Netflix’s “Midnight Mass” Offers Salvation without Bite

This review contains major spoilers.

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As a young preacher, I learned early on that the “The mind cannot retain what the seat cannot endure.” Even the best of sermons miss their mark when too long-winded. Make no mistake about it, director Mike Flanagan’s latest entry in the horror genre, “Midnight Mass,” is both a “sermon” and “long-winded.” However, the punch line to this cinematic polemic is more about gauzy postmodern logic than anything with theological bite.

Some have described the new Netflix miniseries as “Catholic horror at its best.” Although the story is centered around St. Patrick’s Church, a small Catholic church on sparsely populated Crockett Island, the inclusion of a variety of religious representatives is evidence enough of the director’s intended story arc and ensuing religious cerebrations. There’s a practicing Muslim, a staunch atheist, and a doctor (repping #Science, of course). All provide significant pushback to the largely naïve, when not blatantly malevolent, Catholic parishioners.

The arrival of Father Paul (played by Hamish Linklater) sets the story in motion. Linklater gives an especially compelling performance as a charismatic, but darkly duplicitous figure. Running cover for Father Paul is Bev Keane, an incarnation of Mrs. Carmody if ever there was one. Carmody, if you remember, was the rabid religious fundamentalist of Stephen King’s “The Mist.” Such caricatures are common in film and Bev Keane fills the role admirably, protecting Father Paul’s sinister ministrations, framing Muslims as terrorists, and quoting Bible verses to suit her apocalyptic paranoia. But when miracles follow the priest’s arrival (healings and recoveries), the entire town is prompted to give heed to he (and Keane’s) zealotry.

The revelation of the source of these miracles (Episode 3-4) will likely be the watershed for viewers’ opinions about “Midnight Mass.” The “big reveal” is not that God, Father Paul, or Bev Keane are actually behind this “revival.” You see, the good priest was previously a senile, dementia-addled cleric who encountered a gaunt, leathery, blood-sucking angel in the Holy Land. (More on the actual nature of said “angel” in a minute.) Now, Father Paul, revitalized from drinking the wraith’s blood, has brought the winged creature back to Crocket Island in hopes of baptizing a flock of revenants like himself and creating an “army of the Lord.” As such, Saint Patrick’s becomes the vehicle to spread this new “gospel,” while the defiled Eucharist, spiked now with the blood of the “infected,” is the actual contagion.

But as troublesome as the imagery of the profaned sacraments are, its the series’ religious implications that I found most problematic.

Flanagan has been up front about his unsettled Catholic upbringing and subsequent religious quest. His philosophical conclusions permeate “Midnight Mass.” In this essay, the director describes his religious search and the ideas that have most influenced him:

I read the Bible. And then I kept reading. If I was going to look for God, I was going to look everywhere. I devoted myself to studying Judaism. Hinduism. Islam. I connected pretty intensely with Buddhism for a few years in there, even seeking out temples in Los Angeles as I tried to further explore it, but ultimately the book that impacted me the most was God is Not Great by Christopher Hitchens. That led to Letter to a Christian Nation by Sam Harris. But I found more spiritual resonance reading Pale Blue Dot by Carl Sagan than I found in two decades of Bible study.

Hitchens, Harris, and Sagan represent the holy trinity of the New Atheists. Their perspectives, all particularly hostile to historic Christianity, led Flanagan to a new conclusion on religion:

My feelings about religion were very complicated. I was fascinated, but angry. Looking at various religions, I was moved and amazed by their propensity for forgiveness and faith, but horrified by their exclusionism, tribalism, and tendency toward fanaticism and fundamentalism. I found a lot of these various religions’ ideas to be inspiring and beautiful, but I also found their corruptions to be grotesque and unforgivable. I wasn’t going to support those kinds of institutions any longer. I was only interested in humanism, rationalism, science… and empathy.

This disconnect between the “inspiring and beautiful” elements of religion and its “tendency toward fanaticism and fundamentalism” is the thematic heart of “Midnight Mass.” To his credit, not all the religious portrayals in the series are that of crazed, merciless fanatics. Many of the congregants of St. Patrick’s are seen as good people simply being led astray by corrupt shepherds. Yet many reviewers recognize that “Midnight Mass can be read as a pretty sharp commentary on organized religion, Christianity in particular.” Both the “dark angel” and the “thirst” it imparts are fictional springboards to embody the perverse machinations of religious charlatans. The profaning of Scripture and religious iconography are just casualties along the way. But make no mistake, that profaning is a horror all its own.

It’s why this writer described the series as using horror “to explore the dark role religion can play in the lives of working-class people. Viewers will be taken on a journey involving both sinister and benevolent forces, which may have them reflecting on the complex role faith and dogma has played in the history of humankind—for better and worse.” And this reviewer at Roger Ebert.com correctly notes that “Midnight Mass” mines “the idea that The Bible truly is a horror story.” While I’m sympathetic to the idea of “Bible as horror story” or “the complex role faith and dogma has played in the history of humankind,” I wonder that Flanagan has erected little more than a straw man to plunder.

Unsurprisingly, it’s the “non-Christian” characters in “Midnight Mass” who are some of the most spiritually lucid. Both the atheist and the Muslim have lengthy monologues about religion, philosophy, human suffering, addiction, xenophobia, and the afterlife. In fact, nearly the entire half of one episode is simply a discussion, in a single room, between Father Paul and Riley, a recovering alcoholic and atheist. Drawn-out soliloquys are par for the course in this series. While it definitely gives characters an opportunity for depth, it also infers their role as spokespersons for a much larger existential exploration. Which Flanagan himself corroborates.

