The platforms have in common that, over time, people develop a sense of who you are from the things you say about yourself. The difference (for me, at least; this isn’t true of everyone on the radio) is that I’m pretty selective about what I share about my life on the air. My two basic rules are that A) stories I tell can’t make me look good at someone else’s expense, and B) I don’t share things that would generate an awkward silence if said in person to someone. As I heard a radio consultant say once, the things you share on the radio should be personal, but not private. I see radio–at least the way I do it–a bit like having people over for dinner. Social media is like having a roommate, and the picture that comes out over time is going to be quite a bit different (not better or worse, necessarily, but definitely different).

We all have those friends on Facebook who share just a tiny bit too much information. Sometimes it’s coming from someone who would say the same things in person, but most of the time I think it’s because social media is so ubiquitous that we forget that there are dozens, or hundreds, or thousands, or millions of people who are going to read it. It’s like the email phenomenon that gave birth to Gmail’s Goggles app, which requires you to complete a simple math problem before sending your message (on the assumption that it’s beyond you if you’re inebriated enough that emails are a bad idea at that moment), or the Gmail setting that allows you to set a time frame in which you can cancel your message after you’ve hit “send.” We sometimes dash things off in an email that we wouldn’t say in person, or we fail to see how starkly different those words are in black and white than they would have been when said in person. I think that the more social media platforms we have, and the more time we spend with them, the more we see the rules of polite conversation break down. I kind of like those rules. I’m with Abraham Lincoln, who said, “Better to remain silent and be thought a fool than to speak out and remove all doubt.”

I’m not always terribly good at that, but I’ve generally been pretty quiet in person as an adult. I was a very gregarious kid and also a social outcast, and that’s not the best combination.

I was a fairly early adopter of the blogging phenomenon; I blogged pretty steadily from the end of 2001, and somewhat haphazardly since. The freeest I felt as a blogger was when I wrote anonymously about my journey toward Catholicism. I chose to go nameless because I worked at an Evangelical Protestant radio station, and hadn’t told anyone there what I was going through. Although concern for my job was part of the underlying reason, I also did it out of respect for my employers. I can’t say that respect was returned, but when I did tell them, I shed the anonymity. I kind of wish I’d either have kept it or shut down the blog. It went from being a platform where I felt free to share my thoughts and feelings, to one that was ridiculously scrutinized by the people who read it.

After I made the leap to Relevant Radio, someone left a comment that I already had an outlet for my thoughts on the radio, and it was unfair of me to have a blog as well. In fairness, this was back when all of the major deposits of Internet had been identified, the Saudis were artificially inflating the price, and we hadn’t yet learned to manufacture our own domestic Internet out of yard clippings and old newspapers.

I think I’m reluctant to put too much of that stuff out there, even though I know where the lines are that I don’t particularly want to cross. I’m honestly not sure if that reluctance has to do with being judged over minutae (What? He’s listening to “Werewolves of London” while he’s doing show prep?) or not being the person you might think I am (What? He’s listening to “Werewolves of London” while he’s doing show prep?). It may be more accurate that some people feel I’m not the person they think I should be; and to a large extent, I would agree with them. If I have any gift of communication, it consists largely in not trying to impress you by projecting an image of someone I’m not. I am the person you hear on the radio, just–abridged. It’s like the Reader’s Digest condensed Me–like the unabridged Me, but without all the boring patches. You don’t get the whole thing, but you have a pretty good idea what it’s about.

I guess it works out to the same thing in the end. One aspect of radio in the post-modern age is that the conversation goes both ways. I’m going to start encouraging that by surfing Tweets and Facebook posts while I’m on the air, and encouraging people to use them to communicate (you’re much more likely to send a tweet while you’re already online than to dial the phone, and I think people will figure out pretty quickly that their messages will go directly to me).

Even though I’ve embraced new media since the beginning, I think I’ve seen an almost artificial distinction between what I do on the radio and what I’d do on Facebook or Twitter. Social media open up people’s lives in a way they’ve never experienced before–but I have. I’m far from famous, but my name and voice are out there enough that people recognize my name (or even my voice) from the radio, and that’s been the case for most of the past 25 years. I’m already online a good chunk of the day, so it’s really just a matter of taking a little time.

I’ve seen some really amazing examples of TV that has become interactive via tweets, and I took part in a live chat on Twitter that was unlike anything I’d ever seen before. It was much closer to a real-time conversation, both because there is no moderator and because everyone involved has to keep their answers short. Live chats often consist of, “(Name) is typing,” followed by the answer to a question buried so deep that nobody remembers what it was. The Twitter chat happened quickly enough that the question and answer were typically both still visible. It also encourages participation because there’s nothing to sign up for or into; if you’re on Twitter already, it’s just a matter of searching for a hashtag (those little pound-sign-keyword #things.) I looked up the hashtag “Morning Air,” and found three random references to sunny mornings. I think I can use that without creating a lot of confusion, so I’ll start throwing it out there (along with my ID, @SeanHerriott). We’ll see what happens.

