Recently I've been thinking a bit about spiritual disciplines in relation to film. Disciplines have undergone something of a renaissance in Open Heaven. Despite being a post-modern, culturally-relevant, "charismatic" new-church we’ve found that 21^st century discipleship has something to learn from structure (or rhythm) and discipline that have traditionally been part of the Christian life. It’s been dubbed New Monasticism, (are we aware of just how much that name embodies the post-modernism that is our predominant worldview?) - seeking to connect with something of Christianity’s traditions, but also taking a fresh approach that hopefully avoids some of the legalism and other assorted pitfalls that the D word conjures up.

In a nutshell, the "new" take is that we need to find a rhythm for life that is God-centred and embrace the disciplines that help us keep our lives pointing in the right direction and give it the right balance. We put things in place that help us put Jesus in his rightful place. There’s more to it than that, but that its core. As a result there has been much fasting, crafting of prayers, abstinence, meditating, resting and retreating. There are a few others I’d like to see come in. A discipline of recklessness where every so often you stay up late to do something when the domesticating voice inside you tells you that you can’t do it because you’ll be tired for work tomorrow. The Lion of Judah didn’t free us from sin to be tamed by work instead.

Over the last few months I’ve been wondering how all this impinges on film. The simplistic approach is just to say that one will abstain from watching films or going to the cinema for X weeks. That's a great thing to do, but at the same time over the last few years I have been increasingly seeing film as a source of spiritual nourishment. Whilst that doesn’t exclude "fasting" film entirely, perhaps there are, for me, more beneficial ways to proceed. For example very few people abstain from reading the bible (and no I’m not equating the two!).

The main idea I’ve been toying with is abstaining from films I’ve never seen before. In our hyper-consumer culture I feel the pull to consume more and more films. There’s a thrill, or sense of achievement that comes from watching a film that I’ve never seen before, which somehow feels quite consumerist in nature. In contrast many people talk about how appreciating a piece of art takes time, and, in the case of film, repeating viewings to find new insights and details each time. By setting aside a period of time for which I will only watch films I have seen before to appreciate what I have already got, and to move from consuming films to interact with them. I started a "fast" like this (technically its actually abstinence) at the start of October for 10 weeks. I’ll let you know how it went when I’m done.

Other ideas include abstaining from recent releases. To gain a greater appreciation of some of the great works of the past. Our culture is incredibly fad-ish, yearning for the new thing before the old has been really appreciated. Or how about avoiding "pure entertainment" films, or Hollywood films for example. Or only watching films on a particular theme?

I’m aware in writing this that these are all in one particular vein, and I’m keen to hear other ideas, particularly coming from another perspective. Edward McNulty’s Praying the Movies takes a clip which embodies a certain film, places it in the context of the film and ties it in with a bible passage and some questions for people to work through almost as a quiet time / meditation. Perhaps there are other approaches such as this which need to emerge.

Film has great potential to be a mouthpiece for God, but it also has the potential to take us over. Knowing how, when and what to abstain from could be a part of engaging with God and our culture at the start of the 21^st Century.