It is a dramatic scene and central to the story of the film Conclave. The story begins with the recent passing of the Pope, and in this scene Cardinal Lawrence (played by Ralph Fiennes) prepares the College of Cardinals - gathered from around the world - to enter into sequestered "conclave" and choose the next Pope. He addresses them saying:
There is one sin I have come to fear above all others: certainity. Certainity is the great enemy of unity. Certainity is the deadly enemy of tolerance. Even Christ was not certain at the end - My God, My God, why have you forsaken me? He cried out in His agony at the ninth hour on the cross.
Our faith is a living thing precisly because it walks hand in hand with doubt. If there was only certainty and no doubt, there would be no mystery and therefore no need for faith. Let us pray that God will grant us a Pope who doubts.
CLICK HERE to see the entire speech. The portion I quote begins around :45.
As I listened, I wanted to leap through our TV into the scene, rise and ask the Cardinal: How can you be certain that certainity is the sin to fear above all others? I doubt your certainity on this, sir! Here I stand!
Even in the moment it struck me that this was a great statement of the creed of expressive individualism: Nothing can be certain except your self! A real moment of modern of chatechism right there in theaters and living rooms around the country.
But is this really a statement of faith - for it is indeed a step of faith to say with certainity that certainty is the greatest of sins! - that makes sense of the world, leading to human flourishing? This is an important question for both myself and my unbelieving neighbors.
I graduated from an outstanding, nationally-ranked, church-related college. The institution did a phenomenal job helping students deconstruct their "Sunday-school beliefs." Many professors were outspokenly direct about that goal, and all were very capable and effective in their teaching. Sadly, once our faith was deconstructed, they were rarely concerned with grounding us in a more mature Christian faith and were instead more subtle and effective in catechizing us in various expressions of what I have come to identify as "expressive individualism." As I write elsewhere - CLICK HERE - I do not think expressive individualism is faithful either to the Gospel of God's Grace or to human flourishing even for unbelievers.
NUANCE ALERT - I do think that orthodox Christian faith gives us a reason to see the sin that often presents itself as certainity. If I thought the Cardinal were pointing to this in his speech, I'd be all in with him.
Here is the problem that the Scriptures and our experience point out to us: When broken people - "sinners" is the classic term - are "certain" in themselves, their sin infects their certainity. A statement can be "true" in terms of "facts," but be pursued self-righteously. Or self-defensively. Or self-servingly. THAT is sin. Make note: when anything is centered on or from the "self" it can be infected by the sin of our "self." There is the problem that the Cardinal is close to, but pursued more deeply and in light of the Gospel. It is one of the insights into the humman condition presented in the Scriptures.
Let me suggest that the better posture for life is to have confidence - trust, faith, belief - in someone or something greater than ourselves and even our own certainity. It seems that this is exactly how Paul writes in Philippians 1:6:
(I am) being confident of this, that he who began a good work in you will carry it on to completion until the day of Christ Jesus.
Live with confidence - trust, faith, belief - in who the LORD is, what He has shown of us Himself and what He can do.
Experience - and the Holy Spirit speaking in the Scriptures and my church - has shown me that I can sometimes be wrong or unloving or confused or MANY other things like that - even when I am well-intentioned and carefully researched! I am certain that I make mistakes, but confident that the One who is faithful, loving and true will complete His good purposes in His world and even in me.
I would suggest that the life-giving world-view comes when faith in God as He has revealed Himself in the Gospel is walking hand-in-hand with humility, rather than faith in self navigating life with doubt.
I HIGHLY RECOMMEND you CLICK HERE to read Value Confidence over Certainty by Randy Newman on TheGospelCoalition.org site. You will see that the best of what I might say here originated with him and was simply applied to the movie. His post includes several other and important steps illuminating the distinction between certainity and gospel confidence.
And Finally: I watched the movie and know it may well win an Oscar or two, but I'm not sure I would recommend it. Save the money. Invest time in your marriage, or with a friend or reading Scripture or just taking a walk. I watch, listen and read things like this to better understand the world that I present the gospel to and what my neighbors are encountering, so it is helpful for me - and I hope you - in that way. I'm not certain - pun intended - that you learn anything not alread known about the Roman Catholic church. The surprise ending was gratituitous. And the catechesis in "expressive individualism" was as subtle as it was thick throughout.