Social media are here to stay, and I guess we’ll all have to deal with it sooner or later. It’s all about connection, and that’s what I’m trying to focus on–making a connection with other people, large or small, rather than just trying to get X posts per day up…wherever.

Fr. Burns quoted St. Josemaría Escrivá and St. Thérèse of Lisieux (as well as Thomas Aquinas, who is a bit less user-friendly to most of us), talking about holiness being found at home–in the everday things we do and the places we go. It’s nothing revolutionary; it’s just really, really hard to do. As Chesterton said, “Christianity has not been tried and found wanting; it has been found difficult and left untried.”

One of Fr. Burns points was to “define your reality;” he was talking about seeing things as they are rather than envisioning a world full of nothing but sunshine and puppies. When we understand where God has us, we can begin to understand what he wants of us (and for us). In The Reed of God, Carryl Houselander talks about how we have daydreams of foreign missions or martyrdom because those fantasies are much easier than dealing with a difficult relative or a job we hate.

The very simple lesson I’m still learning is to look for God in everything that happens to me and everyone I meet–and for me, it means remembering that my failure to see him doesn’t mean he’s absent. One of the people I met at that luncheon told me about a horrific event that happened to her, and how she saw God’s grace in the midst of it. She said, “It was the most horrible thing that has ever happened to me, and the best thing.”

God is present in every trial and every joyful moment; we just need to see it. Actually, we just need to be willing to see it, since Jesus has done all the heavy lifting for us (literally; think about that as you pray the Stations of the Cross this Lent).

His house has sat empty since he moved; a friend mowed the lawn, we picked up stray branches and arranged for the gutters to be cleaned, and along with our neigbors on the other side of Don’s house, kept an eye out for him. The place looked lived-in, but no one was home. I had a key, and would occasionally go over there for one reason or another. On my daughter’s birthday in October it was to fetch a stuffed panda Don wanted to give her for her birthday (it still had the tag on it, so he’d apparently been planning ahead). A month later I went to his basement to turn on the water for the gutter guy, and it was more than a little spooky.

I don’t usually get freaked out by things that go bump in the night (or the day, for that matter), but the ordinary creaks, groans, and assorted noises a house makes are masked by all the other stuff going on. When there is no other stuff, it sounds like things are happening that shouldn’t be happening. At one point I heard what sounded like footsteps upstairs; I knew they weren’t (some part of the house settling a bit, or a heating duct expanding), but I also decided I wouldn’t go upstairs to the second floor to investigate. I shut off the water and got out of the house as quickly as I could. No ghosts, but the house was filled with something worse; emptiness. Don was in better place (Kalamazoo, not heaven–not yet), and he wasn’t coming back. I missed him then; I miss him more now.

Don lived alone with a house full of memories; aside from assorted stuff he’d picked up in his travels as a naval officer (and later, just to see what the world had to show him), his walls and tables were adorned with the kind of family pictures that make a house a home. Don had married his college sweetheart, and she had died; he married again, had two children (both girls and the center of his life’s orbit), and his wife passed away. You could see the whole story on the pictures in his home; the people he had loved and lost, the family he cherished, and the full, fascinating life he’d lived.

Don never talked much about his time as a naval officer in World War Two (at least not to me), his stint as a local politician, or his long career in forestry managment. He talked about his daughters, and his grandsons, and about our daughter, who became something of an adopted grandchild to him. I learned more about his life from his obituary than I’d ever learned from him, at least in terms of the stuff you’d find impressive. It’s not that those things didn’t matter to him, but Don didn’t live in the past. One of the many things I loved about him was that in his own quiet, unassuming way, Don was fully present in the moment.

Julie would visit him after school, sometimes spending an hour or two over there. I used to worry that she was wearing out her welcome, but he was delighted to have the company, and they developed their own little ritual over time. It involved chocolate, Pepsi, potato chips, and cards (he taught her to play War; Julie reported today that they’d stop when they had gotten to a tie). Julie used to ask which goodies she could have before she went over, and later tell me (somewhat slyly) that she might have had a bit more than was strictly authorized; after a while it was a given that a visit to “Mr. Don” (our compromise between “Mr. Lambrecht,” which we all tacitly agreed was too formal, and just plain “Don,” which isn’t something we let her do with adults, and which wasn’t quite enough to describe his relationship to her) would involve goodies, card games, too much holding the cat for her mild allergy, and pop. That was just fine with me.

There were some genuinely perfect afternoons in those visits, according to reports from both parties. At the service, Don’s daughters and neices all mentioned to us how much he enjoyed Julie’s visits–he’d mention as one of the noteworthy things he’d done since he’d last talked to them–and how much he treasured the letters she sent him in his last year.

Don quietly, joyfully spoiled her, just a little; Julie would walk across his front yard and into ours, and tell us what they did and what she ate. We didn’t usually go with her, and I didn’t check on her, other than to let her know it was time for dinner (or to make sure she wasn’t cutting into his rest time–which was never an issue, because he’d let her know if he was tired, and she’d come home). It was their time, and Stacey and I knew that however long that season would last, it would be far too short. It lasted for seven years, and I’m grateful for every minute.

