In Theaters Now: All Saints

All Saints (2017)

Years ago, when I served in a church in Healdsburg, there was discussion about whether a little piece of the property should be used for a community garden. Arguments went back and forth about water issues and strangers on the property and use of resources, and the church ended up not doing it at the time. The benefits of the project weren’t appealing enough for the church leadership.

A very different story is told in the new film, All Saints, which is based on the true story of a Episcopalian Church in Smyrna, Tennessee, that turned most of its land into a farm to save itself. In 2007, first time pastor, Michael Spurlock (John Corbett), was brought into a church to close it. Only a dozen people were in attendance on Sunday mornings, and the diocese didn’t feel they could support the church any longer. Spurlock intended to follow instructions to facilitate selling off the property and to encourage the members of the congregation to worship elsewhere.  

But Spurlock began to see another path when a group of Burmese refugees from a people group called the Karen came to worship at All Saints Church. The refugees became Christians in the Anglican Church back in Burma, so they’re ready to worship as Episcopalians. But they also had great financial needs of their own, including a number of families struggling even to feed their children.

Spurlock believes God gives him an answer to the question, not unlike Kevin Costner in Field of Dreams. Whereas Costner was told by a voice to plow under corn to make a ballfield, Spurlock says God told him to use the land that had once been used for ball fields to plant corn -- and tomatoes and a Southeast Asian favorite, sour leaf. Spurlock hopes that the crops can provide food for the Karen, and the sale of the rest of the crops will pay the church’s mortgage.

But God does a more interesting work of bringing Tennessee and Burmese farmers to work together and eventually to worship together. Mindy and I have visited a number of ethnic congregations over the last couple of years, and we’ve visited churches that have English language services and on the same facilities a congregation using another language. Sometimes there seems to be little contact between the congregations, but All Saints uses a translator during the service to allow the two groups to worship together.

To be honest, I was even more impressed by another church not shown, but talked about in the film. The leader of the refugees, Ye Win (played by Nelson Lee), told Spurlock about the refugee camps where he and other Karen refugees lived for years. In those camps there was theft, brutality, and abuse, and often the only refuge in the refugee camp was found in the rice hut where the food was stored. That was also where the church met. It was a sanctuary for hurting people.

In the film, Spurlock made many mistakes as pastor, taking on too much work on his own. His wife started a youth choir which the movie portrayed as having somewhat mixed results. On their own, the children sing songs with enthusiasm in Karen, but she taught them a rather weak English language version of “For the Beauty of the Earth.”

The church’s path isn’t a smooth one. The people in the film end up asking, “Why, God, did you ask us to act and seem to ruin the results?” a variation on the old “Why do bad things happen to good people” question. Amazingly, the film comes up with some decent answers.

In spite of the choir’s sour notes and Spurlock’s Scripture-light sermons, I’m going to give the church in All Saints our highest rating of four steeples because they do raise the Name of Jesus,  and they care for the poor -- their neighbors -- in that Name.

(A bonus for fans of the old CBS show, Northern Exposure; not only is the lead role played by Corbett who played the DJ Chris in the Morning on that show, the film also features Barry Corbin, who played Chris’ boss, Maurice the former astronaut. It was fun to see them bickering again.)

Sports Churches: The Leather Saint (1956)

 "If every clergyman had a right like yours, there wouldn't be be many sinners left around," Father Gil's gym buddy tells him. Boxing evangelism hasn't caught on over the last half century as some would have hoped, but the good work of this Episcopalian pugilist is preserved in Paramount's 1956 release, The Leather Saint.

Here at Movie Churches, we're used to seeing fundraising as the primary goal of the clergy and churches in films. At least Father Gil (played by Bo's future husband, John Derek) is raising money for something other than paying the church’s mortgage before Simon Legree forecloses. Because of a recent polio epidemic, the local children's hospital is ill-equipped to meet the needs of the community, so Father Gil says, "Whatever I have to do to help the kids, I'll do it."

Early in the film, we see Father Gil meeting with his superior within the church. Gil is asked why he hasn’t pursued the suggestion that he to get married and have children. He’s told congregations find such pastors more relatable. Father Gil replies that having a wife and family of his own would take attention away from his kids. In fact, he’s taken a year-long vow of celibacy to concentrate on work with the kids.

