100 Movies Every Catholic Should See #57: The Mission (1986)

Directed by Roland Joffé. Written by Robert Bolt. Starring Jeremy Irons, Robert de Niro, Ray McAnally

There are really three missions in The Mission, each intertwined with the others. The first mission is Fr. Gabriel’s mission to the Guarani; the second, Rodrigo Montoya’s mission to find redemption; and finally, Cardinal Altamirano’s mission to suppress the missions and allow the Portuguese to occupy their land. Each of these characters represents a different philosophy of love, loyalty, and conscience, some of screenwriter Robert Bolt’s main preoccupations (see his other entries on this list, A Man for All Seasons and Lawrence of Arabia). Each man is totally dedicated to his mission, but they are each challenged by a different loyalty, a deep-seated element of their character, to abandon or redirect their mission. For each, many lives and many souls, including their very own, are at stake.

We begin with Fr. Gabriel (Jeremy Irons). Following the martyrdom of one of his brother Jesuits, he travels up the river and deep into the South American jungle to evangelize the Guarani people. He has already led successful missions, setting up Christian settlements close to the Spanish capital but yearning to go deeper into the jungle and bring Christ to the farthest-flung of his people. His evangelical approach does not rely on the force of arms or argument to drag people into the Church, but rather he draws them in with beauty, courage, and love. In his very first interaction with the tribe (which, remember, had just martyred his friend), he sits by a stream and alerts them to his presence by playing the oboe. Ennio Morricone’s masterful score turns this tranquil theme, known today as Gabriel’s Oboe, into the theme of Christianity in the wilderness, contrasted with the wilder theme of the pagan tribe and the brash and haughty theme of the Spanish and Portuguese settlers. Fr. Gabriel connects with the Guarani first through the beauty of music (for which, it turns out, they have quite a talent) and then shares gradually with them the beauty of Catholic art and architecture, creating an incredible Catholic paradise in the wilderness.

Beauty is not Fr. Gabriel’s only strength, however. It is merely one aspect of the Christlike love that he shows his flock. Throughout the film he displays a loving attitude of service to a people counted as mere animals by the colonists with whom he ostensibly has more in common. He helps them build an authentic, beautiful, joyful community by working alongside them, becoming a servant leader and eventually bringing back several other brothers to help continue the work.

One of these men in Rodrigo Mendoza (Robert de Niro), a former Spanish slaver who has killed his brother in a duel. Fr. Gabriel offers Mendoza a chance at repentance, giving him the second of the three missions in this film. Mendoza is a hothead, killing his brother because he was the choice of the woman they both love. However, his anger and his ruthlessness turn to despair at the realization of what he has done. An outcast in the Spanish settlement, he joins Fr. Gabriel’s mission in hopes of redemption and Fr. Gabriel imposes a harsh penance on him. He must drag a bundle of all his military gear up the waterfall and through the jungle to the Guarani mission. Mendoza’s armor, weapons, and all the possessions that had contributed to his pride and vanity become a physical weight that he must drag, gathering dirt and mud as he struggles on his Sisyphean journey of penance. Although the other brothers think this penance to be too harsh, Mendoza never complains and completes his penance in stoic silence. When they reach the Guarani, a tribesman cut the bundle off of Mendoza’s back and it falls into the river, showing how fruitless it was for him to carry around these worldly goods and vices. Rather than flare up into anger, Mendoza laughs, finally having broken free of this burden of guilt and able to fully repent of his violence, cruelty, and fratricide.

Mendoza becomes devoted to helping the Guarani people he once enslaved, and even eventually joins the Jesuit order himself. He seems to be a new man, past his anger and pride and committed to a life of love and service like Fr. Gabriel, who had shown him the love and given him the penance necessary to break through his veil of vice. This middle part of the film is joyous and beautiful as they build the settlement, the score perfectly harmonizing the wild Guarani theme with the beauty of Gabriel’s Oboe. Christ has come to the wilderness and he makes all things new and beautiful.