Don’s health had been failing for some time, but he was still able to get around, still quietly positive about his life, and still sharp as a tack. Things took a turn in the last two weeks, and Don began saying his goodbyes. Julie wanted to know why he didn’t say goodbye to her, and I think it was because he knew that would be harder for her than if he just slipped away. It might have been harder for him, too. We told her that it wasn’t because he hadn’t thought of her, and his daughters confirmed that; we thought of Don as the grandfather Julie had never had (both our dads had long since passed when Julie came along), and from what his family said, so did he.

The night Don’s son-in-law called us to tell us he was gone, Julie gathered up all the things he’d given her over the years–a novelty straw hat, her stuffed panda and another stuffed animal he’d sent her for Christmas, and the letters and cards he’d sent–sat with us, cried, and told us about each of the letters and when he’d sent them.

We celebrated his 89th and 90th birthdays these past two summers; my wife slyly turned barbecues with the neighbors into suprise birthday parties (quiet ones) with old friends (and us newer ones). He protested–just a little–that we should’t have gone to the trouble, but he also talked, and laughed, and reminisced, and smiled. One of the most beautiful things I’ve ever seen was a conversation he had with a friend from college–a sorority sister of his first wife, who also became good friends with his second wife–and they talked about their lives and their memories going back 70 years. In an age of disposible relationships and a sort of nomadic mobility, it’s indescribably beautiful to see two people who have been friends for three-quarters of a century, and have literally a lifetime of memories to share.

Don’s life was unremarkable–at least until you got to know him. He saw action in the Pacific, loved and lost two beloved wives, raised two daughters whom he loved dearly, went to nearly every Packers home game from the year the stadium was built until that last year of his life, and quietly enriched every life he touched. I don’t know if you could say I knew him well, but I think I knew everything I needed to know. Forgive the sci-fi reference, but it reminds me of an exchange between The Doctor (Who) and a man they both know is about die. The Doctor says, “I wish I’d gotten to know you better,” and the man replies, “I like to think you knew me at my best.”

I’d like to think I knew Don Lambrecht at his best, and I believe that everyone at that memorial service felt exactly the same way. I thanked the pastor of his Lutheran church for her genuinely comforting words and kind observations, and she said it was easy when she was talking about someone so truly good, and whom she really liked.

Don was a good man who humbly served his country, worked hard and well, and loved his family. He loved his friends, too, and I’m fortunate to be counted among them. He would be the first to tell you that he was just an ordinary midwestern guy, but thinking about Don’s life–and the ache of losing him as our neighbor, blossomed into the sting of grief at the loss of our friend–I’m reminded that no one is ordinary. Every person has a story, and if you take the time to listen, every story is amazing.

This past Sunday Don Lambrecht was just one more picture in the obit section to most of Green Bay, Wisconsin, but not to me.

Basically, Tolkien was a hack. No, really. A HACK. They said it a bit more nicely–but just a bit; they summed up his magnum opus as “poor prose.” Ow.

Fun fact–Tolkien was nominated for the Nobel Prize by his close friend and fellow literary duffer C.S. Lewis. Those stuffy Oxfordish/Cambridgian professors and their sad pretensions to writing stuff us regular folk would actually want to read! Over and over again! And then read to our children! And make into films! And then read some more! And something else (stage whisper): Tolkien was a…Catholic. Oh, and Lewis was an Anglican (back when being Anglican meant you were just as Catholic as the Pope, minus the Pope). No wonder their most popular works have only sold somewhere north of 100 million copies each. Kind of sad, really. In fact, I rather pity them. And Smeagol.

So, Mr. Baggins, if you would be so kind as to take your kit bag and your hairy feet and your evil ring and vacate these premises before we’re overrun by undead kings riding horses from hell (seriously,they’re absolutely lousy tippers, and they always refuse the bill we send them for room service, property damage, and squashing the stable-boy), we’d be most appreciative.

Dr. Görg’s treatise on the life and legacy of St. Anthony of Egypt is like a bowl of bran flakes; it’s good for you, but that doesn’t mean you’ll get through the whole thing. This is a scholarly work, with sentences like, “Besides the itinerant ascetics, who at times were scurrilous and prone to discredit monasticism because of their lack of refinement, it was mainly members of the nobility, in Rome for example, who showed interest in the ascetical life.” The Desert Fathers is comprehensive, full of interesting information, and very carefully researched–and you could say the same things about a good textbook. Basically, this is a textbook. I’m not criticizing the work or trying to scare you off, but know this; if you’re looking for an engaging scholarly work looking at the history and influence of the Desert Fathers on monastic life, run out and get this. If you’re looking for some inspirational light reading before bed, there are other books about St. Anthony (a few of them published by Ignatius Press, I bet) that might better suit you.

Wholly Mary: Mother of God, Chris Padgett (Servant Books)

Punny title aside (and a potential headache if you’re trying to order it but don’t know the author’s name), Padgett’s book does what you’d want an introductory book about the Blessed Mother to do (by, um, introducing you to the Blessed Mother). Great stuff about Mary’s role in salvation history, why we venerate her, the value of the Rosary, etc. Excellent for personal devotion and study, or for handing to a friend who keeps asking those “Why do you Catholics worship Mary?” sorts of questions.

