By Mary Joseph

“We need to find God, and He cannot be found in noise and restlessness.  God is the friend of silence.  See how nature – trees, flowers, grass – grows in silence; see the stars, the moon and the sun, how they move in silence.  We need silence to be able to touch souls.” 

These words of Mother Teresa’s came to my mind after my viewing of Silence, Martin Scorsese’s film of the acclaimed 1966 novel by Japanese Catholic author Shusaku Endo.  Based on true events and depicting the brutal persecutions of Japanese Catholics and their pastors in 17^th century Japan, Silence is at once harrowing and sublime.  Its extraordinary achievement lies not simply in its gripping, sensitively-told story of faith and martyrdom, doubt and apostasy; or in the magnificent, quiet beauty of its cinematography; but in the great delicacy, patience and reverence with which the director draws us into the profound moral and spiritual experience to which the film refers.

Silence opens in Japan, where a Portuguese missionary, Fr Ferreira (Liam Neeson) witnesses the brutal torture of his fellow Jesuits on a mountainside.  In a letter back home, he describes the cruel and coercive methods used by the Japanese authorities to induce apostasy in the Christians and their pastors.   When this letter reaches Portugal some years later, two ardent young Jesuits, Fr Rodrigues (Andrew Garfield) and Fr Garupe (Adam Driver) volunteer to go to Japan, to minister to the suffering Christians and to seek out and bring back to the faith Fr Ferreira, who is now rumoured to have apostatized during the persecutions.

Entering Japan to the joyful reception of the Christians, Rodrigues and Garupe minister secretly to their flock, but they witness first-hand the cruel tactics of the authorities and the courage of the Japanese faithful.  As the authorities’ net closes in upon the young Jesuits, Rodrigues and Garupe decide to separate in order to reach more Christian villages, and Rodrigues continues on alone, followed by his untrustworthy Christian guide, Kichijiro.  A frightened, haunted man, Kichijiro betrays Christ and his fellow believers multiple times, yet clings to His mercy, returning again and again for the sacrament of reconciliation.   In a heartfelt confession scene with Rodrigues, Kichijiro acknowledges and laments his own weakness and the unfairness of being a Christian in these times of persecution.  He cries out “Where is the place for a weak man, in a world like this?” 

Silence takes up Kichijiro’s question and answers it by examining the true nature of “weakness” and “strength”.  The film beautifully presents the paradox that it is not necessarily the strongest or most virtuous Christians who prove most steadfast in times of trial, but, rather, those who humbly live the truth of St Paul’s words “I will rather boast most gladly of my weaknesses, in order that the power of Christ may dwell with me” (2 Cor 12:9).

It is difficult to put into words how deeply moved I was by this film; suffice to say I have never before seen a film with such an outspoken, honest and unashamed presentation of the truth of the Catholic faith.  Just as Christ will always be “a sign of contradiction” to the world (Luke 2:34), so the Japanese authorities, led by “the Inquisitor” (Issei Ogata), know that Christianity represents a tremendous threat to their power.  The knowledge and love of Christ gives the human person an interior freedom which no worldly authority or power can bestow, and which they can never extinguish, however much they may imprison him physically.   Whilst Silence rightly raises the question of whether embracing Christianity must mean a giving up of one’s culture, refreshingly, it does not present the missionaries as cultural imperialists, or the Japanese as unthinking thugs.

The Japanese authorities try endlessly to persuade the Christians to apostatise by stepping on the fumie – a holy image of Christ, Mary and the apostles– telling them, “It’s only a formality”.   But Silence constantly reiterates the importance of the body – that what we do with our bodies matters.  When Rodrigues, out of concern for one of the Christians, Mokichi, tells him that it would be okay to trample on the fumie because God will know his heart, he is rebuked by a scandalised Garupe, who says simply “You can’t.  You must pray for courage”.  Later in this conversation, Mokichi says that his love for God is strong, but asks, is this love the same as faith?  This simple exchange early in the film between Rodrigues, Garupe and Mokichi beautifully sets up the crucial events of the story and movingly prefigures the final journeys of the three characters.

Although he is warm-hearted and valiant, filled with great zeal for Our Lord and love for his flock, Rodrigues is a man with a deep weakness – an unconscious pride and reliance upon himself.  His weakness is all the stronger because he does not recognise it, whilst his enemies do, and know how to use it cunningly against him.   As Rodrigues becomes more and more traumatized by the torture and suffering of the Japanese Christians, he feels that he is in some way responsible and that he must save them from their terrible fate.

