This site provides a lot of great information on the Jesuits, the Catholic brotherhood that Father Rodrigues represents. Want to know what's going on these days with Japanese Catholics? We've got you covered. Regardless, Silence will show you how quickly the radiation of bitterness can make your doubts grow Godzilla-sized and trample the city of your heart. Heck, you could be doubting why you started reading this analysis in the first place. You could be doubting your current romantic partner. You could be doubting your current life path. Frankly, it doesn't even matter if you're religious. When push comes to shove, Silence is all about self-doubt. And double yes, we know that the mere thought of a religious novel is enough to send you snoozing like you were in Sunday school.īut here's the thing-none of that matters.

And, yes, it's odd that a book written by a devout Catholic spends so much time talking about the failures of the Church. Okay, so maybe a few rather racist Jesuit priests aren't exactly the most likable protagonists in the world.

We don't know about you, but that little mind-bender is enough to get us hooked. Silence is a novel about European Catholics who visit Japan, written by a Japanese Catholic who visited Europe. What is Silence About and Why Should I Care? If you're looking for a novel that's subtle, powerful, and totally moving, then you could do a lot worse than Silence. You might expect a novel with such heavy religious themes to beat you over the head with them, but that's simply not the case here. And in the midst of this, the poor priest is left scratching his head as to what it all means.įrankly, we're not entirely sure ourselves, and that's why we love the book so much. We even meet a former priest or two: men whose rejection of Christianity shakes Rodrigues to his core. We meet powerful samurai who can sentence entire villages to death without breaking a sweat. We encounter hordes of Japanese Christians more devoted to Christianity than Ron Swanson is to bacon. Sure, there might not be any mobsters or Wall Street bigwigs in this one, but don't let that trip you up-this thing is intense.Ĭonsider Silence a tour of 1600s Japan. His mission: to learn the truth about his former teacher, who supposedly renounced his faith after being captured and tortured. Published in 1966 by legendary Japanese Catholic author Shusaku Endo, Silence follows Father Sebastien Rodrigues, a Jesuit priest, as he performs missionary work in Japan during the height of the country's persecution of Christians in the 1600s. That's a ringing endorsement if we've ever heard it. Wait, what? Yes, it's true-the legendary director of edgy crime dramas like Goodfellas and Wolf of Wall Street has been obsessed with a little book about Jesuit priests in Japan for over two decades. Correct us if we're wrong, but we're going to go out on a limb and say that if Martin Scorsese adapts a book into a movie, you can be reasonably certain that it's going to be an awesome book.

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