Becoming the Woman God Made You to Be, Tammy Everard

Everard combines spiritual principles and personal stories to talk about “the issues women face as we struggle to find our true identity” (I borrowed that last bit from the back cover). Guys, run out right now and buy one of these for your wife, along with some flowers.

Mass Revision, Jimmy Akin (Catholic Answers)

You’re still saying, “And also with you,” right? Well, you’re in good company; we all are, including a priest I know who attended a Mass incognito on a day off. Go get a copy of this.

1. Post more than once a quarter

2. Make no promises about how often I’m going to post

3. Write shorter stinkin’ articles

4. Facilitate goal #1 by acquiring, by any means necessary, a laptop that works at least 90% of the time

I posted an article about Nazis and vampires in film just before advent, and decided that I’d wait until after Christmas to do Part II. That’s on the docket for this week. I’m also going to try to (Yoda was right; “There is no ‘try’”) post more reviews of DVDs & books I’ve watched/read, since I get a ton of ‘em.

Some may be nothing more than “I loved/liked/didn’t like/hated” something  and a quick reason why (see #4 above), but hopefully that will be helpful to someone, somewhere. I get some books or films that seem worthwhile but don’t really spur me to book an interview for one reason or another, and others that I drop into the “donate to the library” pile (or sometimes the recycle bin) like they’re radioactive.* Those are the two categories that I think would be the most useful to mention, but there’s no harm in a short-ish synopsis of the rest as well.
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* Just to be clear, I would never knowingly donate or recycle an item that was in fact actually radioactive. I’d leave it at the curb on Extra Garbage Day.

Strengthening Your Family: A Catholic Approach to Holiness at Home, Marge Fenelon (Our Sunday Visitor)

Marge is a regular contributor to On Call with Wendy Wiese; the title says it all. Good stuff.

The Day Satan Called: A True Encounter with Demon Possession and Exorcism, Bill Scott (Faith Words)

Evangelical Christian layman in way over his head (spiritually or psychologically; don’t know/doesn’t really matter). Introduction, “I’m Really Not Crazy,” says it all. Flee like Joseph from Potiphar’s wife–or like Joseph from Herod, for that matter. Just…flee.

You Are Made for More!, Lisa Osteen Comes (Faith Words)

You are, but not for this. Megachurch truisms (“You weren’t made for the pit, but for the palace”) supported by the author’s personal experiences (with a foreward by her brother, Joel), along with the now-common Evangelical dismissal of Jesus’ “hard saying” about divorce and remarriage. Lisa Osteen Comes has lived through some really tough times (including being seriously injured by a mail bomb) and credits her faith for sustaining her. I hope one day she’ll write a book about it, sans exclamation mark.

Faith at Work: Finding Purpose Beyond the Paycheck, Kevin Lowry (Our Sunday Visitor)

Now here’s the way to use personal experiences to make your point effectively(!). Kevin shares practical principles (rooted in the core teachings of the Gospel and the Church), along with his own experiences learning to live them out at work. Most people I know have had some Office Space/The Office moments, and Keven describes a few of his along the way.

The 10 Dumbest Things Christians Do, Mark Atteberry (Nelson Books)

Written by a seasoned Evangelical pastor, so it has a mega-churchy bent in terms of jargon–along with a lot of valid and challenging points for any Christian to consider. I didn’t read every word, so I can’t say I’m certain that it’s 100% Catholic-friendly, but Atterberry has some good things to say about issues like dealing with scandals in the congregation, developing a cult of personality around the pastor, letting controlling or abusive people remain in leadership, or avoiding tough conversations with people about scandalous personal behavior. If you’re in a parish leadership role and solid in your faith, I think it’s worth a look.

Here’s the initial connection I made between the two, inspired by the question of whether Christians should see films about the supernatural. I think it’s sort of like trying to decide if Christians should watch films about World War II. In terms of influence, a person is much more likely to become a neo-Nazi than a neo-vampire, and in terms of sheer brutality, anything that’s ever been depicted in a war film fails to do justice to the inhumanity of the Holocaust. Watching something like “Schindler’s List” or “The Pianist” can be thought-provoking and even uplifting, despite the horrors depicted (and, like most of the genuinely good films about the Holocaust, these were based on real people and real experiences); on the other hand, “Inglorious Basterds” makes a mockery of the memories of the millions who died. Quentin Tarantino can defend the Revenge-Fantasy-as-War-Epic all he wants, but the outcome is just obscene. Besides the complete disrespect shown to the real victims of the Holocaust (and the men who laid down their lives to stop him), Tarantino and his ilk have another, almost insurmountable problem; you really can’t out-Hitler Hitler. The things that actually happened were so far beyond human decency or comprehension, how do you top them–and why would you even want to try? What’s the point in making up fake atrocities, even if they’re directed against Hitler?

