This is interesting news. Hmmm. Martin Scorsese, the director behind The Last Temptation of Christ, is making a movie about Jesuits in the face of persecution in Japan.
The CS Monitor reports:
Actor Liam Neeson will reportedly star in the long-awaited adaptation of author Shusaku Endo’s novel “Silence,” which is set to be directed by Martin Scorsese.
“Silence” was first published in 1966 and follows a Jesuit missionary living in the seventeenth century who travels to Japan to investigate whether a priest there has renounced his religion. He and a fellow Jesuit arrive in the country and witness the persecution of Christians taking place there.
According to Deadline, Scorsese has been hoping to adapt the novel for some time, and now Neeson has joined the project to co-star with “The Amazing Spider-Man” actor Andrew Garfield and “Inception” actor Ken Watanabe.
Now, the book is a bit controversial so I’ll be intrigued to hear what anyone who’s read it has to say.
Spoiler Alert!!!
According to the Wikipedia site:
Rodrigues and Garpe are eventually captured and forced to watch as Japanese Christians lay down their lives for the faith. There is no glory in these martyrdoms, as Rodriguez had always imagined, but only brutality and cruelty. Prior to the arrival of Rodrigues, the authorities had been attempting to force priests to renounce their faith by torturing them. However, beginning with Fr. Ferreira, they tortured other Christians as the priests watch, telling the priests that all they must do is renounce their faith in order to end the suffering of their flock.
Rodrigues’ journal depicts his struggles: he understands suffering for the sake of one’s own faith; but he struggles over whether it is self-centered and unmerciful to refuse to recant when doing so will end another’s suffering. At the climactic moment, Rodriguez hears the moans of those who have recanted but are to remain in the pit until he tramples the image of Christ. As Rodrigues looks upon a fumie, Christ breaks his silence:
“Trample! Trample! I more than anyone know of the pain in your foot. Trample! It was to be trampled on by men that I was born into this world. It was to share men’s pain that I carried my cross.”
Rodrigues obeys, and the Christians are released.
The book seems to deal with the seeming silence of God in the face of atrocities.
I don’t know much about it. Let me know what you guys know. Some of you are smarty pants reader types, right?
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