God in Film

I was poking around facebook today, and I found an ad for a church here called "Journey" and I clicked on it because I thought their graphic/name was so cheesy (I love all things church, and one of the endearing things about it is when churches go nuts with the contemporary graphic design look, for another example, check out this link) and I was delighted to find that they meet relatively close to our apartment.  The website was advertising a sermon series called "God in Film" which really struck a note with me, because just last night Dutch and I watched John Huston's Wise Blood.  I was disappointed when I realized the movies on the list were not that interesting (or, to be fair, I hadn't heard of most of them and/or had heard of them, but didn't think much of them, except Harry Potter, of course).  I was thinking they really ought to do a sermon on Wise Blood, or at least, it could be a stand in for a sermon.



We like John Huston a lot (Treasure of the Sierra Madre was one of my favorite movies growing up) and Dutch made me read Flannery O'Conner while we were courting so I could "understand him better."  I hadn't read the novel, so I didn't know what to expect.  And knowing Flannery O, things would probably not be pretty.  The movie exceeded our expectations and was disturbing and fabulous all at the same time.  I would go into more detail, but I don't want to spoil it for anyone.

The funny thing is, WB might be one of the deepest, most spiritually intriguing movies I have seen in a long time, but there is no way it would ever be screened in a church.  Which is one of the things that makes church culture so endearing and frustrating at the same time is the tension between authentic communication and the rigid mores that dictate what can be said from the pulpit (something I am sure pastors everywhere chafe under)