If you ever have the opportunity to visit Dachau, Auschwitz, or any other camp still standing, do it. You’ll never see the Holocaust the same way again, you’ll never forget it, and you’ll never want to go back. Standing in the yard at Dachau, where over 200,000 were imprisoned and 30,000 died over 12 years–roughly 50 people every week–was one of the most powerful and least pleasant experiences of my entire life. Even after all these years, you’re literally walking on the ashes of the people who never came out. There is a mass grave out of sight of the main area, but the ashes  of the rest are everywhere–ground into the soil, standing as long-overgrown mounds of earth, deposited as grime on what’s left of the original buildings.

Standing in Rome’s catacombs made the Church’s early martyrs present to me in a way that changed my perspective, and being in Dachau–a place that is almost entirely silent, even with busloads of people walking through it–put names and faces on some of the thousands who died there. People visit more as pilgrims than tourists; nobody walks out with a sweatshirt or a hat, and what might be a gift shop elsewhere is a bookstore there.  The store was packed with people browsing  hundreds of titles about the war, about the camps, and about Dachau itself. Most of us maintained the hushed tones not of a library, but of a mausoleum. Signs asked us to talk quietly out of respect for what had happened there, but most of us didn’t need the reminder. Before anyone anywhere makes a movie or TV show involving Nazis, they should tour such a place. If that requirement had been in place 46 years ago, I’ll guarantee you that “Hogan’s Heroes” never would have made it to air.

I’d put “Hogan’s Heroes” and “Life is Beautiful” on the milder side of the same continuum as “Inglorious Basterds”; I initially liked Roberto Begnini’s fable about a man who hides his young son from his captors and from the horrors of life in a concentration camp, although I found it impossible to suspend enough disbelief to find the film even mildly credible. As a fable it’s too realistic, and as a depiction of the war it’s too fantastic (and maudlin).

After watching it, I read reviews from a couple of critics who were genuinely angry at Begnini for suggesting that the inmates just needed to think happier thoughts to get through the experience, or to fantasize that it would be possible to hide a child from the guards (and for a more realistic take on that, watch the fact-based film “The Grey Zone,” an understated and very effective film about the moral choices that were still available to the prisoners, and how a group of them chose to give up what little time they had left in order to shut down the killing machine at one death camp). I did actually wince at Begnini berating his little boy because he wouldn’t go off to the showers like the other kids, so maybe I didn’t like it that much after all. It’s a lot like “Signs,” the last watchable M. Night Shyamalan film. Aliens to whom water is a deadly acid can travel across the cosmos, but don’t notice that the earth is two-thirds water, or that death literally rains down from the sky? And hey–where are their space-pants?

It doesn’t help that the actions of both the boy’s parents–the gentile mother insisting on being taken away after she’d been sent home, and the father getting shot trying to find her, leaving his young son to hide from the guards until the tanks came–were incredibly short-sighted and selfish. You could argue that the mother’s sacrifice showed how much love she had for her husband and son, but you could also make a strong case that she was enlisting the Nazis to help her commit slow suicide to assuage her own guilt over something she couldn’t control. It’s understandable that she wouldn’t have expected to see them again–but even given that, couldn’t she have taken that pain and done something that would have had real meaning, even if it still caused her death? I’m not in a position to judge someone having done this in real life, but as a plot device it romanticizes a genuine horror, and exists only as a plot device, giving Begnini’s character a pretense to abandon his son.

The boy’s mother could do nothing to help her family except to hold out to the end of the war and try to preserve their home. Aside from the ridiculous chain of events that compel Begnini’s character to search for her on the eve of the camp’s liberation (leaving his son vulnerable to guards who have nothing left to lose), you’re left with her choice leading to his, and the boy needlessly fatherless and nearly orphaned (or worse). The scene where Benigni clown-steps to his death is powerful for what it doesn’t show (two men walk into an alley, a shot is heard, and only one walks back out)–in other words, at least in my opinion, it was composed well as a camera shot–but ultimately is also completely pointless.

What’s the lesson here–that an epic love for your wife justifies abandoning your son to a terrible death? The father makes a reckless and horrifically irresponsible decision made possible only by his wife’s pointless sacrifice; it’s “The Gift of the Magi” with barbed wire. No wonder Begnini won an Oscar.

I think “Life is Beautiful” ends up being a bleaker version of “Hogan’s Heroes,” a comedy–not just about the war, but about the German army–featuring wacky Nazis and absolutely no Jews. Is it really funny to hear Sgt. Schultz constantly saying, “I know nothing?” Isn’t that the defense used by quite a few real-life minders of the camps? Schultz was just following orders, after all; cue the laugh track. Schultz is the wiley soldier who sees all and doesn’t tell; Commander Klink is a walking embodiment of the Peter Principle (that a person will rise to the level of his incompetence) constantly worried about what they think back at the Home Office. Of course in this case, the Home Office happens to be Nazi Headquarters, where (in the real world) incompetence, or simply falling out of favor with the regime, often resulted in death.

Since Stalag 13 is a POW camp, the whole pesky question of the Final Solution is simply and conveniently ignored. Nazis without the Jewish problem? Holocaust deniers who are in the act of carrying it out? How did we ever think that was funny, even in 1965?

