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| Jeremy Ambrose wants to shoot through Lent |
Jeremy Ambrose must go to the same dentist as Shane Warne. As he launches into his cameo performance as the John Wayne of theology his glistening white teeth shine and gleam with the confidence of a Colgate model.
However as I watched this promo for Lent from ACU Campus Ministry the shine and gleam were tarnished by a message that can only be described as tacky. Jeremy almost gushes his way across the screen with a dramatic costume change which seems to include a pair of R.M.Willaims boots.
Despite the toy gun that he flouts Jeremy attempts to draw along bow of connection between this theology and the Western "genre", a word he manages to repeat five times within a minute.
If only Jeremy has taken some time to be still with one of our spiritual elders such as Dr Miriam-Rose Ungunmerr and taken us into the Australian desert experience of Dadirri for Lent
Jeremy had his costume on and wants us to share his passion for Western movies during Lent. No need to fast, pray or worry about Project Compassion. As he launched into "the journey of mans' self discovery" I had a feeling that the hyperbole would expose a few cultural hiccups.
In true Hollywood style the images that Jeremy chose wiped out any reference to the First Nations peoples who occupied the land before John Wayne arrived.
Jeremy introduces his three motifs for this "Western" journey into Lent. First motif is that of trains. According to Jeremy the arrival of trains in the West "denotes the coming of civilization and the changing of values". Whoops. not exactly good cultural awareness there Jeremy. And a case could be made for the ambiguity of those values that were changed. And somehow the connection between trains and the history of slaves fell off the script.
The next motif is a clanger: the posse!!!Against a backdrop of violent images of men shooting each other Jeremy invites us to "Kill the pose of vices". Not sure where grace fits in this picture but there are no women anywhere in sight either.
I got a bit over-excited when Jeremy announced the third motif of water. I was silly enough to imagine this would be a reference to Laudato Si and care for our common home. No, it was just another plug for Clint Eastwood to stir the testosterone of viewers.
Somewhere in his background it seems that Jeremy taught theology at Notre Dame so being a good teacher he provides a viewing list of suggested Westerns to watch over the 40 days. Thanks for the suggestions Jeremy but I might pass on the Western theme this Lent. I feel it would be like going through the desert with the horse with no name.
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