I was deeply moved by the film, stayed up way late to watch it, was deeply, deeply troubled throughout by the power dynamics and will keep thinking about it long after reading closely the very many interesting comments and replies. And when I’m trying to think sometimes I get wordy.
I was deeply moved by the film, stayed up way late to watch it, was deeply, deeply troubled throughout by the power dynamics and will keep thinking about it long after reading closely the very many interesting comments and replies. And when I’m trying to think sometimes I get wordy.
I don’t know the author, or his theology.
He depicts SO WELL, and this is the great strength of the film for me, common Catholics’ REFUSAL TO BE FOOLED. Let them be thought fools, by the powers, they are not fools. And that is why I cheered for the monks throughout, who represent the ordinary, common Catholics of the title. The film cheered for them. It touched me more than I can say.
So what I say here, trying to ease my unease, echoes in many respects the astonishing commentary of Dr. K who was cheering them. And who was perhaps accenting the forces they were up against.
These all too ordinary Catholics with their unsophistication refuse to be fooled about what a priest is, and how he should look and present himself. They refuse to be fooled about what worship is, possible arguments by powerful forces or experts of the time for the vernacular and Mass versus populi? notwithstanding.
Against the novelties of Vatican IV (did the Substack and initial audience gasp at the mention of the number IV as I did?) these commoners and their articulate Father Abbot uphold every Catholic’s need for sacramental private auricular Confession. So they did it, fulfilling their vocation. And the Abbot will give the inquisitor— visitor—their explanations.
(This practice corresponds with the way Jesus instituted it, on the very first low Sunday, so that bishops and priests actually hear sins in order to forgive or retain them—kudos and thank you for this insight to my priest this low Sunday who preached on the sacrament, and not on “how hard faith is” for moderns—the doubting Thomas popular spin.)
It is the common, childlike-of-faith Catholics whom the childlike-of-faith monks refuse to leave behind, and they have the backing of their abbot-shepherd. They are being good shepherds. There ought to be no shame in being what our Lord said we needed to become, in vocation and in attitude.
The abbot doesn’t think too highly of himself. He seems to have a shepherd’s heart and logic. He couldn’t stand by while the pews emptied and the men stood outside and smoked, as soon the Mass was changed by Pope John. The abbot doesn’t want to leave anyone behind (recall, as Dr. K narrated, the Father General spoke disdainfully of the church the modernists were trying to “leave behind.”) In contrast the abbot instructs the monks to minister to the Catholics where they are, a place which our Substack audience also believes we still inhabit in common, the still-fallen world desperately needing eternal salvation.
So the exodus from novel worship reverses, the gathering accelerates, as common Catholics of every description and locale and nation seek out what they had so recently lost.
Which is why they’ve been found out.
And that’s where the power brokers, the father general of the order and Kinsella the visitor come in with their smug assurance that they know better than the common Catholics. Their discussion reveals that the big, global moves God is making through the winds of change must not be impeded by the common Catholics. Modern man has come of age and childlike faith must be left behind.
Of course Substack readers will smell a revisionist history of the early church focused on revolution and material utopia rather than the eternal salvation of souls and eternal blessedness. (Today, think: material betterment, encouragement of massive economic migration, and the embracing of globalist goals for reducing humanity’s carbon footprint on a collision course with Catholic teachings on the sanctity of life.) What does it matter if common, deplorable Catholics refuse to be conned by the comrades of this revisionist Jesus? They must be forced to conform to the winds of change and the impending unity of faiths!! There is to be no holding out on the untried goal by way of unexplored paths!
And I’m puzzled why this imperfect shepherd should side with the powerful, instead of the common Catholics he seems to love.
Yes, maybe he is hollowed out at the heart, having lost his faith. That’s to be pitied. Who in the church didn’t pray for him enough, and those like him, so that one day he was reduced to responding as a branch manager of his order only?
The film does seem, as Dr K says, a cautionary tale. And I suggest it may tell us more about what actually already happened after Vatican II, and ordinary Catholics being made to endure more change and tinkering than they felt in their bones was right and good.
Of course I am saddened by the decision of the abbot, and it could well be that obedience is all he has left.
(The monks are genuinely meek. Jesus asks us to be meek and humble like Him. But when pressured to renounce his vocation by the powers of Pilate and the High Priest he is unrelentingly truthful and they appear to win the day.)
(I will try to read up on so much which Dr K has recommended and proposed on what is TRUE obedience. We must uphold that. But the movie dramatizes for me why true obedience for Catholics is never, and never was, unconditional, even if that seems to be the last value the opposing sides in the story share, and which the film seems to applaud. And because I have tried to understand the monks, I now realize that while we Catholics today must be meek and humble, we must never betray our vocation. The powers in the film are neither humble nor meek. They are just canny and smooth.)
(And yet, having converted from the Protestant revolt, I know that defiance, too, can become heady. Luther was many things, but he was not meek.)