The sitcom’s sardonic tone (or at least a more nuanced version of it) worked a lot better in “Stalag 17,” from which “Hogan’s Heroes” was either adapted or stolen. It helped that William Holden was the lead in the film, and that the reason for the war itself wasn’t completely forgotten. Still, I’d rather pass on a film where the most sympathetic character is a Nazi POW camp guard.

Tremendous liberties have been taken with Nazis on film because they continue to make terrific arch-villains; it doesn’t hurt when they’re chasing some supernatural Big Bad, as in “Raiders of the Lost Ark” or “Captain America.” Still, unless you strip out the central reality that made Nazis Nazis–a total commitment to ethnic cleansing, and a utilitarian view of humanity that is almost incomprehensible–you always know who the bad guys are.

That’s the common thread I see between celluloid Nazis (not the real ones) and vampires; you always know who the bad guys are, unless you strip away the essence of the mythos. The less threatening they are–the less evil, really–the more cartoonish they become. “Inglorious Basterds” turns the tables on Hitler and makes him the victim of a secretly-sanctioned U.S. Army unit of Louisville Slugger-wielding Jewish vigilante soldiers. I don’t think we should be asked to feel sorry for Hitler in any way–not because human compassion doesn’t apply to him or to whatever was left of his soul, but because the real Hitler had no use for either giving compassion or receiving it. He saw no value in the lives of others–friend, foe, or victim–past his own uses for them, and when the end came he treated himself, his lover, and their dog the same way. Whatever liberties you might take with the story, Hitler’s insane vision of human and societal perfection is still at its core. Without Hitler and what we know of him, you don’t have the power-mad Nazi general of “Captain America” or the vengeful, desperate one in “Raiders of the Lost Ark.” You end up with “Hogan’s Heroes,” which is basically ”The Office” with uniforms. Klink is Michael Scott, Col. Hogan is Jim, and Dwight Schrute apparently hasn’t been captured yet.

By the way, if you want to see real comedy involving Nazis, rent “The Producers.” I prefer the Gene Wilder/Zero Mostel original to the updated musical version; Wilder had the gift of appearing completely rational and absolutely insane in the same moment, and his hair should have had its own credit as a performer. You also can’t go wrong with Kenneth Mars’  deluded, pidgeon-loving Nazi sympathizer, Franz Liebkind. He has the impenetrable earnestness of a conspiracy theorist, and the utter metaphysical disconnect of your crazy Uncle Phil (we all have one). Mel Brooks said, “The worst thing you can do to evil is to laugh at it”; and Liebkind is essentially an alternate-universe Hitler–as unsuccessful at inspiring murderous hatred as he is at painting landscapes–completely unhinged after years of being marginalized as a crackpot.

Oh, and don’t get me started about the Joseph Mengele/Fake Joseph Mengele sub-genre of films like “The Boys from Brazil” and “Marathon Man.” Again, there’s no point in competing with real evil by making up fake evils committed by the same man.

Next up: Hollywood’s common problem with Nazis and vampires on film.

Steven wasn’t entirely negative about “The Mighty Macs;” and gave it a B- in his print review. I’d consider that a mixed review (and/or a somewhat mild recommendation) rather than a negative review. If you want to see a negative review, read what he said about “Cars 2″ (“Cars 2 is something more disappointing than Pixar’s first unmistakably mediocre film: It’s a work of disheartening anonymity.” Yeouch!). I don’t think people always grasp the difference. “The Mighty Macs” isn’t “Ghandi,” (or “Secretariat, which Steven used as a point of comparison), but it would be unreasonable to expect that from a small-budget, independent film by a first-time director. I think Steven’s review reflects that.

I was (and still am) happy to see a movie getting mainstream distribution that’s positive, family-friendly, and that has a solid cast (Carla Gugino, David Boreanaz, and Ellen Burstyn)–but I also think we should be objective about the strengths and weaknesses of a film like this. If people want to apply a different set of criteria to Catholic films, Christian films produced by amateur film makers, “family-friendly” films, etc., they can, but I’d rather get an objective sense of what a movie’s like before I’d spend $50 to take my family to see it. If we were to take one of our rare excursions to the movies, I would see “The Mighty Macs” as a good choice for our family, and at least for me, Steven’s review wouldn’t change that; he described the movie I would have expected to see based on the trailer.

The point of a film review isn’t that you “should” or “shouldn’t” see it, but to give you enough information to decide whether you would want to see it. There is an added dimension in looking at movies from a Catholic perspective, but I think most films that Church teaching would rule out aren’t films we’d be likely to talk about in the first place. I mean, do we really have to explain what’s wrong with the “Saw” franchise? Sometimes films go in that direction when you wouldn’t expect them to, and that’s certainly worth knowing.

You want to go see “The Mighty Macs?” Absolutely! Go see it. You enjoyed the living daylights out of it? Great! Tell somebody.

