A documentary linking the child sex abuse scandal that has rocked the U.S. Catholic Church to mandatory celibacy among its clergy airs on HBO on Monday and has drawn fire from church officials.
Disturbing images such as a roomful of skulls in a desert cave inhabited by early Christians, modern-day self-whippings and reenactments of crucifixion punctuate "Celibacy," by British filmmaker Antony Thomas. The film examines the religious roots of celibacy and explores connections to the recent church controversy.
A review from the Catholic News Service (CNS), written by David DiCerto, called the film "a polemic against the Catholic Church's entire sexual ethos."
Thomas says he was just trying to answer questions raised by the spate of sex abuse scandals that has seen the Church pay an estimated $1 billion in legal settlements so far.
"Why celibacy? Why do people accept it? What are its effects?" Thomas, who wrote, directed, produced and narrated the documentary, said in an interview. "I felt I had to make this film for my own education."
Filmed in 10 countries, it features interviews with current and former priests as well as historians, scientists and psychologists while examining the primal power of the sex drive and the arrested social-sexual development of priests.
Adult survivors of childhood sexual abuse are interviewed as are a pedophile priest who resorted to surgical castration when his sexual urges did not abate after he joined the priesthood, and a former parish priest and Franciscan nun who left the church to marry and raise a family together.
The film also looks at sexual abstinence in major eastern religions, where celibacy is often aspired to but not mandated as it is by Catholics. It includes a graphic scene in which a member of a Hindu sect wraps his penis around a stick and contorts himself to show the supremacy of the spirit.
But the film soon leaves the general arena of survey to focus on the Catholic Church.
The CNS review jabbed the documentary for "trotting out the hoary chestnuts about the Church's thinking that sex is, at best, a necessary evil."
"The Church does not deny that certain members of the clergy have committed heinous crimes resulting in immeasurable harm by their betraying the trust of those they were sent to serve," it said. "But the show's oversimplified prognosis, which recommends ending celibacy as a panacea to the ills facing the Church is hardly convincing."
Thomas, once an observant Anglican, said that despite the critical tone of his film, he felt his own faith in the clergy was restored following his experience filming evangelical Christian faith healers for a previous documentary called, "A Question of Miracles."
"'Celibacy' may be highly critical of the establishment, but it was very reassuring to meet real men of God," he said.
"I just hope it will open debate," Thomas said. "I hope the reaction of Catholics will not be 'Oh, this is an anti-Catholic film.' It is something we've done, if you like, with strong feelings of love, and strong concerns about something that is unnecessarily damaging the church."