Ils ne comprennent pas

Yesterday I watched The Passion of the Christ for the 2nd time, the first time since the day it opened on Ash Wednesday 2004. While I understand that Gibson made artistic and cinematic choices when making the film, the story itself impacted me again. At no time did Jesus curse, abuse, or mock those who were mocking him. Like the Gospel account, Caveziel's representation of Jesus shows him silently going to his death. There were others who came to his defense, but Jesus never defended himself. Instead, Jesus speaks those powerful words of grace as he hung from the cross, "Father forgive them for they don't know what they are doing." When squeezed and pushed, what came out of Jesus' heart was grace and a passion for God. What would come out of my heart? What would come out of our hearts?

In 1969 Brennan Manning spent time in a monastic community in France. As the seven monks were sitting around a dinner table, they talked about their employers. He writes, "The table grew animated when the German brother remarked that our wages were substandard and the Spaniard added that the hours were lousy. I noted that our employers were never seen in the parish church, and a French brother suggested that they were hypocritical. The salvos got heavier and the tone more caustic...

Brother Dominique Voillaume sat at the end of the table and never opened his mouth. I saw tears rolling down his cheeks.

"What's the matter, Dominique?" we asked.

His voice was barely audible. "Ils ne comprennent pas (They don't understand)" was all he said.