Dear Editors,
In reading your lead web page article by Steve Kellmeyer I had to double check that I didn't inadvertently click on a Protestant site. Had this been the Finkelstein brothers from NYC which has a larger Jewish population than Jerusalem, the stereotype would have been just as invalid.
I did not see The Matrix so I neither condemn nor defend it. I'm being critical about Mr. Kellmeyer's shallow and dubiously Catholic review. In particular he is critical of a statement by one of the characters, Morpheus: “Faith is not a matter of reasonability, I do not believe things with my mind. I believe them with my heart… in my gut…”
Again, not having the benefit of the context of this statement, I will analyze it on its own merits. Although not entirely true, this statement is much more profound than Mr. Kellmeyer's statements about understanding Catholic concepts. Certainly a mature Catholic tosses these truths of faith around in his head and tries to somehow align them with his own thinking. But this is not where the battles of faith are won.
They are ultimately won in the person's heart.
Christ did not ask Peter: Simon son of Jonah, do you understand me? He asked him, do you love me, and thrice the same. The Catechism of our Church, chapter two, paragraph 50 reads: “By natural reason man can know God with certainty, [Mr. Kellmeyer's correct assertion] on the basis of his works. But there is another order of knowledge, which man cannot possibly arrive at by his own powers: the order of Divine Revelation.” It's Divine Revelation that permeates the whole being of a person. Many Saints in moments of ecstasy had these “feelings” that Mr. Kellmeyer distrusts.
It is precisely why our Church is sacramental so that we may “taste and see the goodness of the Lord” as the song goes. Evidence destroys faith. Looking for proof in the Bible for our belief is a sign of a troubled soul. That was also my mission in my mid-thirties and forties. I came back to the church of my youth not because of the understanding of my mind, but because of the longing of my heart. Sure I'm smarter and more mature. But I also nod my head to the words of a poem: “It was a childhood ignorance, but now 'tis little joy, to know that I'm farther from heaven then when I was a boy.”
In conclusion, I would have to say that Morpheus and the Wachowski bros. have the better part of the truth. If they can honestly rely on their childhood Catholic education, it will take them far. The Catholic faith in the US is in trouble precisely because that education is missing. Our adult Catholic colleges are bursting with enrollment but seriously confused. Just remember that the Protestant revolution was not brought to us by the people of the heart but by the people of the mind.
Frank Chowaniec, Burlington, CT
Steve Kellmeyer replies:
Mr. Chowaniec, your concern about the proper definition of faith is exactly the kind of conversation I hoped my articles would provoke. When discussing faith, we must be careful not to reduce it to pure logic. That is rationalism, and it is a heresy. On the other hand, we cannot deny the power of unaided human reason to reach truth. We cannot say that the fundamental act of human knowledge consists in an act of faith because reason alone is insufficient. This is the condemned heresy of fideism.
As the Catechism points out, we cannot attain the facts of Divine Revelation on our own. Revelation means “to reveal, to pull back the veil.” God is hidden from us unless He chooses to reveal Himself to us. We can know God only insofar as He reveals Himself to us. It is the unveiled encounter with the Divine Persons that brings ecstasy precisely because this face-to-face encounter makes us fully aware of God’s love for us.
Now, we need to be clear on something: we need to be clear on what love is. Faith is not an emotion and love is not an emotion either. Emotion is an expression of the material body. It is a wonderful thing, but it is restricted to those who have material bodies. God does not have a body, but God has always been and will always be Love.
So what is love? Love is a choice. It is the choice to serve another totally, to pour oneself out for another, to make a gift of oneself to the other. It is a form of knowing another person, for who knows a person better than the one who serves that person constantly?
Parents know their children because they serve their children’s every need. Spouses know each other because they serve each other’s every need. When Scripture speaks of human love, it speaks of this love in terms of knowledge, “Adam knew Eve, and she conceived and bore a son” (Gen 4:1). As the movie Life is Beautiful points out, God serves man, but He is not man’s servant. God knows man intimately because He serves man intimately by giving us, as a pure gift, Himself. This service, this gift, is love. This gift is Divine Revelation. This is the evidence of faith.
Evidence does not and cannot destroy faith: to say this is to speak the heresy of fideism. Rather, evidence forms the foundation of faith and faith brings us to personal, intimate knowledge through service. Divine Revelation is evidence we could never have obtained on our own, but it is evidence nonetheless. This evidence of how God serves me, how deeply He loves me, is something I would not know except He reveals it to me. He gives silently, quietly, as the wise man in Scripture gives. He is infinitely great, yet He deigns to care for every need of one so small as me. The very fact that He stoops to do this speaks His service to me, His love for me. In this personal, intimate encounter of being served by God, God knows man; in man’s personal intimate encounter of serving Him, man knows God. This total gift of one Person to another person, this is Love.
That’s why we need faith to get to heaven, but we don’t need faith in heaven. Faith is the evidence of things not seen (Hebrews 11:1). Love is the Person standing before you, giving self completely to you and you to Him, both completely unveiled. As I pointed out in an earlier essay, faith, hope and love are all different forms of knowledge, each one building on the previous. But, this knowledge leads not to a set of facts, but to the Divine Persons. The knowledge is the means to an object, a goal: the Divine Persons. Communion of service with the Divine Persons is the lived expression of the goal.
