Discussing
What should Christians do with Mel Gibson?

Followers of Jesus need to uplift people in prayer every day. Someone comes to know Christ, and that is when we start to pray. Rather than criticizing, pray.

This rings of why the phrase "Christians shoot their wounded" still exists. Sadly, it's more often the stories circulated are of when a Believer is hurting and they are abandoned. As if the world is saying, "See, why bother with this Christ stuff, you'll just be alone anyway. So, go have fun!"

Beautiful lies.

The only difference between international celebrities and the common us are that they have so many eyes on them...all the time. We cannot imagine the consequences or demands of our every action and decision being discussed on multi-media venues. Local celebrities (radio/TV personalities and pastors) may have less eyes but the demands are similar.

Now, let's make this personal and bring it to our family & friend circles and our neighborhoods. What do we do when lives are shattered? When there's divorce, adultery, or physical/emotional/mental/substance abuse? Do we choose sides? Do we hide? Do you judge and/or gossip? Do we pray?

Yeah, prayer...that little thing that's so very powerful is so easily forgotten.

This brings to mind Jon & Kate Gosselin and all the Christian support they had. It inspired me to create the blog http://www.jonandkateprayers.c... because so little attention seemed to be on praying for the couple and instead the focus was on judging and commenting. We want to support those who appear to make a stand for Christ but sometimes become fair-weather fans when they stumble or fall. We become as fickle as the world.

Invest energies in the people around you and never give up on them. God never gave up on us. Pray for those on the world's stage who make a stand for Christ but also for those who clearly need the Lord.

The problem is as much with Mel Gibson as it is with evangelical Christians. It has disturbed me for years how easily our Christian subcultural is hoodwinked and manipulated by slick marketing techniques. We believe the Hollywood hype, I think, because we've been trained to believe the megachurch hype (not being cynical, just observant--I attend a megachurch). Gibson had no previous Christian testimony, had questionable beliefs about Christ and doctrine, had always made gratuitously violent films, and obviously targeted the Christian market so aggressively because he knew they would make or break his film. I would like to know if any of the massive profits generated by Christians that made him even more of a multi-millionaire ever went back into any evangelical Christian ministries. Doubtful.

I'm glad I decided then not to see the film, and never have. I'm a lifelong, card-carrying, conservative evangelical in full-time family ministry, so I was at the dead center of the marketing strategy. But what little I knew of the film from partial screenings and clips convinced me it was an opportunistic cinematic excuse for Gibson to be violent with sanctified impunity. I got nothing but warning signs in my spirit, and was roundly rebuked by other evangelicals if I even mentioned my doubts about the film. But at least I know that I do not carry in my mind what I believe are unbiblical, false, violent images of Jesus.

Even a cursory reading of the gospels does not support Gibson's violent vision of the crucifixion, nor does anything in the apostolic writings. Many evangelical leaders seem to still prefer his violent vision, though, I suppose because it sells--it makes for more dramatic videos and passion plays in church that keeps the people coming, regardless of accuracy or truth. Seems to me that Mel just gave us what we wanted.

Perhaps Christians should stop rushing to idolize celebrities period.

What are we to do with him? We pray for him..period! I don't understand how as Christians we get so caught up in this world's affairs. It is important that we take into account of how Jesus forgave them that laughed and ridiculed him while on the cross. Our responsibility is to pray for them that don't believe, as well as them that have fallen.

Several have commented about praying for Mr. Gibson. True enough, but I would suggest we should be praying for his salvation. Making a film about Jesus and talking like a Christian to sell it does not make Mel Gibson a Christian. Where is the testimony of a changed life? Not there, before or after. It seems to me we should be talking much more about praying for Oksana and her baby, and for truth and justice.

Not violent? Apparently you don't have any idea what a "scourging" is, or what crucifixion is like. Jesus lost most of the flesh from his torso and approximately one third of his blood during that scourging. His death was torture. How can you be in ministry if you don't even know the basics about the death of Christ? You don't know the original languages, or you would know that His death was violent.

I watched the movie, and felt that if any person walked out of there unsaved, there was little hope for that person. Every person who filed out of that theater was crying, and many, many were making comments - the thought that He went through that for them... Some were amazed, and there was an on-the-spot sidewalk ministry for others.

Proverbs says a person should know what they're talking about before spouting off about it.

Maybe we should not hail any so called 'Hollywood Hero's' we are not told to lift any man (or Woman) up as Idols. The T.V. evangelist 'Super Pastors' have conditioned many people including christians into this sort of hero worship. If Mel Gibson wasn't lifted up so high he wouldn't have so far to fall! Most of what passes for news in the main stream media is little more than Gossip -- Gossip is a sin.

