Deliver Us From Evil

May 10, 2007

I have been a rottentomatoes user for a few years. I routinely scan their top movies list to, um, decide which movies to legally rent at blockbusters. The latest one is Deliver Us From Evil, a documentary about a very disturbed priest, a few of his many, many victims, and the uber-sick Church that continues to protect him. That’s all I’ll say about the film.
As for me, it rattled my cage and disturbed me quite profoundly. Although I was raised a “spiritual new-ager”, the Church loomed large in the life of my grandparents. My great-uncle Marcel, a jesuit priest, gave me my first communion at a family mass in the basement of my great-grandfather’s house in Trois-Riviere, Quebec. (My folks were in Mexico City at the time, where we lived, and had no idea this was going on. At least, that is how my memory serves it to me.) My now deceased grandpa was once in the seminary, but abruptly left it. It was said that he was a changed man after that. One can only wonder why, or what “life changing” event happened to him there…
My wife came in the room while I was watching the film, became interested and left as soon as her stomach curled. It took less than 4 minutes.
It’s stuck in my mind, in my throat. I’m just beginning to be able to shake it off.
Richard Schickel from TIME magazine wrote:

It cries from and for the hearts of victims and leaves its viewers moved, shattered, outraged. And impotent in the face of the ugliness visited on the souls of good and innocent people.

Unfortunately, there is no hyperbole here.