. We will  exchange our conventional greetings of “Happy New Year” probably more than once in the next few days. 

Under closer inspection, there remains something vague about that expression, and perhaps that is for the better. Do we wish for the other person – as well as for ourselves – that nothing will go (terribly) wrong in the unknown future of the new year? More positively, do we wish that all of our desires and wishes for our lives will be fulfilled in this new year? Or, are we wishing a successful year of the perpetual pursuit of “happiness” (whatever that means) for ourselves and for our friends? At that point we just may be reaching beyond the restrictive boundaries of reality. As Tevye the Dairyman once said: “The more man plans, the harder God laughs.” 

Perhaps the more realistic approach would be to give and receive our “Happy New Year” greetings as neighborly acknowledgement that we are “all in this together,” and that we need to mutually encourage and support one another.

We also approach the New Year as a time to commit ourselves to those annual “resolutions” that we realize will make our lives more wholesome, safe, sound, or even sane - if only we can sustain them. A resolution is to dig deep inside and find the resolve necessary to break through those (bad) habits or patterns of living that undermine either our effectiveness in daily life; jeopardize our relationships with our loved ones, our friends and our neighbors; or seriously threaten to make us less human than we can and should be. 

We know that we should eat less, swear less, lust less, get angry less, surf the computer less, play on our iPhones less, watch TV less and so on. We further know that we need more patience, more self-discipline, more graceful language, more attention to the needs of others, more “quality time” with our families and friends, more forgiving, more loving and so on. We know, therefore, that we need to change, and we intuitively realize how difficult this is. Bad habits are hard to break. Therefore, we need this annual opportunity of a new beginning and our New Year resolutions to give us a “fighting chance” to actually change. 

 

 

As a 'holiday' is a more-or-less secular and watered-down version of a 'holy day', so a 'resolution' is a more-or-less secular and watered-down version of 'repentance'.

 

We may joke about how quickly we break our resolutions, but beneath the surface of that joking (which covers up our disappointments and rationalizations) we are acknowledging, once again, the struggle of moving beyond and replacing our vices with virtues. May God grant everyone the resolve to maintain these resolutions with care and consistency.

And yet I believe that we can profoundly deepen our experience of the above. For, as a “holiday” is a more-or-less secular and watered-down version of a “holy day,” so a resolution is a more-or-less secular and watered-down version of personal repentance. To repent (Gk. metanoia) is to have a “change of mind,” together with a corresponding change in the manner of our living and a re-direction of our lives toward God. The New Year’s resolution of our secularized culture may be a persistent reminder — or the remainder of — a lost Christian worldview that realized the importance of repentance. “There is something rotten in Denmark,” and an entire industry of self-help and self-reliance therapies — totally divorced from a theistic context — is an open acknowledgement of that reality regardless of how distant it may now be from its religious expression. As members of the Body of Christ living within the grace-filled atmosphere of the Church, we can, in turn, incorporate our resolutions within the ongoing process of repentance, which is nothing less than our vocation as human beings: “God requires us to go on repenting until our last breath” (St. Isaias of Sketis). Or, as St. Isaac of Syria teaches: “This life has been given you for repentance. Do not waste it on other things.”

Summarizing and synthesizing the Church’s traditional teaching about repentance, Archbishop Kallistos Ware has formulated a wonderfully open-ended expression of repentance that is both helpful and hopeful:

 

Correctly understood, repentance is not negative but positive. It means not self-pity or remorse but conversion, the re-centering of our whole life upon the Trinity. It is to look not backward with regret but forward with hope – not downwards at our own shortcomings but upward at God’s love. It is to see, not what we have failed to be, but what by divine grace we can now become; and it is to act upon what we see. In this sense, repentance is not just a single act, an initial step, but a continuing state, an attitude of heart and will that needs to be ceaselessly renewed up to the end of life.  (The Orthodox Way, p. 113-114)

 

Hard not to be inspired by such an expressive passage! In the Service of Prayer for the (Civil) New Year, we incorporate into the litanies of the service some of the following special petitions. Thus, in the language of the Church, these petitions served as an ecclesial form of the resolutions we make to break through some of our dehumanizing behavior; as well as a plea to God to strengthen our better inclinations:

 

That He will drive away from us all soul-corrupting passions and corrupting habits, and that He will plant in our hearts His divine fear, unto the fulfillment of His statutes, let us pray to the Lord.

That He will renew a right spirit within us, and strengthen us in the Orthodox Faith, and cause us to make haste in the performance of good deeds and the Fulfillment of all His statutes, let us pray to the Lord.

That He will bless the beginning and continuance of this year with the grace of His love for mankind, and will grant unto us peaceful times, favorable weather and a sinless life in health and abundance, let us pray to the Lord.

 

If you resolve to seek and to “love the Lord your God with all your heart, and with all your soul and with all your mind … and your neighbor as yourself” (MATT. 22:37-38), then I believe that this new year may not be perpetually “happy,” but that it will truly blessed.