Shadowgraphs is a column written from a progressive Christian perspective, based on a concept for an essay from Kierkegaard's work Either/Or.

"To be human is to strive toward being God. Or, if you prefer, man is fundamentally the desire to be God."--Sartre, Being and Nothingness (italics added)

I am having a crisis of faith at the moment. It is important that I am very candid about this experience, otherwise the seed of doubt may grow deeply within me and the bad fruit of cynicism might annihilate my faith in God and therefore my immortality.

It's just that I keep wondering, from a psychoanalytic perspective, just exactly why Christ suffered so much. I recently saw The Passion of the Christ and was thrown into a wheel of thought: perhaps the very core of Christianity is the victorious superiority of man over God.

How can I think otherwise, when in the movie theater in the company of other human beings I found so much faith with very little validation? My cohorts were clearly lost in inexplicable despair at the sight of Jesus being graphically tortured and yet unable to turn their eyes... Some emerged from the viewing in tears, yet everyone emitted the clear vibe of victory.

Secular masterminds like Freud and Sartre and Fromm crafted a very worthwhile explanation for all of this. I invite you to join me in battling this wheel for a moment (especially if you are of the faith). Isn't the sight of God suffering at the hands of men, we wretched and barbaric creatures, somehow carnally gratifying? Seeing Jesus in the box office completely covered in blood must touch us subconsciously.

Ecce Homo! Behold the man! God is a human being and we can maim and kill him as though he were one of our own--humanity can accomplish everything including the destruction of an infinite, all powerful God whom we lured onto the Earth to tear to shreds!

All right, perhaps the feeling of victory comes from the final scene of Jesus emerging again; perhaps it's only faith being reasserted. But shouldn't the more frightening thought stir you, believer and non-believer alike?

We should be asking ourselves: why is this movie so appealing? I just won't accept religious answers anymore. It's part of my protestant ways to decry the abuse of imagery and to orient my thoughts to the spiritual and not the physical world. The passion I have in my mind is much more horrifying than the movie, as it should be for any genuine Christian. The reason for a violent movie to be so appealing must have more to do with baser instincts than the desire to be drawn closer to God. Perhaps we Christians are slowly and collectively falling into the trap of masochism, much in the same way a historian romances about being present at horrible battles, or the way books about Hitler are continuously best sellers.

Of course, I'm a much better love poet than I am a Christian. I might be missing the point here and I warmly invite any corrections.