However the ending of the film is uncertain, I believe, still. The abbot has his orders to make the monks conform to the changes in every way. And he has given his word. Why? Perhaps I wonder now, whether he looked down on the monks’ being “like children” since he had lost faith himself. Some commenters here are sure Kinsella’s trust is him is sound, the abbot will never buckle, the monks will. I’m less certain of that.
I’m not amazed that the abbot doesn’t finish the Lord’s Prayer. I’m amazed he starts it. He is clearly unhappy with what he has told the monks and he leads them into prayer, after not having led them in prayer or prayed himself for a deadly long time.
Maybe, in a real situation, the prayer would change what seems the foregone conclusion that it is futile to have childlike faith, and futile to try and refuse to be fooled, conned, by the inevitability of bowing to novelty.
Here is another puzzle to me.
The simple monks in the film articulated the real presence in defiance of “Vatican IV”—and bully for them—that priceless treasure of Jesus, that miracle under the sacramental veil. But for these monks, shouldn’t the Real Presence have been undergirded and effected by the miracle of the Real Sacrifice (bloodless but renewed and represented at every Mass)?Wouldn’t the priests of any order, with their schooling and dispositions have articulated that? Have I stated the Catholic truth here? And if so, was the author or screenwriter aware of it? These monks only say Mass commemorates Calvary. Was either artistic figure underestimating those simple monks? (Did Padre Pio for instance not also have the childlike faith required by Jesus, and yet nothing was clearer to Padre Pio than that the world depended on the Sacrifice of the Mass?) Was either artistic figure underestimating the audiences of the early seventies?
Or maybe, is it like films, and plays which state the pope wouldn’t grant Henry VIII a “divorce” because the general public doesn’t understand the concept of annulment?
Just wondering.
And a final thought. Maybe like the monks, might we describe ourselves less as the faithful Catholics—as if others aren’t even trying—and more like the Catholics who are unashamed of childlike faith in the words of Jesus and the constant teaching of the only church he founded, a church known for its millennia of charity and clarity?
Many good reflections in here... it is a puzzling film but I think a lot of the uncertainty that runs through it comes both from the time it was made and from the author's personal struggles, which he "writes into" the characters.
PS maybe this too: Jesus is meek and humble of heart. But he is unrelentingly truthful before Pilate as well as the High Priest who want him to betray his vocation.
The abbot and film take refuge in unconditional obedience because, what, we can’t differentiate that from actual meekness? And he has betrayed his vocation as a true shepherd. Mistaking weakness of purpose with seemingly pious but mock meekness?
I was deeply moved by the film, stayed up way late to watch it, was deeply, deeply troubled throughout by the power dynamics and will keep thinking about it long after reading closely the very many interesting comments and replies. And when I’m trying to think sometimes I get wordy.
I don’t know the author, or his theology.
He depicts SO WELL, and this is the great strength of the film for me, common Catholics’ REFUSAL TO BE FOOLED. Let them be thought fools, by the powers, they are not fools. And that is why I cheered for the monks throughout, who represent the ordinary, common Catholics of the title. The film cheered for them. It touched me more than I can say.
So what I say here, trying to ease my unease, echoes in many respects the astonishing commentary of Dr. K who was cheering them. And who was perhaps accenting the forces they were up against.
These all too ordinary Catholics with their unsophistication refuse to be fooled about what a priest is, and how he should look and present himself. They refuse to be fooled about what worship is, possible arguments by powerful forces or experts of the time for the vernacular and Mass versus populi? notwithstanding.
Against the novelties of Vatican IV (did the Substack and initial audience gasp at the mention of the number IV as I did?) these commoners and their articulate Father Abbot uphold every Catholic’s need for sacramental private auricular Confession. So they did it, fulfilling their vocation. And the Abbot will give the inquisitor— visitor—their explanations.
(This practice corresponds with the way Jesus instituted it, on the very first low Sunday, so that bishops and priests actually hear sins in order to forgive or retain them—kudos and thank you for this insight to my priest this low Sunday who preached on the sacrament, and not on “how hard faith is” for moderns—the doubting Thomas popular spin.)
It is the common, childlike-of-faith Catholics whom the childlike-of-faith monks refuse to leave behind, and they have the backing of their abbot-shepherd. They are being good shepherds. There ought to be no shame in being what our Lord said we needed to become, in vocation and in attitude.
The abbot doesn’t think too highly of himself. He seems to have a shepherd’s heart and logic. He couldn’t stand by while the pews emptied and the men stood outside and smoked, as soon the Mass was changed by Pope John. The abbot doesn’t want to leave anyone behind (recall, as Dr. K narrated, the Father General spoke disdainfully of the church the modernists were trying to “leave behind.”) In contrast the abbot instructs the monks to minister to the Catholics where they are, a place which our Substack audience also believes we still inhabit in common, the still-fallen world desperately needing eternal salvation.
