This post is part of a ten-part series drawing from the Arts and Faith Top 100 Films. You can read the introduction the series here, along with the schedule of films to be featured. Note: My apologies for the tardiness of this post. Of all of the world, art-house films in my current series, Yasujiro Ozu’s Tokyo Story (1953), with its simplicity and easily recognizable characters seems one of the most accessible to a general audience. Yes, you have to... Read more
I am mourning for America today. I am mourning because so many have abdicated the values that already make America great. Now, granted, we have never kept these values perfectly, and we have often rationalized abandoning them. Nevertheless, these values have called us back over and over again to freedom, decency, and human rights. Alexis de Tocqueville once wrote: America is great because America is good, and if America ever ceases to be good, America will cease to be great.... Read more
This post is part of a ten-part series drawing from the Arts and Faith Top 100 Films. You can read the introduction the series here, along with the schedule of films to be featured. Of all the films in this series thus far, none has hit me right in the gut like Ingmar Bergman’s The Seventh Seal did. In its honest grappling with the hiddenness of God, the silence of God, and the inescapability of death, it grabbed me up... Read more
This post is part of a ten-part series drawing from the Arts and Faith Top 100 Films. You can read the introduction the series here, along with the schedule of films to be featured. We are three films into our series, and for me, this one was the toughest film yet. While most or all of the films included in this series requires a certain slowing down from the frenetic pace of postmodern culture and a cultivating of contemplation, Philip... Read more
Hi folks, Sorry to be late on last Friday’s post, but I don’t think I’m going to be able to get it done until this coming Friday. Alas. I’m looking forward to reflecting on it, but our dialogue will have to wait until then. (Eeks! Time!) Until then, how is everyone doing? Anyone taking up the practice of Lent? (For something Lent-related, check out my post on Ash Wednesday here.) I have kind of a love/hate relationship with Lent myself.... Read more
This post is part of a ten-part series drawing from the Arts and Faith Top 100 Films. You can read the introduction the series here, along with the schedule of films to be featured. What would you do if you discovered you had terminal cancer and had only 6 months to live? Some might seek to enjoy all the fleshy pleasures this world has to offer. Some might seek revenge for all the powerlessness they had experienced in their lives.... Read more
Note: I do my best to keep this review as spoiler free as possible. I went into my viewing of the film Spotlight expecting my big takeaway to be related to faith. It’s a film about the massive clergy abuse scandal in the Catholic church, after all. And certainly, it was a sobering reminder of the toll abuse takes on the vulnerable, particularly when it is perpetrated by those who represent God (something also explored in one of my favorite... Read more
This post is part of a ten-part series drawing from the Arts and Faith Top 100 Films. You can read the introduction the series here, along with the schedule of films to be featured. Carl Theodor Dreyer’s 1955 film, Ordet, is based on a play by Danish pastor and playwright Kaj Munk. During the Nazi German occupation of Denmark, Munk refused to bow the knee to the Third Reich. In 1944, he was killed by the Gestapo and dumped in... Read more
For the past few months, a combination of busyness, frustration with the state of blogging in general (all too often lending heat–not light–to our world) and with myself (so easy to talk, so hard to do), and general disillusionment with this broken world (what else did I expect?) have led to a virtual halt in my writing here. I’ve been frustrated with this, particularly because I have some loyal, wonderful readers whom I hate to let down. As I’ve brainstormed... Read more
I am blessed to know a number of people who have served refugees. The truth is that anytime we serve others (refugees or otherwise), we may expect to bless them–but oftentimes we end up being blessed even more. Relationship and service enriches our lives. Serving those of other cultures enriches us and sometimes opens our eyes to our own cultural impoverishment. I discovered this as a missionary kid, and it’s a lesson I never forgot. The low-income people of the... Read more
Rebecca Florence Miller
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