Silence has stirred controversy and mixed opinions within the Catholic community, because of its sympathetic depiction of apostasy – reflecting the tragic but very human reality that not all Catholic priests or laity were able to remain faithful during the persecutions.  But whilst we are clearly encouraged to empathise with Rodrigues’ suffering, his climactic act of apostasy is not presented as something to be justified or celebrated.  To the contrary, both Scorsese in his film, and Endo in his novel, draw an explicit and devastating parallel between Rodrigues’ betrayal and St Peter’s denial of Christ.  Silence does not condemn those who apostatized, but rather draws us into a deeper, more honest appreciation of the true cost of following Our Lord, and a fuller understanding of the depths and reach of His mercy.

The film’s portrayal of apostasy is balanced, too, by its moving depiction of martyrdom, vividly bringing to life the words we pray in the Preface of the Martyrs, “You choose the weak and make them strong, in bearing witness to You”.  I found tears streaming down my face as I watched the courage and faith of the Japanese martyrs – ordinary, humble men, women and children, who did not seek to die for Christ, but who chose to say ‘yes’ to this call in an extraordinary moment of grace.  Indeed, in two climactic scenes by the ocean shore, Scorsese depicts the martyrs’ deaths as another baptism, as the victims are bound and plunged into the water to die with Christ.

From the opening credits of the film, where a breathtaking silence is broken by the sound of ocean waves breaking upon the shore, Silence emphasises the sacramentality of the world – that God touches and sanctifies us through water, earth, bread, wine, bodies.   At times, Scorsese utilises the camera in a way that seems to emphasise that God is not silent – that He hears us and loves us.  Several stunningly composed shots at key moments of the film seem to look down upon and embrace the characters from above, as if to show God embracing a suffering world.  Throughout the film, there is a delicate but distinctive focus upon hands as a channel of grace and love – priestly hands absolving penitents, hands clasped in prayer or in grief, hands embracing, blessing, baptising, bestowing.   In one of the most beautiful and ecstatic shots of the film, the camera lingers upon the Host in Rodrigues’ hands at the moment of elevation, as Christ’s great act of love is consummated on the cross.  As the camera cuts to show the congregation receiving the body of Our Lord in Holy Communion, their faces show how joyfully they taste and delight in the ardent embrace of their bridegroom.

The Japanese Christians hunger for holy pictures, rosaries, crosses and other physical symbols of the faith – all items declared contraband by the authorities. At one point, Rodrigues worries that they attach too much importance to these poor symbols; yet when the faithful Mokichi places in his hand a tiny, roughly-made cross, he clasps it with gratitude.  In accepting this humble cross from the man whose simple faith inspires him, little does Rodrigues know how it will accompany him and witness his betrayal of his Lord.  But when we see this little cross again, it is a moment filled with hope that this pathetic but tangible symbol of Christ’s love is the thread of grace that will save this poor priest in the end.

Pope Benedict XVI once said, “Nearly all of us know God only through hearsay…the more we are open to His silence and to our silence, the more we begin to know Him truly.”  Silenced and shamed by his apostasy and its terrible consequences, Rodrigues remains a priest, albeit a fallen and secret one.  In his review of the film, Catholic writer and editor of Image Journal Gregory Wolfe suggests that it may be precisely in this silence and humiliation that lie the seeds of hope for Rodrigues’ repentance and reconversion.  His mission field – once as large and glorious as his ambitious heart longed for – is now humbled and narrowed to his own household of his Japanese wife and servants, including the ever-wayward Kichijiro, who continues to believe and to hope in God’s mercy.

Such a beautiful and extraordinary film owes much to the fineness of its actors.    The Japanese actors ground the film with great depth and humanity, with particularly strong performances from Shin’ya Tsukamoto as the heroic Mokichi and Yosuke Kubozuka as Kichijiro.   Andrew Garfield – who undertook a 30 day Ignatian silent retreat in preparation for the role – gives his all as Fr Rodrigues, his earnestness, passion and heart rendering a performance of immense conviction.  Adam Driver delivers a humble and moving performance as Rodrigues’ saintly brother priest, Fr Garupe; and Liam Neeson is devastating as the fallen, Christ-haunted Fr Ferreira.

The “silence” of the film’s title is often understood as referring to the struggle of the Christian to remain faithful when God seems silent in the face of suffering.  In a moment of anguish, Rodrigues cries out, “Christ is here – he is here – I just can’t hear him”.  Silence does not answer this struggle definitively.  Rather, the beauty and depth of the film is seen in the way that it turns this notion of silence around, challenging our simple assumptions.  The tragic and yet hopeful human drama played out in Silence suggests that it is not so much the silence of God that the Christian must wrestle with, but the silence and walls of his own heart.  For it is only when we accept and enter into this silence that God can change us; that He can free us from our illusions, vanity, and pride.  Only in silence can we face the depth of our emptiness and our poverty, and discover how utterly and completely we need Him.  Only with silence – as Mother Teresa said – can we touch souls. ▪