![\"messiah_1sht_3k_rgb\"](\"https:\/\/wp-media.patheos.com\/blogs\/sites\/485\/2016\/03\/messiah_1sht_3k_rgb.jpg\")
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By Sr. Anne Joan Flanagan, FSP<\/strong><\/em><\/p>\n Last week\u2019s opening of The Young Messiah<\/i> in theaters opened a theological can of worms in some circles. The controversy centered on the self-awareness of Jesus. Did the film imply that the boy Jesus did not know his own divine identity?<\/p>\n I\u2019m not sure that everyone who wrote about or commented on the human knowledge of the Christ Child actually saw the movie, or if they were going more on the quote (from \u201cJoseph\u201d) used in some social media: \u201cHow do we explain God to His own Son?\u201d<\/p>\n To me, it was clear in the movie that the seven-year-old Jesus was more than just precocious in his knowledge of God. When his dying uncle Cleophas was muttering incoherently, it was Jesus, yards away, who informed Cleophas\u2019 wife \u201cHe is talking to God\u201d as if he had been on the receiving end of that communication. In the subsequent healing of that same uncle, Jesus is portrayed praying to his \u201cFather God.\u201d<\/p>\n At the same time, Mary and Joseph have not told the little boy anything of his mysterious origin, despite his searching questions. (That is one of the questions that continues throughout the movie: When, and under what circumstances, should the young child learn about his conception?)<\/p>\n We know from the Gospels that Mary referred to Joseph as \u201cyour father\u201d and the evangelist Luke speaks of Mary and Joseph as \u201cthe parents of Jesus.\u201d It is only at age twelve that we hear the boy claim God as his father in a unique way, referring to the Temple as \u201cmy Father\u2019s house.\u201d (The same striking expression comes up again\u2013at the cleansing of the Temple by the adult Christ.) Personally, I suspect that (pace<\/i> The Young Messiah) Mary and Joseph never referred to God as Jesus\u2019 \u201cfather\u201d; that this was a revelation we received directly from Jesus himself. But I digress.<\/p>\n That Jesus possessed full divine knowledge, knowledge that was somehow accessible to him in his human nature, is part of the truth of our salvation. Pope Pius XII (in his encyclical Mystici Corporis, n. 63) wrote: \u201cThe loving knowledge with which the divine Redeemer has pursued us from the first moment of his incarnation is such as completely to surpass all the searchings of the human mind; for by means of the beatific vision, which he enjoyed from the time when he was received into the womb of the Mother of God, he has for ever and continuously had present to him all the members of his mystical Body, and embraced them with his saving love.\u201d \u201cThe Son of God loved me<\/i> and gave himself for me<\/i>,\u201d Paul asserts (Gal 2:20<\/span><\/span>).<\/p>\n He knew who<\/i> he was, he knew his mission, and he knew whom<\/i> he was saving.<\/p>\n But how did that work itself out in a seven-year-old<\/i> with two natures? How did the ongoing formation of synapses in a seven-year-old brain coordinate with the workings of a divine mind? The filmmakers take a legitimate look at one way this might have expressed itself in the life of Christ. Since we cannot refer to anyone else with two complete natures, all we can do is use our imagination to try to envision the real-life implications of the dogma, and I think the filmmakers did all they could to create a movie that respects the whole truth about Jesus (even though they may not have been aware of the finer points of doctrine on the human knowledge of Christ).<\/p>\n In theology there is an expression \u201cThat which was not assumed [that is, taken on personally by Christ] is not redeemed.\u201d Jesus \u201cgrew in wisdom and age and grace before God and men\u201d (Lk. 2:52<\/span><\/span>).\u00a0 It is not unfathomable that part of Christ\u2019s acceptance of a true and complete human nature might have been that he humbly submitted to the full natural process of personal development. (There is nothing in the Gospels to let us suspect that Christ\u2019s childhood was somehow remarkable; the incident in the Temple when he was twelve is narrated as an outlier in an otherwise ordinary home life.)<\/p>\n \u201cThat which was not assumed is not redeemed.\u201d Gregory Nazianzen coined this expression to teach that all of human nature was taken on and healed by Christ; could it not apply also to the entire process of growth and development?<\/p>\n For more on Christ\u2019s human and divine knowledge, see the Catechism of the Catholic Church, 470-472.<\/p>\n Also available to accompany the film:<\/i> \u00a0<\/p>\n By Sr. Anne Joan Flanagan, FSP Last week\u2019s opening of The Young Messiah in theaters opened a theological can of worms in some circles. The controversy centered on the self-awareness of Jesus. Did the film imply that the boy Jesus did not know his own divine identity? I\u2019m not sure that everyone who wrote about […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":4261,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[526,257,437,96],"tags":[1134,465,1142,1143,272,1133],"class_list":["post-4272","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-guest-post","category-jesus","category-movie-reviews","category-pauline","tag-anne-flanagan","tag-catechism-of-the-catholic-church","tag-christology","tag-gregory-nazianzen","tag-sr-anne-flanagan","tag-young-messiah"],"yoast_head":"\n\u2013 \u2013 \u2013 \u2013 \u2013 \u2013<\/div>\n
\nStudy guide for Catholic youth groups<\/a>
\nCatholic family discussion guide for the film<\/a><\/p>\n![\"sranne_sm\"](\"https:\/\/wp-media.patheos.com\/blogs\/sites\/485\/2015\/02\/sranne_sm.jpg\")
Sister Anne Flanagan, a Daughter of St Paul, a native of New Orleans, is author of\u00a0Five Keys to Understanding Pope Francis.<\/a><\/em>\u00a0She has also recorded over two dozen albums as a soprano in the\u00a0Daughters of St Paul choir<\/a>. Follow her on Twitter\u00a0@nunblogger<\/a>. She blogs at\u00a0Nun Blog<\/a>.<\/p>\n<\/body><\/html>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"