Living and expressing our Catholic faith

The director Martin Scorsese’s film Silence, based on Shusaku Endo’s novel of the same name, came out in 2016. It tells the story of two Jesuit missionaries (Sebastiao Rodrigues played by Andrew Garfield and Francisco Garupe played by Adam Driver) who—having learned that their formator (Cristovao Ferreira played by Liam Neeson) had renounced his faith—leave Portugal for Japan to find him.

Rodrigues eventually connects with Ferreira to discover that he indeed has renounced his faith. Rodrigues is later forced to watch Christians being tortured, which will not abate until he too renounces his faith. He engages in an inner battle over this: If he refuses to renounce, these people will suffer greatly; if he renounces, their suffering will cease. Rodrigues believes he hears Jesus’ voice saying that it’s okay to renounce his faith to end the suffering of others. He then renounces his faith and marries a Japanese woman and spends the rest of his life in Japan. He was under constant surveillance to ensure that he wasn’t practicing his Christian faith.

Near the end of the film, Rodrigues dies. His Japanese wife, during the funeral, places a small crucifix in his hands that he had received upon arrival to Japan years earlier. Does this suggest that while Rodrigues had publicly renounced his faith, he continued practicing his faith privately within himself? Since his wife placed the crucifix in his hands, it seems that she believed he had remained Christian—at least privately in a context of significant persecution.

One question this film raises is the following: Is Catholic identity only visible when it is explicitly measured by symbols, policies or statements? I personally don’t use the word “identity” to discuss my Catholic Benedictine faith partly because I prefer to avoid polemics but also because the Catholic Church’s tent is wide enough to gather people that are not merely copies of one another. The word “identity” connotes sameness. But I see the Church as a unity in diversity. Faith, for me, is less about marking boundaries and more about cultivating a way of life rooted in Christ. The Rule of Benedict does not begin with institutional branding, but with heartfelt listening. At St. John’s this has been exemplified, for instance, through decades of commitment to ecumenical and interreligious dialogue.

The Catholic intellectual tradition, moreover, has also played a vital role here by forming students to ask better questions and foster diverse perspectives. This tradition, after all, draws from philosophy, science, literature, art and lived experience. When students are encouraged to encounter complexity, ambiguity and meaningful conversations they are participating in a Catholic mode of inquiry. Perhaps the most important question, then, might not only be whether Catholic identity is visible but whether students are being formed to commit themselves to the common good, to be attentive listeners, to be compassionate, to be concerned about justice.

Can we do better? Absolutely. Symbols, liturgy and explicit expressions of Catholic faith are essential. These should never be dropped. Some of the best Catholics I’ve met, though, don’t wear their identities on their sleeves but in how they live. They engage in quiet ministry with drug-addicted people, volunteer at homeless shelters or engage in dialogue with people from other religious traditions. In other words, they carry a little crucifix in their hands in all that they do without much pomp.