Today is one of those days when I half-heartedly wish I were back in Norway. Norwegians have today off because it is second day of Easter. You see, Norwegians have 5 weeks of vacation and most major Christian holidays off. During Easter you can have 9 consecutive days off by using three days of your vacation time. Sounds good doesn’t it?

Like most Christian holidays, Norwegians have a tendency to turn them into pagan celebrations of nature and light. Easter is the time of the year where Norwegians goes on vacation to get some sun after a long dark winter. Some will head for the mountains to enjoy skiing before the snow goes away. Some will head to the summerhouses by the sea to prepare them for summer. The rest spend a quiet week in the cities or goes south to the Mediterranean to kick-start their tans. The one thing all the alternatives have in common is that you are outside basking in the sun.

Norway’s relationship to religion must be considered schizophrenic at best. We have a government Protestant-Lutheran church sanctioned by the constitution. Most Norwegians does not consider themselves religious, but a majority will turn to the church for major rites of passage. Few of them will regularly attend church outside of attending weddings, baptisms, confirmations or funerals. Religious arguments are considered uncouth in the public discourse.

The Passion of the Christ premiered in Norway one week before Easter week. The movie has been dubbed “The Jesus-movie” in the vernacular lingo and it has received mixed reactions in the press. Regardless of the controversy, it became number one in the box office with 21.119 tickets sold its opening weekend. Some smaller community-cinemas have scrambled to get copies of the film by popular demand. The copies are few and far between; their first showing might be as late as the end of May.

The protestant bishops are split in their view of the movie. Bishop Stålsett said the violence was sickening and speculative. He did not recommend the movie at all and claimed it made him physically ill.

One of his peers, Bishop Skjevesland said that the movie was honest, but recommended that it should be seen together with somebody. That way you could help each other process the strong impressions afterwards. He must also have seen the recruitment potential of the movies evangelism.

Mel Gibson’s passion play is based on Catholic liturgy according to Father Pollestad, the public face of the Catholic Church in Norway. He felt the movie was speculative in its use of violence and clearly commercial. He emphasized that his church placed greater focus on the personal sacrifice and suffering of Jesus compared to the Protestant church. They tend focus on the resurrection myth.

The critique of “speculative violence” and “commercialism” are reoccurring themes for critics of all camps including secular views. Violence is a taboo in Europe. The use of force is considered to be beneath the compassionate society they think they have created. The European denial of violence and force as a part of human society is to hide from reality.

Gibson’s use of violence was probably a historically accurate portrayal of penal customs at the time. It is also a means of enforcing the message of Jesus’ personal sacrifice for humanity. My problem is not the level of graphic violence in the movie. I find the glorification of self-sacrifice morally despicable. The ethics of altruism and self-sacrifice that is propagated by the Christian churches around the world creates victims that endure mental and physical abuse because it makes them more worthy. I wonder how many personal tragedies this has created over the centuries.

Commercialism is another taboo in Europe. If your motive is to make a profit, you have a morally suspicious character. Making a profit is just another way of saying that they are making a living. Father Pollestad have not had any moral scruples of collecting his paycheck from his congregation in Oslo or making a profit of the many books he have written. Mel Gibson made a great movie because of his personal conviction, and he probably hoped to make money as well as making a difference. I do not see how the moviemaker and the author are all that different.