I went and saw the Bill Maher documentary movie "Religulous" today at the Landmark Theater in Greenwood Village, CO.
First off, let me talk about the theater. It is extremely awesome - the cost of a movie is 9 bucks which is around the usual price. However, they have a complimentary popcorn and soft drinks area where you can get as much popcorn and drink as you want! How awesome is that!
Now, for the movie.
Maybe I'm at a certain place in my life where I am no longer defensive when it comes to someone attacking Christianity or religion. Maybe I'm at a certain place in my life where I can see a lot of what's wrong with religion in our world. But I seriously liked this movie. I've read a lot of Christian reviews, and all the complaints about Bill Maher making fun of religion and being mean or whatever. But from my point of view, he was asking good questions, and then poking holes in the answers he was given. I don't think it was in a mean-spirited way, it was more of in a "You gotta be kidding me, you actually believe that?" kind of way.
As for favorite scenes, I loved two of the Catholic priests/bishops/whatever he interviewed - one guy was a Vatican astronomer or something, and he talked about creation vs. evolution, the other guy was interviewed outside the Vatican, and was just a funny character. When Maher asked him if he felt that Jesus would live in a palace like the one the pope lives in the Vatican, his response was basically "No Way." And he confided to Maher that in a list of saints/people that Italians would pray to in times of emergency, Jesus was actually sixth. Incredible.
My favorite line was by an Arkansas senator who was getting grilled by Maher about all kinds of things, including the creation story, and being flustered, he said, "Well, you don't have to pass an IQ test to be senator." The look on Maher's face was priceless.
The scenes at The Holy Land Experience in Orlando, FL were hilarious, and there was one interview with "Jesus", i.e. the guy who plays Jesus, that actually made Bill Maher think for a few minutes.
Overall, I thought it was good. The Islamic parts of the movie were very interesting to me. Maher covers Christianity, Judaism and Islam, and even Mormonism and Scientology. It will offend you as a Christian, but that might be a good thing, because it may cause you to think about the silly things and the brutal things that are done in the name of religion.
3 comments:
The only complaint that I have is that he didn't really talk to many "intelligent" Christians. He mostly pointed the spotlight on the extreme fundamentalist or the otherwise circus freak versions of Christianity. There was no voice of reason from the Christian view. If he had spoken with Brian McLaren, Rob Bell, Dan Kimball, Cameron Strang, or any other "progressive" Christian leader, it would have cast the Christian view in a different light.
I did find it interesting that he did not talk about far eastern religions like Hinduism or Buddhism. Maybe because they tend to just mind their own business and not bother anyone.
In the end, the thing that he hates most about religion: manipulation and control of people through fear and emotional coercion, is the exact thing he did to point out that religion will be the end of humanity.
Well, I understand your point and agree with you to some degree, but the people you mentioned are still on the "fringe" of Christian popularity and although they are progressive, they are looked at as heretics or unconventional by the Christians who think that the Holy Land Experience is the greatest thing in the universe, who are right now telling me that I need to see the movie Fireproof, who wear their "Be Wiser" budweiser shirt rip-off because it's a good evangelism tool.
The only seemingly intelligent Christians he did interview were Francis Collins and that Catholic astronomer guy. I guess you could say that Ken Ham is an intelligent guy as well, but I wholeheartedly disagree with his views on creation.
Very good points. I guess the people I would have liked him to have talked with would have a more "generous" perspective, to use McLaren's own words. These people, although orthodox in their beliefs, live out their beliefs in what would appear to be less orthodox ways. (In my opinion, many of their ways seem more orthodox than mainstream Christianism.)
A generous version of Christianity leaves room for doubt and doubters. It realizes that we are human and even with God's guidance, can mess things up. A generous Christianity allows for questions and for the ability to honestly answer, "I don't know."
In my opinion, this is what was missing from the film.
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