Hollywood actor-director Mel Gibson’s controversial film on the death of Christ is proving popular among Christians even before its February 25 release date.

The graphic, $25 million film “The Passion of the Christ” depicts Christ’s life from the Garden of Gethsemane to the resurrection.

After a private showing, Billy Graham praised it. Mission America Coalition plans to use the movie for evangelism. Campus Crusade is promoting it. Rick Warren’s Saddleback Church in southern California purchased 18,000 tickets. The Evangelical Free Church of Naperville, Illinois, purchased more than 1,000. Two members of Wheaton Bible Church in Wheaton, Illinois, have offered to buy out two screenings of the movie at a local theater. After Gibson showed part of the movie to a convention of the Full Gospel Business Men's Fellowship, he received a standing ovation. Afterward, the daughter of the organization's president laid hands on Gibson and asked Jesus to “bind Satan, bind the press, we ask you, Lord” (Peter Boyer, “The Jesus War,” The New Yorker, Sept. 15. 2003). Worship Leader magazine for Feb. 2004 offers a free guide to Gibson’s movie and says, “There has never been a film like it! Powerful, life changing, an unprecedented opportunity for evangelism & discipleship.” Robert Schuller of the Crystal Cathedral was given a private showing and afterward proclaimed, “It’s not your dream, this is God’s dream. He gave it to you, because He knew you wouldn’t throw it away. Trust Him.” The movie has been recommended by psychologist James Dobson and by Don Hodel, the current president of Focus on the Family. Ted Haggard, president of the National Evangelical Association, called Gibson “the Michelangelo of this generation.” The Catholic League purchased 1,200 tickets at $9.75 apiece and will make them available to members for $5. The film was shown to members of the Vatican Secretariat of State, the Pontifical Council for Social Communications, and the Congregation for the Doctrine of the Faith, and all of them expressed unanimous appreciation and approval.

A positive review of the movie is making the rounds via e-mail under the name “Paul Harvey’s Comments on The Passion,” but it was actually written by Roman Catholic apologist Keith Fournier.

Gibson belongs to a Traditionalist Catholic group that performs the mass in Latin, abstains from meat on Fridays, eschews ecumenism, and other such things that were changed at the Vatican II Council in the 1960s. Gibson built his own Catholic chapel, called Holy Family, near his California home. During the filming, Gibson attended a Catholic mass every morning with the misguided desire “to be squeaky clean.” The script was translated into Aramaic and Latin by Jesuit priest William Fulco.

When asked by a Protestant interviewer if someone can be saved apart from the Roman Catholic Church, Gibson replied, “There is no salvation for those outside the Church” (The New Yorker, Sept. 15. 2003). This was the official teaching of Rome prior to Vatican II.

The movie is not based solely on the Bible but also on the visions of Roman Catholic nun-mystics St. Anne Catherine Emmerich and Mary of Agreda.

Of the visions of Emmerich, Gibson said, “She supplied me with stuff I never would have thought of” (The New Yorker, Sept. 15, 2003).

Anne Catherine Emmerich (1774-1824) was a German nun who allegedly had the stigmata or wounds of Christ in her body. Emmerich supposedly “had the use of reason from her birth and could understand liturgical Latin from her first time at Mass.” During the last 12 years of her life, she allegedly ate no food except the wafer of the Catholic mass. Her visions on the life of Christ were published in 1824 under the title “The Dolorous Passion of Our Lord and Saviour Jesus Christ." -- THIS IS A FREE !() PAGE DOWNLOAD IN PDF -- They are still in print and were consulted by Gibson. An advertisement for Emmerich’s Life of the Virgin Mary says, “This book is filled with unusual, saintly descriptions that are not recorded in the Gospel story -- descriptions that supplement and illustrate the Biblical narrative in a way that makes the actual Scripture passages truly come alive.” Thus these alleged visions go beyond the Bible. According to Emmerich’s visions, Protestants also go to purgatory but they suffer more than Catholics because no one prays for them or offers masses for them. She taught that it is more holy to pray for souls in purgatory than for sinners who are still alive. Her deceptive visions on the suffering of Christ describe His scourging and crucifixion in great detail, giving many “facts” which do not appear in Scripture. For example, she claimed that Christ “quivered and writhed like a poor worm” and that He “cried in a suppressed voice, and a clear, sweet-sounding wailing” as He was being beaten. She even claimed that Christ “glanced at His torturers, and sued for mercy.” She also claimed that Jesus suffered from a wound on his shoulder more than any other.

Mary of Agreda (1602-1665) was also a Catholic nun and visionary mystic. Her entire family entered monasteries and convents in 1618, which means that her mother and father disobeyed 1 Corinthians 7 and separated for the sake of the Catholic church. She was given to trances and even claimed that she could leave her body and teach people in foreign lands. Her book The Mystical City of God is about Mary. Like the visions of Anne Catherine Emmerich, those of Mary of Agreda go far beyond the Bible. For example, she claimed that though Joseph ate meat, Jesus and Mary seldom did.

Not surprisingly, therefore, Gibson’s film contains errors when judged by the biblical account. For example, after Christ’s arrest and as He is being escorted to the high priest’s residence, He is beaten, knocked down, and thrown off a bridge. After Christ is whipped, Mary gets down on her knees and wipes up the blood. Mary is shown assisting Jesus on the way to the cross, with Jesus telling her, “Behold I make all things new.”

Jim Caviezel, who plays Jesus in the Gibson film, is also a staunch Roman Catholic. He prayed to St. Genesius of Arles and St. Anthony of Padua for help in his acting career. He has visited Medjugorje to witness the site where Mary allegedly appeared to six young people. One of the things that Mary allegedly told them is that the pope “should consider himself as the father of all people and not only the Christians.” Caviezel said, “This film is something that I believe was made by Mary for her Son” (Interview with Jim and Kerri Caviezel by Catholic priest Mario Knezovic, Radio “Mir” Medjugorje, December 2003;  Caviezel also said that his goal with the movie is to “bring mankind back together.” Caviezel said that he was given “a piece of the true cross, which he kept with him all of the time during the filming of the movie. He also had relics of “Padre Pio, St. Anthony of Padoua, Ste Maria Goretti, and saint Denisius, the Patron saint of Actors.” He prayed the Rosary to Mary every day.

We believe that it is idolatrous to depict the Lord Jesus Christ in pictures and films. The Jesus in Mel Gibson’s movie is depicted in the typical fashion with long hair. Gibson got his inspiration for the long-haired Jesus from the Shroud of Turin. He attempted to re-create the face depicted on the Shroud.

Mel Gibson is famous for his roles in R-rated films such as Braveheart and Lethal Weapon.

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