Passion for the Passion

So, last weekend, I went with some friends to see Mel Gibson's new movie - The Passion of The Christ. I purposely went with some friends who are all different religious demonimations. So, we had a Calvinist, an atheist, a fallen-away Buddhist/agnostic, and a Jew. As expected, each one of us had extremely different perspectives on the movie.

I had three main reactions to the movie:

Pontius Pilate was the most compassionate character (besides Jesus) in the entire movie. While I realize that this is predominately how he is portrayed in the Scriptures, remember that the Scriptures were written while the Romans still controlled the Holy Land. So, I'm very skeptical of the treatment that was afforded Pilate because of this. I also think having his wife (concubine?) find Mary went a bit overboard as well.

The violence is extreme. I understand Gibson's point for trying to bring the point home, but frankly, it went way overboard. My friends and I were cringing at several times during the torture. It's definitely not a movie you can bring little kids to see. As Ebert mentioned in his review, if it were anyone other than Jesus on the cross, it would be NC-17 in a heartbeat.

At face value, however, there's another point that could be made here and one that I haven't yet seen mentioned (and why I'm posting at all a full week after seeing it). It's that if you take Gibson's portrayal without questioning it, you see the High Priests willfully going against their own precepts. Is there any merit to casting a Rabbi to death over a condemened murderer (Barbaras)? No. It's against everything that Judaism stands for. And, I see a parallel to today as well in Islam with the Wahhabists. Some seek to pervert the meaning of Islam for their own nefarious purposes. Just as the High Priests (believing Gibson's account at face value again) should be roundly criticized for their actions, so should today's imams who disregard the Qur'an in their teachings and actions.

As always, go see it for yourself. But, do go into it with open eyes.

[/random] permanent link

UCI beat UCLA at something! At last!

In local news, the director of UCLA's body donor program has been arrested. The situation at UCLA sounds very similar to the one that happened here back in 1999.

I'm shocked (shocked!) that the Regents haven't stopped these programs across the entire UC system yet. Wanna bet they think about UC-wide reforms now? Yes, I know their is substantial value by working on a cadaver. But, the exposure for fraud is perhaps too high. Then, again paying technicans $30k to manage the program is asking for trouble. (Hey, wait, they make more than double what grad students do!)

Sadly, something that UCI beat UCLA at by about 5 years. Oh, besides that whole WWW thing that never quite caught on. I'm sure this is payback for us stealing their lame fight song.

[/ucirvine] permanent link