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Oscar season starts with a fizzle: ‘Conclave’ messes up Christian doctrine (review)

Ralph Fiennes in movie 'Conclave' (2024)
Ralph Fiennes in movie "Conclave" (2024) | Photo from FilmNation Entertainment, House Productions

“Conclave” has strong talent both behind and in front of the camera. Above and beyond that, I personally enjoyed the movie. Even with its slow, deliberate pace, I found myself riveted as the plot introduced one complication after another. When I checked the time elapsed and discovered we were already 40 minutes in, I felt like it had only been 20 (at most).

There are, however, some serious problems with the movie. For our purposes, I wish to zero in on one flaw in particular — a theological one.

Certainty vs. doubt

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As the conclave begins, the main protagonist, Cardinal Thomas Lawrence (Ralph Fiennes), who himself is experiencing a crisis of faith, gives a homily to the assembled cardinals. The last part of the speech goes like this:

“In the course of a long life in the service of our Mother the Church, let me tell you that there is one sin I have come to fear above all others. Certainty. Certainty is the great enemy of unity. Certainty is the deadly enemy of tolerance ... Our faith is a living thing precisely because it walks hand in hand with doubt. If there was only certainty, and if there was 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. Let Him grant us a Pope who sins and asks for forgiveness. And carries on.”

Not everything Lawrence says here is wrong. For instance, his closing line about the church needing a leader who doesn’t pretend he’s above sinning — but who rather seeks forgiveness when he sins and moves on — is absolutely true. In fact, it reminds me of a quote from Martin Luther:

“God does not save those who are only imaginary sinners. Be a sinner, and let your sins be strong [or sin boldly], but let your trust in Christ be stronger, and rejoice in Christ who is the victor over sin, death, and the world.”

The grave error Lawrence makes (and which the movie itself makes as a whole) is treating certainty as the church’s enemy and doubt as its ally. The former, Lawrence says, should be rejected, and the latter embraced. Certainty is a sickness and doubt is the cure.

It is true that a Christian’s posture toward one who doubts should not be judgmental and condemning, but patient and gentle: “And have mercy on those who doubt” (Jude 1:22). As Paul wrote, “And we urge you, brothers … encourage the fainthearted, help the weak, be patient with them all” (1 Thess. 5:14). God’s posture toward those weak in faith is not to beat them over the head, but rather to quiet and encourage them with his love.

As others have noted, “Rather than welcome those with questions, the Church sometimes ostracizes them for fear that such mindsets will spread — an act that ironically keeps people away from the very community that they may need.”

Yes, and amen. There is a big difference, however, between showing mercy to the doubtful and valorizing doubt. Biblical authorities like Paul and James — and Jesus himself — view doubt as a vice, not a virtue (Rom. 14:23; Jas. 1:6; Luke 24:38).             

The Scriptural maxim is not, “The righteous shall live by doubt,” but rather, “The righteous shall live by faith” (Rom. 1:17; Gal. 3:11; Heb. 10:38). And contrary to what Lawrence says in his homily, faith intrinsically involves certainty: “Now faith is the certainty of things hoped for, a proof of things not seen” (Heb. 11:1, NASB).

Misplaced humility

Pope Francis once made this statement: “The great leaders of the people of God, like Moses, have always left room for doubt. You must leave room for the Lord, not for our certainties; we must be humble.”

Like Lawrence’s speech in “Conclave,” Francis’ statement is a mixed bag of truth and error. The call for humility is legitimate; after all, no human being is omniscient. Humility, however, isn’t ultimately revealed through doubt, but through certainty. G. K. Chesterton explains:

“[W]hat we suffer from today is humility in the wrong place. Modesty has moved from the organ of ambition. Modesty has settled upon the organ of conviction; where it was never meant to be. A man was meant to be doubtful about himself, but undoubting about the truth; this has been exactly reversed. Nowadays the part of a man that a man does assert is exactly the part he ought not to assert — himself. The part he doubts is exactly the part he ought not to doubt — the Divine Reason.”