OK, that’s all well and good, you say…but Sean Herriott, Catholic radio personality and infrequent blogger, why wouldn’t you throw the full weight of your considerable influence behind every Catholic, Christian-themed, or family-friendly project out there? Well…

1. I don’t have as much influence as you think I do. Whether it’s Steven’s opinion or mine, it’s an opinion. Some of those opinions are strong (Steven and I agree that you’d be better off lighting $50 on fire than watching the “Da Vinci Code” films, and that Howard & Hanks still have some ‘splainin’ to do), and some are not so strong (“Soul Surfer” was better than I thought it would be, but my expectations weren’t very high to begin with), but they’re just opinions. God gave you that gray, squishy thing (I think doctors call it a “brain”) for a reason. You loved “The Mighty Macs,” and think everyone you know should watch it? Tell them! Link to the trailer from Facebook, mention it to the other moms at school, take your kid and his/her best friend. When it comes to your sphere of influence, I can’t do any of those things; and as much as I’d love to think I have the power of cinematic life and death (and would use my awesome powers only for good), I don’t. Really, I don’t. More to the point, I don’t want to. I don’t want to be your definitive source for anything; I do want to point you to sources that are definitive (the Catechism of the Catholic Church, for instance) or useful (Steven’s film reviews) and let you do the math for yourself. By the way, there’s a difference between “reliable” and “definitive.” I do strive pretty hard for reliability.
2. If everything is amazing, nothing is amazing. I’ve seen both “2001: A Space Odyssey” and “Event Horizon;” and both “Lawrence of Arabia” and “Ishtar.” In both cases, the two films had similar settings and some common plot points; one would become a genuine classic and the other would be remembered, if at all, as an execrable flop. Why? Because some movies are great, and some are terrible, and most are somewhere in between. Discussing the in-betweeness of a film like “The Mighty Macs” isn’t an indictment; it’s a review. Touting in-between films as amazing (or, much worse in my book, proclaiming the amazingness of movies that are actually bad) hurts the credibility of the person making the recommendation, and isn’t particularly helpful to people looking for useful information.
3. I don’t think that art & media should get a pass just because it’s Catholic. Two things come into play in a film review (and especially one from a Christian and/or family-friendly perspective), and either can make or break it. If you have great content and bad execution, you end up with a well-meaning film that nobody’s going to watch (and that many would find very difficult to watch). Its impact on a Christian audience or as an evangelistic tool will be limited by its watch-ability. If you’re looking at a film as a piece of art and not just a worldview delivery system, no amount of heart-in-the-right-placeness makes up for sloppy writing, bad production values, or horrible acting. On the other hand, if a film is at least competent in terms of the creative and technical elements but celebrates violence, degrades people, etc., it’s not going to make anyone’s Great Films list. That goes to my previous point; I’ve seen Christian films every bit as bad as “Ishtar” (worse, actually–especially in terms of acting and production values) touted as “must-see” movies. Some Catholic or otherwise Christian-themed films will be great (“The Passion of the Christ,” arguably), some will be awful (“Left Behind”), and lots of them will be in the middle. If we don’t acknowledge that, I think we run the risk of both losing our credibility and celebrating mediocrity.
4. No film is required viewing; no books are required reading. There’s probably no way to say this without offending someone, but no film, book, website, apparition (approved or not) or non-Magisterial teaching is something you have to see, read, or embrace. Nothing, nothing, NOTHING has the primacy of (or, heaven help us, primacy over) Sacred Scripture and Sacred Tradition. I think Christians (including Catholics) do a disservice to themselves and those they’re trying to reach by suggesting that a book or film (or a particular teaching or movement) is something that everyone must embrace. I don’t get a lot of criticism about my approach to the Arts and media, but the complaints I do get tend to center around that idea. Although the artistic & content aspects I’ve mentioned are important to me, this is the only point that’s actually not just my personal perspective, but the teaching of the Catholic Church. The feedback I get along these lines is generally pretty mild (e.g., concerns that someone might be put off a worthwhile film by something Steven’s said, something I’ve said, or something I’ve failed to say by not jumping on the Bandwagon O’ The Week), but I’ve also seen it go to wild extremes. I’ve made some people unhappy by saying this on the air, but it expresses a core teaching of the Church. There is no new revelation.

I think all of those previous points also underscore why I like having Steven on. He looks at films in a way that is consistent with our faith and useful in the real world. I’ve talked with critics who only liked art house films or made recommendations on things like the number of swear words or the amount of graphic content (something that might seem to make some sense on its face–but in actually applying those criteria, “Saving Private Ryan” would probably fare worse than “American Pie”), or who simply couldn’t communicate as well on the radio as they did in print. I don’t have Steven on my show because I agree with all of his reviews (although I’d have to say I agree with most of them, and have long considered him a very reliable and insightful source for info about films), but because I appreciate his underlying values and his approach. I also really enjoy talking with him, which not only makes my day go faster, but also makes for a better interview.

At the end of the day, his reviews and my perspective are just opinions. With the exception of films that are morally objectionable or are obviously without merit (torture porn, gross-out sex comedies, anything with Uwe Boll’s name on it), I think any film review or the opinion of a disembodied talking head (that’s me!) should be something you take into consideration along with whatever other background you dig up. You’re looking at 30 to 50 bucks for a movie these days, so it’s worth your time to read a few reviews and watch a trailer or two.

