A World Without Children-Coming to a Theatre Near You
Posted on Sunday, January 14th, 2007 at 7:01 pm
A new movie raises some important questions for me. The move is “Children of Men� (rated R for language and violence). It is based on a novel by PD James called The Children of Men (why the makers of the movie felt the need to drop off the article, I could not tell you). The significant plot line of the movie and the book is that mankind has become infertile and children have stopped being born.
With the end of births, comes the end of hope. Both the movie and James’ (who is a Christian) novel are dystopian. My Greek students will remember that “utopia� was a word coined by John S. Mill, to mean the best possible world. The word in the Greek (ou and topos) means literally “no place.� J. S. Mill also coined the word dystopia (dus and topos) to mean bad or evil place. A bad and evil place is certainly what the earth has become in the years following the infertility. The world without births is dark and dreadful. Many civil governments have broken down and in England those who continue to live, trade freedom for safety and what is left of the enjoyment of life.
What is interesting in the book, but does not appear in the movie, is the way that humans attempt to keep the rites of childbirth alive even though there are no children being born. Very expensive dolls (a new one every six months) become the rage for those who can afford it. The dolls are taken around in strollers and commented on by passers by.
Even stranger, some transfer these rites to animals. Priests begin to baptize infant kittens and puppies; parties are held for newborn kittens, accompanied by champaign and the best wine. After all there is no point is saving the wine, in another fifty or sixty years there will be no-one left to drink it.
What struck me about this as I was reading, and what was so powerfully portrayed by the movie was how often we take fertility for granted until it is taken away from us. The couple who has just found out that they will never be able to have children think with longing about the maternity ward at the hospital. It is as if the movie has turned us all into that couple for two hours and reminded us that the fertility of mankind is not in the end, based upon rhythms, pills, or other methods. In the end fertility is based upon the will of God.
It did give me pause to think: If tomorrow I found out that there would be no more children born, ever, what would be important? These are the kinds of questions that movies or books from our culture can cause us to ask and more importantly cause others to ask, opening a dialogue about the gospel and the answers that Jesus has. How will we answer those questions?
Tomorrow: The rest of the story. While the movie hints at the loss felt by mankind when no children are born, it makes very clear what the real answer is. That answer tomorrow on Martin Luther King day.
DrSamLam
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Comments
1Anthony:Monday, January 15th, 2006 at 11:26 am
Just saw the movie this weekend, Dr. Sam. I am now seeking to read the book. What I found fascinating in the movie were the many video billboards with advertisements for “Quietus,” “Bliss in a Pill,” “and plastic surgery.” Feels like a mirror being held up in front of contemporary America. The scene with Theo’s cousin and his boy, totally engorssed in some video game type thing, and needing to take his medication (ritalin like I suppose) was striking.
But yes, the theme of God being sovereign over pregnancy and a child being the hope of the world resound through the movie.
2DrSamLam:Monday, January 15th, 2006 at 3:03 pm
Anthony,
I too was facinated by the background of the movie. One particularly interesting sentence of graffiti said “Will the last one living please turn out the lights?” A dark request in a world where there are no more children being born.
What I continue to be moved by are the number of places where a film like this “brushes” or “echoes” the Gospel. How many illustrative opportunities stand at our hands waiting to be picked up and we drive on to intent on getting to where “we are going” to look around at the world that exists in film and literature. One of my messages is simply: Stop! Look around. Listen to what is being said. Then respond. A great problem of Christian witnessing is that there is not enough listening. Maybe I’ll write on that before long.
drSamLam