SERMON SERIES: THE CINEMATIC LENS

This September and October, Sabbatical Minister Rev. Dennis McCarty invites us on a  spiritual/intellectual adventure: a coordinated  examination of the ways popular culture can  express the human spirit and a society’s  hopes and fears. 

We will do this by dovetailing together the  following sermon series, along with a weekly, Tuesday evening “MUUVIE Night.” The series  of film workshops will begin Sept. 9, while the first themed service will take place Sept. 14.

Culture(s) Seen through a Cinematic Lens.  Each Sunday service and each Tuesday  evening film viewing will be a stand alone event. A person can attend as many or as few as seem intriguing. Sometimes a Sunday service will analyze and contextualize the next movie in that series, sometimes it will address a different, though related, topic.

Sunday, Sept. 14

Rev. Dennis McCarty will deliver the first of the five themed services  he is scheduled to share with us. The first topic relates to United States culture in general, and Unitarian Universalist culture in particular. What Is Epistemic Justice and Why Should We Care? (In other words, it can be hurtful if, for example, a trans person says, “A,” which is important to them, but a straight, cisgender person misunderstands and hears “B” because of  their own social conditioning.)  

Epistemology is the study of knowledge: what we know and how we learn it. But what  if we think we think we know something — that isn’t true? What if we assume something — without even realizing we’re assuming it?  (See the accompanying diagram.) Breaking  this complex-sounding topic down into real world terms, we can better turn our good  intentions into real-world practice. 

Sunday, Sept. 21

We will hold our annual Water Ingathering. Join Rev. Dennis, RE Director Christina Strong, and our Choir to formally kick off our church year.

Sunday, Sept. 28

Rev. Dennis will talk about  the first great screen epic, D.W. Griffith’s  racist 1915 film, The Birth of A Nation. Rev. Dennis suggests that, while times may change, human nature does not. Griffith did not consider himself at all racist, nor did the  white actors who worked with him. In Images of Racism Past, though, we examine the early twentieth century white supremacy culture this film expressed, along with the real white fragility lying behind it. These currents have always flowed, for far more than a hundred years. Very much a product of its time, Griffith’s movie resonated for decades after it was made. One of America’s most beloved films, Gone with the Wind, covered much of the same Civil War “lost cause” ground twenty-five years later. We need to know this history, because its tendrils still influence culture in our own time. That message may be unsettling, but be of  good cheer. The following Sunday will bring us inspiration: an encouraging demonstration of the resilient side of human nature.

Sunday, Oct. 5

Rev. Dennis will tell us about The Uplifting Movies of Oscar Micheaux. The open racism of early twentieth century American culture met its match in that era’s African American response. Because no matter how dire the oppression or  misfortune, the human spirit endures. 

Whether we’re talking about marginalized  ethnicities or any other cultural minority, we  need to remember that marginalized people  have always been far bigger than their marginalization. No one better embodies this than pioneering Black film director Oscar Michaeux. For thirty years, from The Homesteader in 1919 to The Betrayal in 1948, Michaeux’s so called “race movies” affirmed the Black spirit in the face of Jim Crow culture. 

Unknown outside the Black community in his own time, Micheaux’s movies remind us that the human spirit is at its most creative and resilient under the worst conditions—a good message for the present day. 

Sunday, Oct. 12

Rev. Dennis will discuss The Epic Struggle: Democracy versus Dictatorship. In our own difficult day, when our Democratic norms are under attack, it is natural to wonder whether the United States will go down our own road toward fascism. We are used to fighting totalitarianism on other shores, not on our own.  

But many a nation has trod that hard road  before us. One is the Republic of South  Korea, which has a tortured history. The Democratic South Korean government of  today had to rise from the ashes of invasion, occupation, and repeated oppressive  regimes. 

From 1979, when he seized power in a military coup, till 1988, when he finally  yielded to public pressure and allowed a  (somewhat) democratic election, dictator Chun Doo-hwan’s soldiers killed thousands of Korean citizens in his grab for power. Koreans are still coming to terms with this violent decade, including repeated attempts to metabolize it through examination in films and TV.  

Rev. Dennis will explain how Korea’s suffering has produced a rich film (and music) tradition, culminating in the K-drama and K-pop revolutions of our own time. But the immediate message, for us, is the preciousness of democracy, and how worthwhile the struggle is to preserve it. 

Sunday, Oct. 19

We will welcome the Halloween season with A Religious Look at Dracula. Bram Stoker's 1896 novel, Dracula,  (and the many movies it inspired) have become classics of the horror tradition. Yet vampire stories have changed a great deal from Stoker's era to ours: vampires have shape-shifted in ways far more profound than just changing into bats.  

Rev. Dennis McCarty's analysis will provide surprising insights into both the culture of  

Stoker's British Empire — but also of currents  in present-day American culture. It will make  for an enjoyable — and surprisingly relevant — look at more than a century of vampire evolution.