Seriously? You really don't think that crucifixion was violent? The word 'excruciating' was invented to describe how painful a process it was ('ex-' = out of, from; 'cruc-' = the cross). The violent nature of Roman floggings is also well documented. I can understand not wanting to fill your mind with violent images, but to claim that a violent portrayal of Jesus' crucifixion is unbiblical and false is just... well, false.

I think we, the Church, have two major problems in this type of situation. For starters, like Melanie said above, we tend to rush to idolizing celebrities who publicly proclaim faith in Christ, regardless of what we know about them. I believe we do this because we are, generally, afraid to share our own faith with others, and we are also a little afraid that being a Christian isn't cool. It is simply easier to point to a celebrity who is outspoken about faith as validation that cool people like Jesus, too.

The other problem is that we tend to have such a small understanding of grace. We idolize someone because they're outspoken about faith, then when they slip up we decry them and leave them by the wayside, a la Jon and Kate Gosselin, Carrie Prejean, and now Mel Gibson. As in all things, we need to follow Jesus' example and forgive people over and over, "seventy times seven times". Jesus didn't give up on Peter, even after Peter betrayed him almost as badly as Judas did.

Distinguishing between "us" and "them" is what gives Christians a bad name. What is the point of differentiating the Christian "good guys" from the nonbeliever "bad guys?" The way we treat either should not be different, should it? Can't we appreciate Gibson's efforts to produce a meaningful movie without holding him up as our representative? I can do it with my plumber and my kids' teachers and my doctor. Why must we label anyone as "us" and "them?"

We can start by admitting that A) there is a huge difference between Roman Catholicism and legitimate, Bible-based Christianity and B) Gibson has never exhibited even a legitimate Roman Catholic lifestyle, let alone a Biblical Christian one and C) the reasons why Gibson and "The Passion of the Christ were so embraced by evangelical Protestants in spite of A) and B) were POLITICAL, not religious or theological. "The Passion of the Christ" was a religious right moment, not a Christian moment. So, the same conservative evangelical Protestants who have so much difficulty relating to and fellowshipping with black and Hispanic evangelical Protestants that have the same view of scripture but different culture and politics fell all over themselves to get behind a movie produced by a traditionalist Roman Catholics (meaning one who believes that Protestants are going to hell) whose script was more based on the "visions" of a mystic stigmatic 19th century nun (Catherine Emmerich) than on the Bible because it was the "religious right family values culture war" thing to do, especially since it fit right in with these same evangelicals' doing all that they could to prop up a George W. Bush who not only did a horrible job as president and commander in chief, but who believes that the Bible isn't literally true, that there are many paths to heaven and that Muslims and Christians worship the same God.

I give you credit for stepping up and addressing this issue. But I want to hear from the major evangelical leaders on not only Mel Gibson, but also their support for the Iraq War and George W. Bush.

How ironic that you are trying to make this a political discussion by denouncing people for making it a political discussion...

Let me explain. Of course the flogging was violent, but I take issue with Gibson's portrayal of the scourging. Pilate could order any of three levels of scourging. Because of his sympathy for Jesus, I believe he did not order the one portrayed in POTC, the worst one. Matthew and Mark both use a word for flogging that could indicate the lesser form. John uses a different word for scourging that some say can indicate the worst form, and yet the same word is in other places in the NT with no such indication. Luke, the careful Greek historian, uses only the general word for "discipline" (paideuo), not a specific term for flogging or scourging. In none of the gospel accounts is the flogging treated as a major part of the passion narrative. It is simply noted, with no description, and the narrative moves immediately to crucifixion. Luke's account doesn't even mention the flogging. Luke also records a significant and lucid address Jesus makes after the flogging, which is not likely if he had received the worst kind. Looking at the rest of the NT, there is no mention of the flogging in the narrative accounts in Acts, and none of the espistolary writers ever mentions the flogging (nor the often applied passage in Isaiah 52:14), so it was obviously not an important part of the passion narrative to them. Jesus' suffering was the cross, not the lash. Gibson's movie, in my opinion, falsely moves the nexus of Jesus' suffering to the flogging, and turns it into what I believe is a false depiction of torture. Yes it was violent, but not as portrayed by Gibson's warped and violent vision. I would just encourage you to think again about whether or not to believe Gibson's vision, or the plain reading of Scripture. I reserve the right to be wrong, and welcome correction, but not flogging.

What should Christians do with Mel Gibson? What a goofy question!

love them, feel compassion and acceptance. They sin not because they want to, but because they are inable to do any better.

