True story

It’s a beautiful thing, seeing the true story of Christmas on the big screen in “The Nativity Story” just released nationwide today.

I saw it in a private screening last Monday, and was taken by the simplicity of the production and its profound message. You can hear reactions — including mine – at Catholic Exchange, on John Morales’ podcast right there on the site. “The Nativity Story” had an impact on everyone who saw the drama unfold.

It brought to life the Gospel narrative of the Incarnation, the birth of Christ. You forget you’re watching a film and enter the space, stark as it is, where Mary lived and worked and prayed, where Joseph built things and planned a future with Mary, and you listen to their personal conversations that you probably never thought about before. What might they have talked about? They were each visited by an angel with a message from God, so were they not afraid? There was so much to fear…

The most overwhelming messages I got from entering the story in this way were, first, the power of the humility of God. Herod sent mighty soldiers to search for a strong leader who may threaten his power, a man the people would follow. He didn’t know, at first, that it would be an infant born in meager surroundings to modest parents. And in that fact, the second message I got strongly was obedience, especially in the face of everything to the contrary. That was essentially the whole story.

Another message so consistent it was probably in every frame of every scene of the movie, because it is in the Gospel, was self-sacrifice. Especially in Mary and Joseph. There was a funny but poignant moment in the lively dialogue among the three wise men when one of them resisted going on a long journey because he needed his ‘stuff’, his favorite foods and spices and drinks and things. “So we’ll bring an extra camel!” replied the other. After we laughed, I did think how apt that analogy was to our own attachments to our things, and how we can’t imagine giving them up for any hardship.

And the overarching message in it all was — and is — love. But it’s a love so profoundly transcendent, we can’t really even imagine it. I have a whole new appreciation (beyond that which I already had) for Benedict’s first encyclical being a treatise called God is Love.

See the movie. Take someone else, especially someone who needs hope.