The reason why doubt has become something of a sacred cow in our society is that it has moved from an inward posture (legitimately questioning our own ambitions) to an outward posture (illegitimately questioning absolute truth). Such doubt allows us to give a show of humility while still clinging to our own finite (and prideful) perspectives. Doubt in ambition has shifted to doubt in conviction — and it works against the very humility we say we aspire to.

Certainty dressed as doubt

Valorizing doubt is selective (at best) and two-faced (at worst). It is selective in that none of us truly believes that doubt and uncertainty should be the default position to life in general. My friend Steven D. Greydanus, a film critic and Catholic Deacon, makes this astute observation:

“[F]ew of us go through the day troubled by radical skepticism about the world as it presents itself to our senses and our intellect. We don’t open our eyes in the morning and wonder, “Am I really opening my eyes, or is a computer telling my brain that I’m opening my eyes?” We don’t look into the eyes of our family members or friends or strangers on the street and second-guess their personhood, or think about what happened yesterday and wonder if those memories are artificial. Rightly so! We couldn’t live our lives if we allowed ourselves to be paralyzed by uncertainty over whether anything we sense or remember is real.”

Functionally speaking, there are very few who truly valorize doubt in the abstract. The only doubt they truly champion is doubt about that which they already disagree. That’s just certainty in doubt’s clothing, pride masquerading as humility. And it is these deceptive vestments which “Conclave” wears, as noted by film critic Joseph Holmes:

“The film never has a moment’s doubt that the ‘liberal’ Catholics who want to loosen rules around women’s roles and homosexuality are the good guys and that the conservative Catholics if given the chance would hurl the church back to “the stone age”...

The film portrays liberal Catholics as bad only when they violate their standards (such as engaging in bribery), yet conservative Catholics are consistently portrayed as bad when they stand up for theirs. This lets the air out of much of the story’s drama. Because the film never shows the “conservative” side, those struggling to retain the old ways, as being sympathetic in any way, we never get to see Lawrence struggle with the rightness of his own position. Ironically, he never doubts himself.”

It is indeed ironic. Clinging to one’s doubts, in the words of the late Tim Keller, means failing to “discern the alternate belief under each of your doubts and then to ask yourself what reasons you have for believing it ... In fairness you must doubt your doubts” (The Reason for God, p. xviii).

Doubt as a self-defeating weapon

The film’s promotion of doubt is, as I said, only one of its flaws. For all of its suspenseful buildup, the third act releases the tension rather blandly. And a final revelation at the story’s closing reminded me a bit of God’s Not Dead — something dramatic happens at the very end, designed to be a mic drop moment, when in actuality it’s a cheap trick that fails to stand under any kind of scrutiny. Even avowed agnostic film critic James Berardinelli calls it “far-fetched and even a little silly.”

All that being the case, why did I enjoy “Conclave” so much? Probably because I studied some spoilers beforehand. Otherwise, I likely would have been shocked and offended. As it was, and similar to Darren Aronofsky’s Noah (which I researched heavily before watching), I was able to enjoy the proceedings without being blindsided. In fact, I enjoyed the movie so much that I plan on a repeat viewing.

Even so, I still recognize that “Conclave’s” valorization of doubt is both selective (it is aimed in only one direction) and two-faced (failing to apply it to itself). As captivating as a piece of cinema that it is, it’s a pity that it stumbles so egregiously as a piece of cultural and religious commentary. It refuses to treat doubt as a disease worthy of gentle and compassionate care and instead validates it as a cardinal virtue worthy of esteem and accolades. The former would have been truly Christlike; the latter is … well, more like a certain Edenic serpent.

Cap Stewart is the author of the curriculum Personal Purity Isn’t Enough: The Long-Forgotten Secret to Making Scriptural Entertainment Choices. As a cultural commentator, he has contributed to Cultural Engagement: A Crash Course in Contemporary Issues (Zondervan Academic, 2019), among other print and online publications. He writes at Unpop Culture.

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