The question that really got me was "So is Mell Gibson still 'ours'?"

He is still God's, how can we do less. Arguing philosophies, justice and anything else does not erase this. Our responsibility to each other does not change because of the behavior of our neighbors.

I may not want to claim him when he does these things that are really terrible, but I must if I am serious about following Christ.

And I must also recognize my own failings as I try to do right by my neighbors.

I often have to remind myself to simplify my outlook - Jesus told us the most important commandments were to love the Lord your God with all you heart, your mind and your soul and love your neighbor as yourself. If I start there, my path is clear even when I would rather take a shortcut.

VERY interesting article from Christopher Hitchens on the inanity and hate-filled rhetoric of Mel Gibson. It comes from his father's right-wing splinter group: http://www.slate.com/id/226093...

"What should Christians do with Mel Gibson?" The same thing we were told to do with Bill Clinton. Galatians 6:1 is one of many passages of Scripture that come to mind.

GOOD AFTER NOON ALL HOPE THAT ALL IS BLESSED AND WELL...AS I HAVE STATE SERVERAL TIME THAT GOD IS A GOD OF ORDER AND DECENT THESE ACTOR IN HOLLYWOOD ARE JUST AS HUMAN AS WE ALL ARE WE ALL HAVE MESSED UP AT ONE TIME OR ANOTHER I THINK THAT AT THE PRESENT TIME... THAT MEL GIBSON MADE THE PASSION OF CHRIST HIS HEART MIND BODY AND SOUL WAS IN THERE HE SENT A POWERFUL MESSAGE THOUGH OUT THE ENTIRE WORLD NOW LOOKING ON WHAT HE DID WHO ARE WE TO JUDGE AS WE ALL HAS BEEN PROVOKE BY ANOTHER HUMAN BEING THAT HAS TAKEN US OUT OF OUR CARTER OR OUT SIDE OF OUR SELVES EVEN IF YOU KEEP PICKING AT A DOG EVENTFULLY HE WILL STRIKE BACK AND COME OUT OF A CORNER ME MY SELF TRYING TO WALK UP RIGHT BEFORE THE LORD JUST TWO WEEKS AGO I WENT OFF ON SOME ONE AND IT WAS NOT GOOD... SO CAN I SAY THAT I'M NOT A FOLLOW OF CHRIST NO BECAUSE GOD DID SAY BE YE ANGRY BUT SIN NOT DID I DO WHAT MEL DID YES I DID I CRUSE THAT PERSON OUT DID I ASK FOR GIVENESS FROM GOD YES I DID CAUSE I KNOW THAT I SAID THOSE THING TO THAT PERSON IN ANGER AND SO DID MEL...BUT I WOULD SAY THIS WE ALL LIVE IN THE FLESH AND CERTAIN TIMES IN OUR LIFE WHEN WE ARE GOING THROUGH IT IS PRETTY HARD SOMETIMES TO CONTIAN OUR SELVES SOMETIMES WHEN WE ARE PUSH TO THE EDGE. I LOOK UPON HIM AS I WILL ALWAYS LOOK AT HIM HE IS A HUMAN BEING HE IS JUST RICH DO I BELIEVE THAT HE BELIEVE IN GOD LESS JUST BECAUSE HE FELL SHORT OF THE GLORY OF THE LORD...KNOW OF COURSE NOT HE JUST LIKE ME AND YOU ASK GOD FORGIVES... AND MOVE ON AS GOD FORGIVES US ALL.HE CAN'T GO BACK AND UNDO WHAT HAS ALREADY HAVE TAKEN PLACE BUT HE CAN MOVE ON AND TAKE CARE OF WHAT IS HIS IT IS A CHILD INVOLVE...AND HE CAN MAKE IT BETTER FOR HIS SELF AND HIS CHILD I WOULD SAY GOD BLESS HIM AND HIS EXGIRL FRIEND GOD WILL WORK IT OUT FOR BOTH OF THEIR PURPOSE...AN FOR ALL WHO LOVE THE LORD.

One important issue is whether Gibson bounces back from this latest meltdown, as he did following his 2006 arrest. That remains to be seen. If he does indeed rebound, it will be because enough Hollywood studios and agents still deem him bankable. And if the culture chooses to stil embrace him, by continuing to purchase tickets to his movies, that will mean the American public is entertainment-crazed enough to tolerate the type of drastic moral idiocy displayed by troubled and conflicted celebrities such as Gibson.

What will that say about the present-day culture and about Christian Theism's influence upon, and penetration of it?