I’m more likely to be interested in a film if Steven likes it and less interested if he doesn’t; if he says a film should be avoided like the plague, I’m definitely going to take his advice. If you feel the same way about the recommendations I make for movies, TV, books, online content, etc., that’s great; if you don’t, that’s fine with me, too. Either way, do your due diligence and make up your own mind.

If we were to take some stories as they stand, we should receive a rather bewildered impression that the biography contains more supernatural events than natural ones. Now it is clean against Catholic tradition, co-incident in so many points with common sense, to suppose that this is really the proportion of these things in practical human life. Moreover, even considered as supernatural or preternatural stories, they obviously fall into certain different classes, not so much by our experience of miracles as by our experience of stories. Some of them have the character of fairy stories in their form even more than their incident. They are obviously tales told by the fire to peasants or the children of peasants, under conditions in which nobody thinks he is propounding a religious doctrine to be received or rejected, but only rounding off a story in the most symmetrical way, according to that sort of decorative scheme or pattern that runs through all fairy stories. Others are obviously in their form most emphatically evidence; that is they are testimony that is truth or lies; and it will be very hard for any judge of human nature to think they are lies…it is admitted that (if it is untrue) the story of the Stigmata is not a legend but can only be a lie.

For me, the question of whether the Wolf of Gubbio existed is a lot less interesting than why a man would walk away from money, power, and a comfortable life to joyfully wear rags and beg for garbage to eat. Francis’ story is that he was far happier cold, malnourished, and the object of ridicule than he was as the playboy son of a wealthy merchant; the things he gave up in life were all the things the rest of us are trying to gain. His joy in his greatest failures–not simply one that didn’t falter in the face of suffering or disappointment, but actually increased–is the miracle that I find to be the most spectacular.

While I was in the process of coming into the Church, I was fascinated by Francis’ life. I read at least four biographies of his life (three of them are on the bookshelf behind me as I write this, and the Chesterton book is around somewhere), and really didn’t wrestle with the question of which stories were true and which weren’t. I was (and am) shaken to the core by a man who could live up to the description as “another Christ.”

My study of St. Francis of Assisi led me to the story of St. Maximilian Kolbe; I mentioned to Albert and Bridget that I became fascinated with the matter-of-fact way that Maximillian offered to be starved to death in substitution of another prisoner at Auschwitz. We have reliable reports about what happened, and one of the survivors was the man Maximilian died to save. He asked to trade places with one of the men randomly condemned to death by starvation (as an example to the rest of the prisoners following an escape for which none of them were responsible);

His simple statement, “I am a Catholic priest from Poland, and I would like to take the place of this man, for he has a wife and children,” momentarily stunned the sadistic commandant, who had done his best to see Fr. Kolbe either worked to death or simply beaten to death.

I think a real miracle occurred at that point, as the commandant allowed the swap to take place, rather than either shooting Fr. Kolbe outright or simply adding him to the group. Not only did the transaction take place, but the people in charge made good on their promise (not that they would have called it that); if that prisoner were to die, it wouldn’t be as a loose ending being tied up in retaliation for that escape attempt. I suppose that any of those men living to tell the tale would be the second miracle; given the depravity and inhuman cruelty of that place.

Another miraculous aspect to this story is what took place there–and what didn’t take place. Kolbe followed nine other men into the starvation bunker and ministered to them until they died. He heard their confessions, prayed with them, and led them in singing hymns. Rather than screaming and cursing as men usually did, the nine with Kolbe died received a level of comfort that was certainly never intended.

It sounds like a sort of paralysis set into the administration at the camp; rather than going in and killing everyone in order to shut them up, they let the scenario play itself out. By the time they did finish the job (to make room for another group of prisoners), Maximilian Kolbe was one of only four men left. As the guard circled the room to deliver a lethal dose of carbolic acid to each man, Fr. Kolbe raised his arm to receive the injection. Hope can be infectious, and it wasn’t enough for the men running Auschwitz to terrorize, torture, and murder their prisoners; the ultimate goal of the camps was to dehumanize them. They did everything they could to reduce Maximilian Kolbe to prisoner 16770, who was disposable and less than human in their eyes, but he remained a priest, and died a priest.

Maximilian Kolbe didn’t shout out last-minute words of encouragement or expressions of his fidelity to Christ. He simply did the next thing that God had for him, which was to end his brutal, short life in the camps being voluntarily starved to death to save another man’s life. There was a calmness, quiet confidence, and unassuming holiness that, to be honest, I find terrifying. St. Maximilian Kolbe not only died at peace, but died imparting peace to men in a place that is as close to hell on earth as it’s possible to get.

As Chesterton said, some miraculous stories could be seen as pious legends, and some could only be lies. I think St. Maximilian Kolbe’s might be a miraculous story of a third kind. A person might be convinced that the account of Francis’ stigmata is impossible, but over time he might accept it as true; the story of St. Maximilian Kolbe is one you could accept as true, but over time be convinced is impossible. The challenging (terrifying) thing about St. Kolbe’s story is that it is both.