Winter Light

From 1961 to 1963, Ingmar Bergman released three films that have been called, retrospectively, the "Silence of God trilogy."  Last season, the Seattle Art Museum exhibited the first and third of those films, Through a Glass Darkly and The Silence, as part of a nine film Bergman series.  Last night, as a part of this year's series, we saw the middle film, Winter Light (1962).  It should be noted that the three stories are entirely different; they have only the theme of the "silence of God" arguably in common.

Winter Light opens in a Lutheran church in contemporary rural Sweden.  The pastor Tomas (Gunnar Bjornstrand), suffering from a cold, stands in front of a congregation of perhaps six or seven, offering the eucharistic liturgy.  The service, amazingly, occupies nearly one-fifth of the film.  

Pastor Tomas is unsmiling, as are the members of his congregation.   Communion is offered to each member of the congregation as they kneel at the communion rail.  Tomas recites the communion verse mechanically and methodically with each, as he offers them first the consecrated bread and then, on a second pass, the wine. 

The film is black and white.  Outside is snow. The church appears cold.  And so do the pastor and his small flock.

Following the service, we learn that one of the communicants, Marta (Ingrid Thulin), is both an atheist and a former mistress of Pastor Tomas.  It is clear from the outset that Marta still loves Tomas, and that Tomas can barely tolerate Marta's presence.

Another member of the congregation, Jonas, is suffering from depression.  His wife points out that Jonas has been in despair ever since reading that China has developed nuclear weapons and is threatening to use them on the West.  Tomas talks to Jonas in private; Jonas can't understand how a loving God could allow such a development.  Instead of offering him consolation, Tomas rambles on about his own experiences during the Spanish Civil War, when he suffered the same despair.  He often thinks, he comments, that life would make much more sense if God did not exist.  We would have no problem accepting evil, because that's all we would expect from our fellow men.  And death would be a release from life's horror.

Not surprisingly, immediately after leaving the church, Jonas commits suicide.  Tomas goes to the scene and, without offering any comments, helps move the body into an ambulance. 

In a moving scene, Tomas reads a letter from Marta -- filmed showing Marta facing the camera and speaking the lines -- in which she tells Tomas how much she loves him, acknowledges that he does not return her love, apologizes for bothering him, and hopes that things might change.  He meets her soon thereafter, and in a rather stunning monologue tells her how much he dislikes her and can barely tolerate her presence.  Marta accepts this rejection stoically.

He then asks her if she'd like to go with him to Jonas's house where he must break the news of the suicide to Jonas's wife.  She agrees.   He tells the wife the bad news, offering no consolation beyond polite condolences.  "I'm sure you did all you could for him," she replies. 

In a minor scene that I thought was telling, shortly before giving the wife the shocking news, Tomas talks briefly to one of Jonas's sons  He asks the boy, who is unfailingly polite, a number of formal, awkward, and intrusive questions about the boy's life.  The boy, petrified, responds briefly to each question.  The boy then meets Marta as he leaves.  She also questions him, but her casual questions display warmth and affection for the boy.  The boy talks happily with her.

Tomas still has an afternoon service to offer in a neighboring town.  He drives with Marta to the church.  No one shows up for the service but the organist and a sacristan.  They both suggest that the service be canceled, but Tomas rejects the idea.  The bells ring and the organ plays, and Marta, the atheist, falls on her knees and prays for Tomas.

Tomas faces the empty church, empty of all but Marta, and begins:  "Holy, holy, holy, Lord God of Hosts." The film ends.

Bergman once said that Through a Glass Darkly suggests that the question of God's existence is best answered by accepting that God is love.  In Winter Light, just one year later, he questions whether even love explains God.  Atheists have gleefully claimed that Winter Light proves that Bergman finally became an atheist.   But what Bergman himself said was merely that with Winter Light he had said all he had to say about the existence of God.   In later films, he would turn his attention to other matters.

In his films, Bergman asks questions.  He rarely provides definitive answers, or even opinions.

The absence of love -- or even of any significant human connection -- between Pastor Tomas and his flock is glaringly obvious, and this absence of human love is either a reflection or a cause of his lack of love for God and of his sense that God doesn't love him -- or even exist for him.   As he told Johan, life would be so much simpler if God did not exist.  God, to Tomas, is a distant Power, a being who makes difficult demands and who requires formal worship.  Even a communion service  when there is no one to receive communion.

As the sacristan in the afternoon church, a good natured friend, observes to Marta, it's surprising how little attention Tomas pays to Jesus himself.

By coincidence, the weekly email letter from my own church's pastor -- in which he ties together the week's gospel reading (the marriage at Cana) and the celebration of Martin Luther King Day -- touches on Tomas's anguish.

 Far too often in our world, people who profess themselves to be Christian distort the fullness of the gospel by turning Jesus into a lonely hero, who singularly understands and proclaims the salvation of God. In this vision, all others become not just subjects of Christ the King, but slaves and servants, who have no role in the proclamation or building of the Kingdom. It is all God’s work, and we are simply to pray for it to happen. But if Christ Jesus is the one true Son of God, he is not alone in the work of God, for we—as Jesus himself declares—are his friends, and as Paul notes, he is but the first of many sisters and brothers.

If this view is correct, God is not an alien and distant being -- a "spider" with unfathomable thoughts, as characters suggest in both Through the Glass Darkly and Winter Night -- but a father who calls his children to work together to build their world.  Rather than brooding alone in his sacristy, agonizing about God's nature and existence, Tomas might more wisely seek God by actual communion -- not just sacramental communion -- with his parishioners. He himself might become a loving pastor to his flock -- a friend and brother -- rather than a "spider" figure of authority himself.    Christianity

reminds us of the power of lived prayer to move a God who has willingly become subject to our need, subject to our call; it reminds us that each act of ministry, each moment when we allow the Spirit to move through us, begins a chain of ministry, in which others are likewise invited to take up their own roles of service and celebration.

Marta, alone in the pews praying to a God in whom she doesn't believe, praying for Tomas, full of love not only for Tomas but for others, instinctively understands Pastor Tomas's Christian faith better than he does himself.

Perhaps Marta offers us the potential for a happy ending -- the hope that her unbelieving prayers might, somewhat ironically, be granted and Tomas be saved from himself.

(A rather heavy blog post, but Bergman will do that to you.)