Steve
Sorry Steve, but your article falls short. Yes, a lot of the speeches demonstrate a limited understanding of the Catholic faith, but I am surprised that you didn't seem to think it through and go beyond the obvious failings of the film. Like all good art, The Matrix is expressing the on-going search for God and His peace. This is the search for freedom that is expressed by Morpheus. While the concepts are limited, I do not believe that they are incorrect. Considering the sad state of Catholic Education in this country, and the lack of on-going evangelization especially of parents…it is a miracle that the Matrix ever got on film.
I consider the Matrix to be a seed that if allowed to grow may lead many of our young people to Christ. I work with young people, and at least in my area of the country we, the Church, are not really getting to many of them. Kids respond to the presence of Christ with their emotions…they “feel” His presence way before they “know” His presence. One has only to attend a Youth Rally to see how the kids get keyed up on Jesus. It's they way they are developmentally. With guidance, these kids can grow spiritually…but, if we are honest, there really isn't all that much for them out there. The great St. Therese herself simply fell in love. With Jesus.
I salute the Matrix as a great tool for evangelization. The challenge is, of course, to try and get to all those kids, and take them “Beyond the Matrix” and to the Cross.
God bless you, Steve.
Oneida Barish, Monticello, New York
Steve Kellmeyer replies:
You are, indeed, correct in stating that the Matrix is a seed which is trying hard to grow. However, it might do us all some good if we consider a more thorough look at the Wachowski's Matrix vision before we begin using it for evangelization. For instance, how many people are aware that the Matrix story is not limited to the three movies that are seen in the theaters? The cartoon series known as the Animatrix and the video game, Enter the Matrix, are both integral to the plot lines of the movies. This is key to understanding what can and cannot be accomplished with the Matrix.
First, let us make no mistake about it: the Wachowski brothers' vision is substantially a Gnostic heresy. If this were limited to just what was presented in the first movie, I would not have a quarrel with it. The Gnosticism presented in the original Matrix was not sufficient to warrant too much concern — in fact, I used to recommend it as a way to teach typology. Once the Animatrix, Enter the Matrix, Reloaded and Revolutions are stirred into the plot, however, things change.
For instance, did you know that the Animatrix explicitly condones and encourages teen suicide in “A Kid's Story”? Did you know that the Animatrix contains deliberate Gnostic parodies of the Judeo-Christian understanding of Genesis in “Second Renaissance” I and II? Were you aware that the Enter the Matrix game highlights an unresolved incestuous relationship between Trinity and Ghost, and a budding lesbian relationship between Niobe and Persephone? Did you see the constant connections being made between sex and death in Final Flight of the Osiris, Reloaded and Revolutions? Were you aware of the reason the Merovingian bore his name, or of the Gnostic connection it is intended to portray between the Christ figure and Satan, namely, that they are spirit brothers and virtual equals? Did you realize that the Wachowski's view the Matrix as a symbol for a woman's womb? Once you know this, what do you make of the fact that corpses are stacked like cordwood inside that womb? Are you aware that both Matrix and Revolutions contain scenes in S&M clubs precisely because Larry Wachowski is a patron of a Los Angeles S&M club? Are you aware that Larry Wachowski is so serious about the Matrix vision that he is getting a sex change operation? I could go on, but you get the idea.
My forthcoming book on the Matrix and how best to use it for evangelization will highlight the symbolism present in the movies, the cartoons and the game, and will show how general interest in the Wachowski vision can be used to steer someone towards Christ. However, in order to do this successfully, we must specifically point out and deny certain fallacies embedded within the Wachowski vision.
The Wachowskis are undeniably brilliant at visual representation. I must say that I love their movies, even as I hate their message. But I would be remiss not to point out that the Wachowskis deliberately placed the most obviously problematic aspects of the Matrix vision into the two pieces an adult is least likely to watch: a cartoon series and a game. The movies look innocent enough to an adult who hasn't done the symbol research. To a teen, who has both the time and the interest to chase these symbols around on the Net and follow up on the supporting story by watching the cartoons and playing the game, there's a lot more hidden in there than would meet an adult's eye.
I've followed this phenomenon since the release of the first movie, which I saw four times. Within the last year, I've spent four months on the net discussion boards talking with mostly teens and pre-teens about Matrix, and two years researching the symbols hidden within the movies, the cartoons and the game, all of which I've seen/played multiple times. Paul used the idol at the Areopagus to evangelize, so it is certainly the case that this series can also be used to evangelize. But, like Paul, in order to evangelize successfully with it, we must know what elements we can agree with and what elements we cannot, which means we must know exactly what it is we are looking at.
The first step towards adult understanding of the Faith is introducing teens to the fact that the Faith concerns facts, not just emotions, that love is about decisions, not glands. The Matrix can be used for evangelization only by someone who is fully aware of the contents of the Wachowski vision, the problems inherent in Gnostic theology and the answers provided by John Paul II's Theology of the Body. I would not recommend anyone else attempt to use it to evangelize.
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