MARY ALICE WILLIAMS: Hollywood's cyclical discovery that religion sells is yielding a millennial bumper crop of films meant to push our belief buttons. Most are too violent or raunchy to dodge an R rating, but one airing on NBC gets a B for bravery. MARY, MOTHER OF JESUS puts flesh and a distinctly feminist face on an extraordinary woman largely neglected in the Bible. Martha Bayles reports.(Excerpt from MARY, MOTHER OF JESUS courtesy NBC)
MARTHA BAYLES: MARY, MOTHER OF JESUS is a film about a mother's love for her son. Strong, deep, and beautifully done; the two people most responsible for this film are also a mother and son: Eunice Kennedy Shriver and her son Bobby. To this particular mother, Mary is a woman of all seasons, including our own.
Ms. EUNICE KENNEDY SHRIVER: I think the most important thing to remember is, first of all, that she was a mother and she was a teacher, and she raised her son for 30 years in private before he became a public figure.(Excerpt from MARY, MOTHER OF JESUS)
BAYLES: Today, many see mothering in the context of feminism. Here is a scene that appears in all four Gospels, Jesus being baptized by John the Baptist.
(Excerpt from MARY, MOTHER OF JESUS)
Her perpetual virginity, her immaculate conception, her ascension into heaven -- these are beliefs that evolved over time. In the same spirit of evolution, many Christians today cast Mary as a spiritual leader in her own right, not just the model of female perfection but an active disciple, a teacher.
