We watched The Patriot tonight. Certainly an intense and bloody movie that mom had to turn her head away from a time or two. Very sad. In one scene Gabriel, the oldest son of Benjamin Martin (the Mel Gibson character), steps into a church to ask for men to sign up to fight. The preacher is offended the minute the young man has entered and lets him know this is a house of God. Through the influence of a very pretty young lady who is sweet on Gabriel, the congregation eventually comes around and men begin to stand and say they will join. The music builds as each man stands. I decide to say at that moment, “You know, James, in the real world when you decide to take a stand for something there is no majestic music playing in the background.” There is no music to inspire and embolden. You often stand alone and in silence.
The last scene in the movie is at the Martins home place where the beginnings of reconstruction of their house (burned by the Redcoats early in the film) has been begun by their friends. All seems right with the world. The war has been won and freedom reigns. But that wasn’t the end for our family. Jack said, “That’s the problem with movies. They make like everything is wonderful in the end. No thought of the two sons that were killed. The son’s wife and her family burned with the whole village in the church. All the other family and friends that had been killed. All this killing because of King George. And why was there a King George? Because people had been putting up with his tyranny for years and the tyranny of the one before him. And he has all these possession that his dad stole from the people before him and…” Then James takes off from there with all that he has learned from our studies of history. The point being that we have wars and homes are destroyed and families slaughtered because people will put up with tyrants. And so the senselessness continues today.
