Unwieldy

Whose decision is it? Jesus did not make us follow HIm. He was clear that was what He wanted, but the choice is still ours. James Martin wrote a piece at Busted Halo in 2008 about Phillip Seymour Hoffman, who directed "The Last Days of Judas Iscariot." Perhaps the best actor of his day, Hoffman recently died from a heroin overdose. When he was a boy Hoffman studied to become a Catholic, and was influenced by his sister's profound faith. Hoffman is quoted by Martin as saying,

“My image of Jesus is someone who is exciting,” he said after the show had closed.

“Were he alive today, he would be causing havoc!”

More often it is that Jesus who in his upending of the status quo proves a threat to those around him.

“Jesus forgave his persecutors. If he were around today, he would be doing things that would be so… unwieldy!”

Hoffman taught his actors in a way similar to the way Jesus taught His disciples, through stories that revealed truth.

We lost another talented human being to addiction. Alissa Wilkinson writes that Hoffman

talked about how painful the work was to him, how it hurt to inhabit another person that way.

The pain, perhaps, ended up being too much to bear.

But the sacrifice for those who make things is to think of the other, to put themselves in someone else’s shoes over and over again – whether it’s your character or your audience. That is not comfortable. It is difficult to deal with. It can drive you toward things you know aren’t good for you, and can make you do things that wind up hurting others, too. But it is certainly a hallmark of bad art that the artist/writer appears to have thought only of himself.