Constantine's Sword (film)
Encyclopedia
Documentary film
Documentary films constitute a broad category of nonfictional motion pictures intended to document some aspect of reality, primarily for the purposes of instruction or maintaining a historical record...
on the relationship between the Catholic Church and Jews. Directed and produced by Oscar-nominated filmmaker Oren Jacoby
Oren Jacoby
Oren Jacoby is a director and producer of documentary films, including Constantine's Sword , "Sister Rose's Passion" , The Shakespeare Sessions , Stage on Screen: The Topdog Diaries , The Beatles Revolution , and Sam Shepard: Stalking Himself...
, the film is inspired by former priest James P. Carroll
James P. Carroll
James Carroll is a noted author, historian and journalist and Roman Catholic dissident.-Youth, education, and service as a priest:...
's 2001 book Constantine's Sword
Constantine's Sword
Constantine's Sword: The Church and the Jews - A History is a book by James Carroll, a former priest, which documents the role of the Roman Catholic Church in the long European history of anti-Semitism...
.
Synopsis
The title page of this film shows the shadow of a cross, with "No war is holy" written across the transeptTransept
For the periodical go to The Transept.A transept is a transverse section, of any building, which lies across the main body of the building. In Christian churches, a transept is an area set crosswise to the nave in a cruciform building in Romanesque and Gothic Christian church architecture...
. Constantine’s Sword is the story of James P. Carroll
James P. Carroll
James Carroll is a noted author, historian and journalist and Roman Catholic dissident.-Youth, education, and service as a priest:...
's journey to uncover the roots of war. Carroll, a former Catholic priest
Priest
A priest is a person authorized to perform the sacred rites of a religion, especially as a mediatory agent between humans and deities. They also have the authority or power to administer religious rites; in particular, rites of sacrifice to, and propitiation of, a deity or deities...
whose father (Joseph Carroll
Joseph Carroll
Lieutenant General Joseph Francis Carroll was the founding director of the Defense Intelligence Agency , and founding director of the Air Force Office of Special Investigations .-Youth & Education:...
) was a famous Air Force general, implies that there has been a relationship between religiously inspired violence and war, beginning with the adoption of Christianity by the Roman Emperor Constantine I
Constantine I
Constantine the Great , also known as Constantine I or Saint Constantine, was Roman Emperor from 306 to 337. Well known for being the first Roman emperor to convert to Christianity, Constantine and co-Emperor Licinius issued the Edict of Milan in 313, which proclaimed religious tolerance of all...
in 312 AD. Constantine was convinced that he had won a battle because he had followed the instructions of a vision, to inscribe a sign of the cross (the Labarum
Labarum
The labarum was a vexillum that displayed the "Chi-Rho" symbol ☧, formed from the first two Greek letters of the word "Christ" — Chi and Rho . It was used by the Roman emperor Constantine I...
) on the shields of his soldiers. In Carroll's view, this event marked the beginning of an unholy alliance between the military and the Church.
Carroll focuses on Catholic and evangelical
Evangelicalism
Evangelicalism is a Protestant Christian movement which began in Great Britain in the 1730s and gained popularity in the United States during the series of Great Awakenings of the 18th and 19th century.Its key commitments are:...
anti-Judaism
Anti-Judaism
Religious antisemitism is a form of antisemitism, which is the prejudice against, or hostility toward, the Jewish people based on hostility to Judaism and to Jews as a religious group...
, and invokes the cross as a symbol of the long history of Christian xenophobic violence against Jews and non-Christians, from the Crusades
Crusades
The Crusades were a series of religious wars, blessed by the Pope and the Catholic Church with the main goal of restoring Christian access to the holy places in and near Jerusalem...
, through the Roman Inquisition
Roman Inquisition
The Roman Inquisition was a system of tribunals developed by the Holy See during the second half of the 16th century, responsible for prosecuting individuals accused of a wide array of crimes related to heresy, including Protestantism, sorcery, immorality, blasphemy, Judaizing and witchcraft, as...
and the creation of the Jewish ghetto
Roman Ghetto
The Roman Ghetto was a ghetto located in the rione Sant'Angelo, in Rome, Italy, in the area surrounded by today's Via del Portico d'Ottavia, Lungotevere dei Cenci, Via del Progresso and Via di Santa Maria del Pianto close to the Tiber and the Theater of Marcellus...
