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Media Reviews
should work and minister in a parish, even if it’s only for a year,” Father John says. “When you work with people in the parish, you allow yourself to be touched by humanity from birth to death. It further humanizes you as an individual.”
When asked what retirement looks like for him as a Franciscan, he laughs and says, “Death.” He can retire at 75, but “they encourage us to keep going as long as we can.” One of his associates in Triangle is an 80-year-old friar who still works part-time.
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Pope Francis, 84, is a role model for Franciscans. “Pope Francis is, for us, Franciscan. He’s really one of us in terms of his approach to ministry and to his own priesthood,” he says of the Jesuit pope. “Francis [of Assisi] didn’t want us to be different from the laypeople we are ministering to.”
In that work of ministry, Father John says nothing is as important to him as a painting that hangs in his rectory office and the story behind it. The pastel depicts a river with a dock and two boats tied to a slip with trees in the background.
Years ago, he visited a woman in the Eastern Shore of Maryland who was dying from cancer. Though she had drifted away from the faith, her family asked him to come see her. He heard her confession and while they were chatting, she told him she had something to give him so he would always remember her: the pastel, which she had painted. She came back to the Catholic faith and died some months later.
The painting, he says, represents what is most important to him as a Franciscan priest: “being a person who can bring people back to the Church, who can help people who are hurting, and can help them to know that no matter what happens in their life, their God loves them.”
Ann M. Augherton is the managing editor of the award-winning Arlington Catholic Herald (Virginia) and its website. She has published multiple articles in St. Anthony Messenger, including “The Top Five Issues Facing Health Care” (February 2019).
— Father John O’Connor
This painting, a gift from a dying woman who came back to the faith, represents what Father John values most about being a priest: bringing people back to the Church.
Our Planet
Netflix
In the opening installment of the eightpart series Our Planet, narrator Sir David Attenborough tells viewers, “This series will celebrate the natural wonders that remain and reveal what we must preserve to assure that people—and nature—thrive.”
From there, Attenborough takes viewers on a journey that reveals the many wonders and harsh realities of life—and death—in nature. The cinematography is breathtaking, capturing images of earth’s most important habitats from the wide expanses of the tundra to the floor of the rain forest.
Attenborough is an English broadcaster and natural historian. He is best known for writing and presenting, in conjunction with the BBC Natural History Unit, the natural history documentary series Life that portrays a comprehensive survey of animal and plant life on earth. He has said he considers his 2020 documentary film, David Attenborough: A Life on Our Planet, his personal witness statement of his life and the future.
At the beginning, Our Planet seems as if it’s going to be a straightforward nature documentary. Viewers watch examples of the interconnectedness of the species, such as migration and mating patterns, but also situations where predator and prey face off. There are no graphic scenes in the documentary, but the music does capture the sense of foreboding and danger in the situations.
As the episodes progress, viewers begin to see how the changes that humans have put into motion are negatively affecting the balance of nature and the very species they are watching.
For instance, Attenborough informs viewers that the polar regions are warming faster than any other part of the planet. To back up the statement, just a short time later massive sections of glaciers are shown falling into the ocean. Our Planet does a great job of pairing Attenborough’s well-known, straightforward delivery of facts with phenomenal imagery to reinforce it.
By the end of the series, in the ultimate lesson of how something in one part of nature can affect other regions, viewers see how the rising sea levels from the melting glaciers affect the birds and other animals we see in the first episode.
Our Planet is a powerful and eye-opening tale of the state of nature and the damage we are doing to it—at an alarming pace.
Those who don’t have a subscription to Netflix can watch the introductory episode for free. The following seven episodes, though, require a subscription. Those episodes explore the following habitats: frozen worlds, jungles, coastal seas, from deserts to grasslands, the high seas, freshwater, and forests.
Attenborough closes this opening installment by telling viewers, “What we do in the next 20 years will determine the future for all life on earth.” But he also offers words of hope that, “with our help, the planet can recover.” This series is the perfect call to action.
As an added bonus, viewers can take a look at the process of making the docuseries thanks to Our Planet—Behind the Scenes. Attenborough again provides the narrative with additional commentary on the filming process from those who capture the footage. Witnessing the amount of work that went into making this documentary, which took four years and was filmed in 60 countries, makes this all the more spectacular.
