"The Blood of the Martyrs Moistens the Seeds of the Church"

Rating: 8/10 (11 November 2019)

...So says the Jesuit missionary to his psychologically astute Japanese "inquisitor" who threatens him with torture and death in Martin Scorsese's overlong but compelling film "Silence." The Jesuit can endure torture and a horrible death for the sake of his Savior but can he endure the terrible suffering of the innocent whose agonies are prolonged due to his unyielding faith in his God....or is it a misplaced need for establishing a church in an alien land....or even a reflection of unconscious spiritual pride amid the honest weakness of the "apostasizers?" The inquisitor asks for an overt rejection of the Christian God by the imprisoned Jesuit whose journey to Japan was prompted by news of an earlier missionary's apostasy (renunciation of the faith). The Jesuit along with another priest have made the perilous journey for the salvation of the apostate's soul and to renew the missionary effort. Will he succumb to the same terrible dilemmas as tortured the apostate's?
Scorsese's film is replete with religious and psychological themes that haunt us. What is the meaning of suffering; can we allow others to suffer to demonstrate (or confirm to ourselves?) our boundless faith; does faith supersede all other human criteria at all times; can love of God be separated from love of man; whose "truth" prevails: the Christian "truth" in a Buddhist land, or the Buddhist "truth" amid Christian interlopers? I'm reminded that Mother Teresa, who did holy work amid the poor and dying of Calcutta, has been criticized for not allowing painkillers to be given to the suffering and dying in her care, because suffering, in her judgment, was spiritually good for them. While that may indeed be right, is that her decision to make?
Part of the power of the church's appeal, and part of the theological problems with the nature of that appeal, is the ordinary person's amazement and respect for the amount of agonies the church's "holiest" representatives will endure to substantiate their faith. While briefly touched upon in "Silence," and not remotely on the same level as martyrdom, I'm reminded that some historians have commented that the clerical power of the Roman Catholic Church is reinforced by priestly celibacy, i.e., these men are stronger than us, they can subdue their bodily appetites unlike the rest of us.