Truly, I tell you, no sign will be given". Mark 8:12.
I watched a fascinating analysis this morning of one of my favorite movies. Taking several of the major themes and ideas of Villenueuve's epic venture, it seeks to examine what the tale says about ourselves - the way we seek to discover what we are in a world in which we can often feel divorced from what makes life meaningful and our existence worthwhile. Whilst the quest is true for each of us, the longing for that which is distinctively, immortally "us", notes the analysis, is a mistake, an internalizing of worth (fabricating a soul) which leads us, like agent K in the film, into foolishly believing notions about himself which were delusional and distractive, so apparently without worth of pursuit.
Like some pack of zealous assassins, the religious men of twenty centuries ago hounded Christ for something they could quantify and define so they could settle Him into their entrenched mental landscape and thereby revert to their business as usual routine. They called for an evidence to satisfy this requirement because they failed to see what was before them and what that meant to the entire world.
In Blade Runner 2049, K's first "conversation" is with another replicant, Morton, who he deems to be inferior because he is an older model. K's entire clarity in his actions ('retiring' Morton) derives from his ordered perception of what is - any referencing of something greater in respect to himself or other replicants was folly, so he certainly cannot, at this stage, "hear" Morton's reference to a miracle, and yet, what then proceeds to unfold, both in respect to his miss-understanding and the truth, will derive from this one cardinal truth - that a miracle has happened.
Jesus pointedly asks the "religious" mind why it would expect the truly spiritual to conform to its requirements - to just be something such a mind can unpeel and dissect. Like K in that first encounter, such believe they have the tools to unlock what counts, to be and do what is valid, but the lock on their blindness is secure. No sign, no miracle would ever be enough, for they cannot see, as the word is spoken, the action has already been performed - the reality is already, truly there.
The prison must be seen for what it is.
In the film, what is dead and lifeless (Rachel's bones) becomes the key to what is new and vital - the hope of a new humanity.
Jesus tells His disciples to avoid the 'leaven' of the religious - those who can never perceive what counts, and our generation is certainly a time that needs to mark that warning.
In the film, K is finally able to look beyond his own illusions and delusions regarding what counts, and to give himself wholly to safeguarding the people who will take the redemptive nature of what is happening forward.
Christianity is about that very same truth - that the life and death of another is not only the true 'sign' of what must define us, but the true gift that provides that miracle.
This season provides us with two options -
Christ's sigh at the Pharisees inability to recognize what has happened, or God's sign in the incarnation.
May we not be blind to what truly counts.
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