Films can deepen and challenge our faith, priest says

By John Shaughnessy

The connection between faith and films struck Father Jeffrey Godecker again as he watched a poignant segment from the documentary, The Power of Forgiveness.

The segment captured the Amish response to the 2006 tragedy in which a gunman entered an Amish, one-room schoolhouse in Pennsylvania, took hostages then killed five children before committing suicide.

“It’s so powerful and provocative,” says Father Godecker, the chaplain of the Catholic community at Butler University in Indianapolis. “It talks about the Amish and their efforts to forgive—and how it’s a struggle, a day-to-day thing for them. It’s flesh and blood and tears, and they’re working with it.

“It has such an impact because it’s about children. Losing a child is a traumatic experience for parents. I relate to my own parents, who lost a child at 10 years old in a gun accident—how they lived with it, how they tried to move on from it. There are places where I have to re-do the forgiveness in my own life.”

The documentary provided one more example for Father Godecker of how films can be used to take a deeper look at faith—a theme that is the essence of an upcoming mini-course that Father Godecker will be leading called “Images That Provoke Faith.”

“I’m a great believer in how the arts can deepen our spirituality,” Father Godecker says. “Films carry powerful imagery that speaks to and challenges our faith. They can be used for our spiritual growth. I’ve done similar things with poetry and photography. This will be the first time I’ve used film or DVDs.”

The course will run four consecutive Monday evenings, starting Oct. 13 at 7 p.m. at Christian Theological Seminary, 1000 W. 42nd. St., in Indianapolis.

Some of the films that Father Godecker plans to use include To Kill A Mockingbird, Tender Mercies and Into Great Silence, a movie about life inside a Carthusian monastery that Newsweek described as “breathtaking.”

“Remember the movie The Mission about the Jesuits defending the natives against the Spaniards in Uruguay?” Father Godecker asks. “There’s a powerful image in that film where a slave trader has committed murder and goes to confession.

“For penance, the Jesuit father has him gather all the implements of his slave trading into a bag. Then he makes him carry this bag up a trail that goes straight up along this very large waterfall. The rocks are slippery, they’re on the edge and they’re risking falling off. When they finally get to the top, the Jesuit priest cuts the bag off the slave trader’s shoulders and the bag goes off the cliff. It’s an image for sin, an image for release, an image of what one needs to go through for release.”

Such images can be sacramental, Father Godecker says.

“In a way, images can be reminders of God’s presence,” he says. “They can function as eucharist with a small ‘e,’ nourishing the spirit.”

He promises time for prayer and reflection during the weekly two-hour sessions.

“I want them to use the images as a form of prayer, to reflect on our lives,” Father Godecker says. “Stay with the image long enough to let it ferment. If you take an image and stay with it, you have prayer.”

He believes the approach of connecting faith and films can make a difference, especially against the background of a society where people are constantly bombarded with images that don’t often show humanity at its best.

“This is the type of teaching that aims at experience and reflection on experience,” Father Godecker says. “It’s how people reflect and grow. People want their own experience and their own life valued. We’ll talk about why this is important. I think it fits very well with Catholic thought. Catholic thought can change a person and help them grow.”

(The cost of the course, which is open to people of all ages and faiths, is $50 or $40 for students and senior citizens. Register online at www.cts.edu/events and click on “Images that Provoke Faith” or call 317-931-4224.) †