10 /10

A documentary is only as good as its subject matter, and Mea Maxima Culpa: Silence in the House of God is a phenomenal examination and magnification of sexual abuse in the Catholic church, specifically at the St. John's School for the Deaf in Milwaukee, Wisconsin. The film interviews four deaf adults who claim to be molested by Father Lawrence Murphy when they were young, and continued to be molested until they graduated high school. They've kept quiet until now, apparently.



When Terry Kohut, Gary Smith, Pat Kuehn, and Arthur Budzinski first arrived at St. John's, they marveled at the delicate, castle-like infrastructure and beautiful statues of Jesus Christ that stood proudly in the yard. They met the likes of several schoolboys their same age, made friendships, became close to the nuns, and even enjoyed the company of their priest, Father Lawrence Murphy. The men reflect on how they strove to meet Murphy's standards and tried ever so hard not to disappoint or upset him.



Then the unthinkable happened; all four men, at separate times, were lured into Murphy's office and were told to either unclothe themselves or pleasure themselves in the presence of Murphy himself. The boys cooperated, as good Catholic children so often do, and immediately knew something wasn't right. Later on, they saw him molesting other boys, entering their bedrooms at all hours of the night and molesting them while they lay in bed. We're told that Murphy specifically singled out kids whose parents couldn't sign so they couldn't communicate with them and tell them what happened. Many of the children, when they received visitors from family, had to communicate through Murphy, so no word was ever even spoken about it.



Even when the children sucked up the gumption to tell their parents, they didn't listen. Many thought of priests/popes as aesthetically and morally "perfect." They were the men of the Lord and how could they dare commit the atrocity that is child molestation? This went on for many years, as Murphy continued to molest deaf children and those already ill-equipped of formal communication. The boys had to find ways to tell people on the outside the horrors that went on in St. John's and actually made "Wanted" posters for Father Murphy, urging he was a "serial child molester" and needed to be stopped. Such courage from children should be admired, not silenced.



After about fifty minutes of exploring the horrors in St. John's, director Alex Gibney shifts the focus to molestation and sexual abuse in The Vatican, and how the broken laws of the monumental church say that a priest convicted of molestation must be removed from his site, "rehabilitated," then sent back into another community perhaps having not learned a single thing. It explores how Pope John Paul II and Pope Benedict XVI's involvement with the questions raised about priest molestation and how the legislation should be adjusted or kept the same.



The facts brought forth in Mea Maxima Culpa (which, in English, means "My most grievous fault") are appalling and disturbing. It was news to me that after being convicted of molestation, Cardinal Bernard Law was sent to another division of The Vatican, where he resided in a luxurious and illuminating palace. Is this what we show people what happens when you harm and endanger children? Even commentary on the issues by Popes shows they are more concerned about the well-being of the priests than the actual victims of the tragedy. The first statement they make is how they are horribly ashamed of the man committing the atrocities, rather than the young, corrupted youth who were on the receiving end. It becomes depressingly clear that they are more concerned about the church's name and well-being than the thousands affected by this.



Alex Gibney, who also narrates the picture, is one of the smartest and most prolific documentarians working today. His Oscar-winning feature, Taxi to the Dark Side, exposed the Bush administration's acts of torture in the ongoing "War on Terror." His film The Last Gladiators details the lives of hockey enforcers that put their life and safety on the line in order to protect the team as a whole. His newest feature, We Steal Secrets: The Story of WikiLeaks, magnifies the controversial event of Julian Assange's website that is known for leaking confidential documents of the U.S. Government. Gibney is not just a brave soul, but one that does the job Frederick Wiseman would continue to do if he was younger. That job is exposing shady institutions and reading between the headlines in order to formulate a compelling feature. He is one of the smartest - if not, the smartest - documentary filmmaker in the business today.



Lisa Rinzler's cinematography is akin to that of a horror movie revolving around the church and The Vatican. Reenactments of events are always shown in shadow, with a disturbingly bleak layer of black covering most of the screen, the interviews with the four men are conducted behind a pitch black backdrop, with light shining on their torso-area in one of the most stylistic approaches to an interview I've ever seen. The whole film has an eerie vibe, especially for a documentary about something as allegedly innocent as the church. From a stylistic/aesthetic standpoint, the picture is beautiful in its depiction of the terrible.



If anything, we can say that we as a society have greatly moved past the senseless, empty-headed "godlike" worship of priests and popes, and are aware that many priests' actions have led to children having incomprehensible problems and lasting trauma due to sexual abuse and torment. Mea Maxima Culpa may inspire sickness, outrage, hatred, and condemnation towards the Catholic Church in The Vatican but, most importantly, now we know more about this issue and we must try to repair it. All it took were a countless amount of unfortunate children and a brazen documentary.