Alas, the third mission is in direct conflict with this new Christian community. Cardinal Altamirano has been sent from Rome to mediate the closure of all the Jesuit missions in this area so that the Spanish can peacefully hand this part of their colony over to their Portuguese neighbors. Europe in the 1750s was becoming an increasingly more hostile place for the Church, and the Pope hoped not to upset his precarious position by appeasing the monarchs of Spain and Portugal. The Pope generally seems far away and uninformed about the situation in South America, willing to trade this local community for the survival of the Church as a whole. Most of my readers will not be surprised at Church leaders prioritizing institutional survival and political maneuvering over local communities and the churches they consider home. Many in the US, Canada, and Europe will also have personally experienced a new bishop or cardinal coming to consolidate and close beloved parishes. Altamirano is simply doing what he and the Pope thinks is necessary to ensure that the Bark of Peter stays afloat for the present, even if it means unfortunately abandoning some of the people who might need to be thrown a lifeline.

However, Altamirano is not heartless and is greatly moved by the beauty and simple faith displayed by the Guarani Christians. He deeply appreciates the community that Fr. Gabriel and the Jesuits have built here and struggles with his conscience in carrying out his mission. He clearly prefers the company of the Jesuits and the Guarani to the obsequious colonial authorities and treats their contempt of the Guarani with contempt in turn. He is awestruck by the beauty of the settlements and must wrestle with his responsibility in ending them. Before officially “making his decision” about the closure of the Missions (a decision that was already made months before in Rome), he spends all night in prayer in the Guarani church, asking God to somehow reconcile his duty to the Church with his duty to these Christians. In the end, he ignores his conscience and carries out his duty, although the conflict between the two clearly tears him apart. His report to the Pope is terse and clearly communicates that he believes he has done the wrong thing, even if he was motivated by loyalty to the Church.

Altamirano completing his mission greatly affects the other two. Fr. Gabriel and Rodrigo Mendoza are clearly devastated by this decision and must choose between obedience to their authorities (a major part of Jesuit spirituality) and resisting the injustice being perpetrated on their community. As the Spanish send soldiers to forcibly clear the missions, the two men choose different paths. Mendoza literally dredges up the armor and weapons he had dragged to the jungle, symbolically unearthing his old life of violence and undoing his path to redemption, even though he thinks he does so in a good cause. Ultimately, his resistance is in vain. The Guarani he leads against the Spanish are all killed, and his abandonment of the law of love in favor of resistance jeopardizes his mission of redemption. His resistance is fruitless and he dies slowly among the people he tried to serve, although there is some prospect of final redemption for him as he sacrifices his chance to kill the Spaniards to save a young boy, giving up vengeance and resistance in an act of love.

Fr. Gabriel also remains with his people, leading them in prayer and carrying the Eucharist among them as the soldiers approach. He is torn by what he sees as a betrayal of the people of God by the Church he faithfully serves. However, he does not abandon his life of love and service and does not resist the decision and orders of his Church, nor does he endorse Mendoza’s violent resistance. But neither does he leave behind his flock and return to some other post, choosing to remain with his people to the last. His mission is to bring Christ to these people, and he remains faithful to that mission to the last. The spectacle of ostensibly Catholic soldiers gunning down a priest carrying a monstrance among the Guarani is among the most tragically moving images of the whole film. It feels odd to call Fr. Gabriel a martyr, since his killers could point to Church authority as justification for their actions, but there have been other cases where political decisions by churchmen have contradicted the true mission of Christ and created martyrs (St. Joan of Arc comes to mind). Fr. Gabriel does not resistance the clearing of the mission; he does not disobey direct orders from his superiors; he does not outright question the authority which ordered the devastation of this part of the people of God. However, he does choose to remain among those people to the last, shedding his blood in witness that they have dignity as human beings and fellow Christians and literally carrying Christ among the Guarani to his last breath. The film’s epilogue suggests that the Guarani remember this sacrifice and remain faithful to Christ and Fr. Gabriel’s memory. Of the three missions, therefore, Cardinal Altamirano’s is successful at the cost of his conscience; Mendoza fails by dredging up his past violence to resist lawful authority; and although Fr. Gabriel seems to have failed in worldly terms, he is faithful to his conscience, to the Mission, and to Christ to the last, and succeeds in keeping the light of Christ alive in the jungle even after his martyrdom.

So, your Holiness, now your priests are dead, and I am left alive. But in truth it is I who am dead, and they who live. For as always, your Holiness, the spirit of the dead will survive in the memory of the living.