Religion, I believe, is one of the ways we attempt to answer the two Great Questions that ache within us all: “how shall we live,” and “what happens when we die.” I don’t know the answer to the second question (although my thoughts, wishes, and even my best guess are articulated in this show), but Midnight Mass has, over the years, helped me at least begin to answer that first question. 

But articulating those “Two Great Questions” is clearly not the only thing the director aims to accomplish. His sympathetic portrayals of both atheists and Muslims have garnered praise… from atheists and Muslims. One reviewer even notes how the Muslim character, Sherriff Hassan, “is one of the few people [in the series] who is lifted as model for how religious devotion can be positive… Respect, humility, kindness in the face of hatred, and helping the needy are some of the biggest lessons that appear in religious texts time and time again. These often-preached tenets of Christianity are displayed through a Muslim man.” Religious News Service writer Jillian Chaney sees the series as directly addressing evangelical fears of “Islamophobia.” She writes,

“To watch Crockett Island’s residents fear Hassan more than they do the monsters at their doorstep is a twisted irony that makes the show a dark delight. “

Such a portrayal does not seem coincidental. While Flanagan appears intent to level “a pretty sharp commentary on organized religion, Christianity in particular,” atheism and Islam get a pass. And nonsensical pantheistic orations are offered uncritically. Like that of Erin (one of the shows’ unlikely heroines) who, as the end draws near, offers this final soliloquy about what happens at death:

“… every atom in my body was forged in a star. This matter, this body is mostly just empty space. After all, solid matter is just energy vibrating very slowly, and there is no me. There never was. The electrons of my body mingle and dance with the electrons of the ground below me and the air. I’m no longer breathing. And I remember, there is no point to where any of that ends and I begin. I remember that I am energy, not memory. My name, my personality my choices all came after me. I was before them and I will be after. Everything else is pictures picked up along the way. Fleeting little dreamlets imprinted upon the tissue of my dying brain. And I am the lightning that jumps between, the energy firing neurons. And I am returning. Just by remembering I am returning home. It’s like a drop of water falling back into the ocean. Of which I’ve always been a part. All of us, a part. You, me, my mother and my father, every one who’s ever been. Every plant, every animal, every atom. Every star. Every galaxy. All of it. We’re galaxies in the universe, grains of sand on the beach. And that’s what we’re talking about when we say God…. We are that cosmos that dreams of itself. It’s a simple dream that I think is my life every time… It’s all one. I am everything. I am the ground beneath me. I am my little girl. I am my mother. I am Father Paul and this miracle. We are all of the same thing.”

Erin finally concludes with the phrase, “I am that I am.” Those familiar with Scripture will recognize this as a phrase used by Christ about Himself and Yahweh, a term exclusive to Deity. The fact that Erin uses this Scripture to describe her Infinite Self is indicative of Flanagan’s reckless application of Scripture and the postmodern mashup of beliefs that form the scaffold of this rickety worldview.

It also reveals what are the real “monsters at their doorstep.”

“Midnight Mass” does not use the word “vampire” to describe the bat-winged, blood-thirsty, “angel” unleashed upon the inhabitants. Nevertheless, Thrillist summarizes thusly: “Father Paul is a vampire, and Midnight Mass is a vampire story.” However, the ambiguity surrounding the creature has left some asking “Is Midnight Mass’ Monster An Angel Or Vampire?” In this interview, Flanagan explained, “Whenever God needs to do something horrible to someone in the Bible, he sends an angel. Do you really want to meet a creature like this? Imagine what that creature must be like.” Furthermore, when Father Paul first encounters the being, and his aging self is revitalized by the creature’s blood, he describes it as an “angel of God” sent to save him. Nevertheless, the fact that a Catholic priest cannot discern a vampire from an angel says much about the theological acumen of the characters, and their creator. In What the Bible Says About Midnight Mass’ Angel, Mikey Walsh correctly notes the blatant deception and selfishness behind Father Paul’s decision to bring the beast back to Crockett Island. But by the time he realizes his folly, all is lost.

And that’s the real “monster” at the church’s doorstep. It isn’t a revenant, a vampire — it’s Man. It’s Bev Keane spouting Bible verses while torching the city. It’s Father Paul, defiling the sacraments for power. It’s the church that brainwashed the entire flock. It’s religious fundamentalism.

But salvation is extended to all. For as the sun rises upon the island, the infected inhabitants march forward singing “Nearer My God to Thee” while turning to ash in the glorious Light. They are now one with the Cosmos, returning to pure energy; all their memories but “Fleeting little dreamlets imprinted upon the tissue of [a] dying brain.”

Flanagan summarizes his “Greatest Commandment” this way:

“For most of this project, there was a preoccupation that I had with what happens after we die. What is the correct answer? How do we answer that question in life?” he explains. “I think it took me until very recently, until the last real swing at this [script] to realize that doesn’t matter, so much as the question about what we do when we’re alive. To the degree with which what you might believe or what I might believe happens after we die. The only thing that matters is how that belief changes our behavior toward each other while we’re alive.” (Bold mine)

In the end, be good to each other. Whether atheist or Muslim or Catholic, whether vampire or human, “The only thing that matters is… our behavior toward each other while we’re alive.”

In this, the salvation director Mike Flanagan offers is toothless. It doesn’t matter what your religious or anti-religious persuasion is, just be a good person and you too will evaporate into the Great Cosmic Void. Unlike Jesus, Who made sharp religious claims and warned of consequences for those who did not believe, the message of “Midnight Mass” is simply, “Don’t be a monster.”

But in that world, the only real “monsters” are of the fundamentalist kind.

Nevertheless, take heart — no matter what you choose to believe, we’re all just stardust, “like a drop of water falling back into the ocean. Of which [we’ve] always been a part.” The Vast Cold Cosmos awaits! And that, my friends, is the real horror.