Matrix ordinations<\/title>\n<meta name=\"description\" content=\"Bizarre. You know how things just waft through your brain when you wake up sometimes, for no particular reason?Today I got up and found myself thinking\" \/>\n<meta name=\"robots\" content=\"index, follow, max-snippet:-1, max-image-preview:large, max-video-preview:-1\" \/>\n<link rel=\"canonical\" href=\"https:\/\/www.patheos.com\/blogs\/filmchat\/2005\/08\/matrix-ordinations.html\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:locale\" content=\"en_US\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:type\" content=\"article\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:title\" content=\"Matrix ordinations\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:description\" content=\"Bizarre. 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{"id":2654,"date":"2005-08-12T07:41:00","date_gmt":"2005-08-12T07:41:00","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.patheos.com\/blogs\/filmchat\/2005\/08\/matrix-ordinations\/"},"modified":"2005-08-12T07:41:00","modified_gmt":"2005-08-12T07:41:00","slug":"matrix-ordinations","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.patheos.com\/blogs\/filmchat\/2005\/08\/matrix-ordinations.html","title":{"rendered":"Matrix ordinations"},"content":{"rendered":"\n<\/head>

Bizarre. You know how things just waft through your brain when you wake up sometimes, for no particular reason?<\/span><\/p>\n

Today I got up and found myself thinking about The Matrix<\/a><\/i> as I did my morning stuff. One of the things I thought about was how, after seeing the first film, I had always wondered, if Neo needed the help of Morpheus and the other Zion-ists to escape from the Matrix, then how did Neo\u2019s predecessor get out so many years before; and I thought about how the sequels actually answered this, but in a way that rather undermined the Christian overtones of the first film and was thus kind of a letdown.<\/p>\n

One of the other things I thought about was this line from the always quotable Mark Steyn\u2019s review<\/a> of the third film: \u201cThis is the big final showdown between the denizens of Zion and the Sentinels, and the Wachowskis lay off the psychedelic LP liner notes philosophizing to concentrate on a not altogether comfortable mix of your basic up-against-the-clock action sequences and celestial choirs on the soundtrack serenading Keanu as if it\u2019s consecration day and he\u2019s the last gay bishop on the planet.\u201d<\/p>\n

And then I started thinking about superheroes in cassocks, possibly because I\u2019m meeting my priest for lunch today and he\u2019s been known to wear sunglasses in mock imitation of Neo and the rest (although, based on what he wore to my engagement costume party last year, I think he\u2019s a bigger fan of The Shadow).<\/p>\n

And then, once I finished my morning stuff, I picked up my newspaper and saw this<\/a> Ottawa Citizen<\/i> story, which jumps off of this<\/a> Catholic News Service story, which talks about a recruitment initiative begun by this<\/a> priest. Life is full of coincidences, no?<\/p>\n

UPDATE: Jeffrey Overstreet<\/a> notes that this attempt to cash in on The Matrix<\/i> is \u201cabout five years behind the trend.\u201d Quite true. The franchise is too old to be hip, but too young to be retro.<\/p>\n

Keep in mind, too, that the priest in question, Fr. Jonathan Meyer, is 28 years old now and thus would have been 21 or 22 \u2014 almost the perfect target demographic for this franchise \u2014 when the first film came out. It\u2019s not too hard to imagine that the film played a big part in his studies at college, or seminary, or wherever.<\/p>\n<\/body><\/html>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"