So the exodus from novel worship reverses, the gathering accelerates, as common Catholics of every description and locale and nation seek out what they had so recently lost.
Which is why they’ve been found out.
And that’s where the power brokers, the father general of the order and Kinsella the visitor come in with their smug assurance that they know better than the common Catholics. Their discussion reveals that the big, global moves God is making through the winds of change must not be impeded by the common Catholics. Modern man has come of age and childlike faith must be left behind.
Of course Substack readers will smell a revisionist history of the early church focused on revolution and material utopia rather than the eternal salvation of souls and eternal blessedness. (Today, think: material betterment, encouragement of massive economic migration, and the embracing of globalist goals for reducing humanity’s carbon footprint on a collision course with Catholic teachings on the sanctity of life.) What does it matter if common, deplorable Catholics refuse to be conned by the comrades of this revisionist Jesus? They must be forced to conform to the winds of change and the impending unity of faiths!! There is to be no holding out on the untried goal by way of unexplored paths!
And I’m puzzled why this imperfect shepherd should side with the powerful, instead of the common Catholics he seems to love.
Yes, maybe he is hollowed out at the heart, having lost his faith. That’s to be pitied. Who in the church didn’t pray for him enough, and those like him, so that one day he was reduced to responding as a branch manager of his order only?
The film does seem, as Dr K says, a cautionary tale. And I suggest it may tell us more about what actually already happened after Vatican II, and ordinary Catholics being made to endure more change and tinkering than they felt in their bones was right and good.
Of course I am saddened by the decision of the abbot, and it could well be that obedience is all he has left.
(The monks are genuinely meek. Jesus asks us to be meek and humble like Him. But when pressured to renounce his vocation by the powers of Pilate and the High Priest he is unrelentingly truthful and they appear to win the day.)
(I will try to read up on so much which Dr K has recommended and proposed on what is TRUE obedience. We must uphold that. But the movie dramatizes for me why true obedience for Catholics is never, and never was, unconditional, even if that seems to be the last value the opposing sides in the story share, and which the film seems to applaud. And because I have tried to understand the monks, I now realize that while we Catholics today must be meek and humble, we must never betray our vocation. The powers in the film are neither humble nor meek. They are just canny and smooth.)
(And yet, having converted from the Protestant revolt, I know that defiance, too, can become heady. Luther was many things, but he was not meek.)
However the ending of the film is uncertain, I believe, still. The abbot has his orders to make the monks conform to the changes in every way. And he has given his word. Why? Perhaps I wonder now, whether he looked down on the monks’ being “like children” since he had lost faith himself. Some commenters here are sure Kinsella’s trust is him is sound, the abbot will never buckle, the monks will. I’m less certain of that.
I’m not amazed that the abbot doesn’t finish the Lord’s Prayer. I’m amazed he starts it. He is clearly unhappy with what he has told the monks and he leads them into prayer, after not having led them in prayer or prayed himself for a deadly long time.
Maybe, in a real situation, the prayer would change what seems the foregone conclusion that it is futile to have childlike faith, and futile to try and refuse to be fooled, conned, by the inevitability of bowing to novelty.
Here is another puzzle to me.
The simple monks in the film articulated the real presence in defiance of “Vatican IV”—and bully for them—that priceless treasure of Jesus, that miracle under the sacramental veil. But for these monks, shouldn’t the Real Presence have been undergirded and effected by the miracle of the Real Sacrifice (bloodless but renewed and represented at every Mass)?Wouldn’t the priests of any order, with their schooling and dispositions have articulated that? Have I stated the Catholic truth here? And if so, was the author or screenwriter aware of it? These monks only say Mass commemorates Calvary. Was either artistic figure underestimating those simple monks? (Did Padre Pio for instance not also have the childlike faith required by Jesus, and yet nothing was clearer to Padre Pio than that the world depended on the Sacrifice of the Mass?) Was either artistic figure underestimating the audiences of the early seventies?
Or maybe, is it like films, and plays which state the pope wouldn’t grant Henry VIII a “divorce” because the general public doesn’t understand the concept of annulment?
Just wondering.
And a final thought. Maybe like the monks, might we describe ourselves less as the faithful Catholics—as if others aren’t even trying—and more like the Catholics who are unashamed of childlike faith in the words of Jesus and the constant teaching of the only church he founded, a church known for its millennia of charity and clarity?
Many good reflections in here... it is a puzzling film but I think a lot of the uncertainty that runs through it comes both from the time it was made and from the author's personal struggles, which he "writes into" the characters.
Ah, glad for your reply, and I alsoreplied to myself to PS on unconditional obedience vs true meekness
PS maybe this too: Jesus is meek and humble of heart. But he is unrelentingly truthful before Pilate as well as the High Priest who want him to betray his vocation.
The abbot and film take refuge in unconditional obedience because, what, we can’t differentiate that from actual meekness? And he has betrayed his vocation as a true shepherd. Mistaking weakness of purpose with seemingly pious but mock meekness?