, to the Holocaust. Carroll also charges that there is an ongoing evangelical infiltration of the U.S. military, and that this has had negative consequences for U.S. foreign policy. The film's final chapter, "No war is holy", concludes with views of military cemeteries as Aaron Neville
Aaron Neville
Aaron Neville is an American soul and R&B singer and musician. He has had four top-20 hits in the United States along with four platinum-certified albums...
sings "With God On Our Side
With God on Our Side
"With God on Our Side" is a song by Bob Dylan, released as the third track on his 1964 album The Times They Are A-Changin. Dylan first performed the song during his debut at The Town Hall in New York City on April 12, 1963...
".
Technical details
- 95 minutes
- Languages in film: EnglishEnglish languageEnglish is a West Germanic language that arose in the Anglo-Saxon kingdoms of England and spread into what was to become south-east Scotland under the influence of the Anglian medieval kingdom of Northumbria...
, GermanGerman languageGerman is a West Germanic language, related to and classified alongside English and Dutch. With an estimated 90 – 98 million native speakers, German is one of the world's major languages and is the most widely-spoken first language in the European Union....
, ItalianItalian languageItalian is a Romance language spoken mainly in Europe: Italy, Switzerland, San Marino, Vatican City, by minorities in Malta, Monaco, Croatia, Slovenia, France, Libya, Eritrea, and Somalia, and by immigrant communities in the Americas and Australia...
and Yiddish - Cast/Featuring: Liev SchreiberLiev SchreiberIsaac Liev Schreiber , commonly known as Liev Schreiber, is an American actor, producer, director, and screenwriter. He became known during the late 1990s and early 2000s, having initially appeared in several independent films, and later mainstream Hollywood films, including the Scream trilogy of...
, pastor Ted HaggardTed HaggardTed Arthur Haggard is an American evangelical pastor. Known as Pastor Ted to the congregation he served, he was the founder and former pastor of the New Life Church in Colorado Springs, Colorado; a founder of the Association of Life-Giving Churches; and was leader of the National Association of...
, Phillip Bosco, Natasha RichardsonNatasha RichardsonNatasha Jane Richardson was an English actress of stage and screen. A member of the Redgrave family, she was the daughter of actress Vanessa Redgrave and director/producer Tony Richardson and the granddaughter of Michael Redgrave and Rachel Kempson...
, Eli WallachEli WallachEli Herschel Wallach is an American film, television and stage actor, who gained fame in the late 1950s. For his performance in Baby Doll he won a BAFTA Award for Best Newcomer and a Golden Globe nomination. One of his most famous roles is that of Tuco in The Good, the Bad and the Ugly... - Director: Oren JacobyOren JacobyOren Jacoby is a director and producer of documentary films, including Constantine's Sword , "Sister Rose's Passion" , The Shakespeare Sessions , Stage on Screen: The Topdog Diaries , The Beatles Revolution , and Sam Shepard: Stalking Himself...
- Producers: Oren Jacoby, James Carroll, Michael Solomon, Betsy West.
- Supervising producer: Elgin Smith
- Screenwriters: James Carroll, Oren Jacoby
- Production company: Storyville Films
- Studio: First Run FeaturesFirst Run FeaturesFirst Run Features is an independent film distribution company based in New York City. First Run was founded in 1979 by a group of filmmakers in order to advance the distribution of independent film...
External links
- Film's website
- Recommendation by Tikkun magazine
- At Rotten Tomatoes
- Link to production company
- James Carroll's Unholy Crusade: A Critique of the Film Constantine's Sword from First ThingsFirst ThingsFirst Things is an ecumenical journal focused on creating a "religiously informed public philosophy for the ordering of society". The journal is inter-denominational and inter-religious, representing a broad intellectual tradition of Christian and Jewish critique of contemporary society...
- Voices on Antisemitism Interview with James Carroll from the United States Holocaust Memorial Museum