Anti-Semitism film shows personal journey, but is it too personal?

Published: 2008-04-22

WASHINGTON (CNS) -- A new documentary on the history of Christian anti-Semitism, "Constantine's Sword," shows the personal journey made by an ex-priest to embrace the fight against anti-Semitism and to rally others to the cause. It is a journey that started when he was a seminarian. "It became an issue in my life in the early 1960s when I was a student in a Catholic seminary," said James Carroll, the ex-priest, who since leaving the priesthood has done more work as a novelist and newspaper columnist than as a documentarian. The movie is based on Carroll's book, "Constantine's Sword: The Church and the Jews -- A History." Like the book, the movie "deepened in a profound way my own Catholic faith," he said. But one nun who has spent much of her academic career in the field of Christian-Jewish relations who has seen the film suggested the story told in "Constantine's Sword" is "skewed by the fact that it's so tied personally to James Carroll." Holy Names Sister Mary Boys, a professor of practical theology at Union Theological Seminary in New York City, told Catholic News Service that the film, like the 2001 book, "pays insufficient attention to the many generations of people who have worked for justice for the Jews in the church, and (for) a corrected self-understanding in our own (faith) tradition."

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