Father Gil asks if the denomination is going to come through with money for the hospital and is told he’s going to need to be patient. But as the doctor at the hospital says, “Paralysis doesn’t understand patience.”

A solution to the money problems comes when a boxing manager sees Gil working out with the punching bag. Manager Gus asks Gil if he’d like to get in the boxing game. Gil says he has a job, and Gus says, “I don’t know what racket you’re in, but you can make some dough in the ring.” Gil agrees to fight, but doesn’t divulge what “racket” he’s in, attempting to keep the worlds separate.

Gil also catches the eye of a boxing promoter, Tony (Cesar Romero, TV’s Joker), and his moll, Pearl (they seem to be interested in Gil for different reasons). I assumed, Hollywood being Hollywood, that Gil would eventually end up with Pearl. But Gil ducks and weaves from her advances as well as he dodges blows in the ring. He even brings his gym buddy along when he goes to see Pearl rather than be with her alone.

Manager Gus and Promoter Tony both worry that Gil might not have the killer instinct necessary for a good fighter. In the ring, he tends to bob and weave before making one devastating knockout punch.  After the fight, he always checks on the condition of his rival. Gus says, “It’s like representing a Bible salesman.”

We never do see Gil preach or meet with adult congregants. We do see him talk and play with the children in the hospital. He promises them a swimming pool to help with their physical therapy and a second iron lung. We also see him giving the money from each fight to a priest at the hospital without admitting it’s prize winnings. He claims to have benefactor in the  “leather glove business.”

We also see him -- often -- go to church to pray by the altar. This is the one time we hear him quote Scripture, using Psalm 23 as his prayer. He asks God to forgive him if boxing is the wrong approach to getting the money but he sees no other.

The paucity of Gil’s references to God and especially to Jesus keep him from getting our highest rating, but he wins by decision with a solid Three Steeples.

Science & Church: The Theory of Everything (2014)

There's not much church in this docudrama of the life of Stephen Hawking, and one assumes that's would be fine with him. When Stephen (played by Eddie Redmayne for an Oscar win) met Jane, who is to be his first wife, he told her, "I'm a cosmologist. That's religion for intelligent people." (You know, as opposed to idiots like Augustine, Aquinas, and Newton who held to orthodox Christianity.)

Jane replied, "I'm C.of E. [Church of England]"

"I suppose someone has to be," Stephen responded.

He told Jane that he can't allow his calculations to be muddled by belief in a supernatural creator, although physicists like William Henry Bragg seemed to be able to do maths well enough to get a Nobel Prize in spite of preaching in the Anglican Church on the weekends. Ernan McMullin managed to find room in his life for the "religion" of cosmology as a Roman Catholic priest. Charles Hard Townes was another Nobel Prize winner for physics who found room on his shelf for the Templeton Prize for religious achievement.

Anyway, back to the meager appearances of the church in this film. When Stephen asked Jane on a croquet date on Sunday morning, she replied, "I'm busy Sunday morning."

"Oh, yes, Him," Stephen replied. We then see Stephen waiting for her to leave church on Sunday.

If you have any acquaintance with the life of Hawking (and why would you watch this film without it?) you know he has battled Lou Gehrig's Disease for the majority of his adult life. In spite of his ailment, Stephen and Jane had three children. In the film, we see photos of the family after their third child's christening at an Anglican Church. Apparently, all three of his children were christened. One would assume this was by Jane's choice.

Not surprisingly, the film portrayed Jane facing many challenges in life due to her husband's illness, academic pursuits, and initial meager income. She went to her mother for advice on finding more in life. When her mother told her she should join the church choir, Jane responded, "That's the most English thing I have ever heard."

But she joined the choir. We see her enter a lovely Anglican church with beautiful stained glass but wooden chairs in place of pews. The choir director, Jonathan Jones, accepted Jane as a music student and soon became a family friend, discussing science and religion with Stephen, who assured him that physics will bring about the death of God (which reminded me of something Mark Twain said about great exaggeration).

Eventually, Stephen took a lover and forsok Jane, so Jane returned to her church and, eventually, the arms of Jonathan. I can't help but wonder if the church's clergy was at all concerned about the behavior of its musical staff.

The little we see of the church in the film doesn't seem to merit the disparaging remarks Hawking made, so we're giving it Two Steeples.