I probably won’t be seeing The Passion of the Christ until Thursday, if then. Maybe not until next week. Michael is going to try to see it tomorrow, so he’ll have thoughts before I do.

That doesn’t stop me from being very interested in what others are saying and how they are reacting. When I read qualified or negative critiques of the film, I can’t help but try to do some reading between the lines, as well, especially since I’ve not seen it myself.

Some might be tempted to brush off critiques, especially from people who don’t profess any Christian faith. Well, that would be as wrong as judging a rave useless because it comes from a Christian.

It is especially wrong because this film has been touted as a tremendous tool for evangelism. If that is really the case, it seems to me that the reactions of non-believers would be the most important reactions of all!

There are some who will, of course, be negative no matter what, because they have decided to be. Just as there will be some who will rave, no matter what, because they have made the choice that this will be their stance – the film represents something important that must be defended, just as to some critics, the film cannot be addressed seriously simply because of its content.

But what I’m thinking about are comments I’ve read in which it is implied that this film is flawed because the violence belies the true story of Jesus. This isn’t the Jesus we’ve heard about – the Jesus who is about love and care for all people.

“The basic message of Christianity — love your brother — is obscured under torrents of blood to the point of benumbing the audience.”

Well, I haven’t seen the film, so I don’t know what the basis of that judgment would be. But what I do know is that if the film is essentially faithful to the Gospel portrait of Jesus during his Passion, and someone comes away from it saying, “Hey, this isn’t the Jesus I thought I knew about,” that person doesn’t deserve to be belittled – the Church does.

I’m always really interested in the soil in which evangelization and catechesis takes place, whether that be the ground that is an individual’s life and experiences, or the cultural and social soil in which Christianity lives and supposedly spreads the seed of the Gospel. Most of the time I find that peoples’ misperceptions about Christianity or Catholicism are perfectly reasonable, given their own experience, and given the poor job that most Christian churches do of preaching the Gospel in its fullness.

(Well, maybe not perfectly reasonable, and there are truly closed-minded people out there, but can we agree on “not totally unfounded?”)

So, of course, the hordes are fascinated and intrigued by the startling “facts” in The Da Vinci Code – no one’s ever bothered to teach them anything substantive about early Christian origins, so how can we expect them to know better?

Same with this film. If the image of Jesus in the film is essentially faithful to the Gospel, and if non-believers are startled and puzzled by it – whose fault is that?

A while back, in one of his anti-Christian rants, Christopher Hitchens wrote something like, “What could the execution of a teacher in Palestine 2,000 years ago have to do with me?”

That question stuck with me, and I think about it all the time as I engage in my own feeble efforts on behalf of faith. I have to keep it at the front of my mind – it reminds me that my job is not to preach to the choir. It will be interesting to see if this film leads those who ask Hitchens’ question to actually seek out an answer or to shrink back and say, “I hope – nothing.”