Overview

Miracles and Sacrilege is the story of the epochal conflict between censorship and freedom in film, recounted through an in-depth analysis of the U.S. Supreme Court's decision striking down a government ban on Roberto Rossellini's film The Miracle (1950). In this extraordinary case, the Court ultimately chose to abandon its own longstanding determination that film comprised a mere 'business' unworthy of free-speech rights, declaring for the first time that the First Amendment barred government from banning any film as 'sacreligious.' Using legal briefs, affidavits, and other court records, as well as letters, memoranda, and other archival materials to elucidate what was at issue in the case, William Bruce Johnson also analyzes the social, cultural, and religious elements that form the background of this complex and hard-fought controversy, focusing particularly on the fundamental role played by the Catholic Church in the history of film censorship. Tracing the development of the Church in the United States, Johnson discusses the reasons it found The Miracle sacrilegious and how it attained the power to persuade civil authorities to ban it. The Court's decision was not only a milestone in the law of church-state relations, but it paved the way for a succession of later decisions which gradually established a firm legal basis for freedom of expression in the arts.

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9780802093073

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""Some critics hailed The Miracle not only as a tour de force by [Anna] Magnani but as a reverent and even a 'Catholic' work. Francis Cardinal Spellman, the head of the Catholic Church in the United States, was not of that view, proclaiming that 'Satan alone' would make such a film. For many years the New York Board of Regents, that state's highest educational authority, had delegated a panel of professional film censors the task of deciding which films should be granted licenses for exhibition in movie theatres. Although these censors had approved The Miracle, the Regents, following Cardinal Spellman's accusation, overruled them, thereby forcing the theatre[s] to stop showing the film... From the perspective of Spellman and his advisers, by getting New York State to ban The Miracle, they had vindicated the chastity of Mary and the miracle of the Virgin Birth at a time when these and other essentials of the Catholic faith were being trampled upon by atheistic Communism. That Rossellini specifically intended to mock Catholic values seemed to them particularly evident because of hearsay comments to the effect that he was a 'Communist,' and because he and Ingrid Bergman, beloved for her portrayal of a nun in The Bells of St Mary's, had recently had a highly publicized affair, resulting in a birth out of wedlock. From Miracles and Sacrilege""

Some critics hailed The Miracle not only as a tour de force by [Anna] Magnani but as a reverent and even a 'Catholic' work. Francis Cardinal Spellman, the head of the Catholic Church in the United States, was not of that view, proclaiming that 'Satan alone' would make such a film. For many years the New York Board of Regents, that state's highest educational authority, had delegated a panel of professional film censors the task of deciding which films should be granted licenses for exhibition in movie theatres. Although these censors had approved The Miracle, the Regents, following Cardinal Spellman's accusation, overruled them, thereby forcing the theatre[s] to stop showing the film... From the perspective of Spellman and his advisers, by getting New York State to ban The Miracle, they had vindicated the chastity of Mary and the miracle of the Virgin Birth at a time when these and other essentials of the Catholic faith were being trampled upon by atheistic Communism. That Rossellini specifically intended to mock Catholic values seemed to them particularly evident because of hearsay comments to the effect that he was a 'Communist,' and because he and Ingrid Bergman, beloved for her portrayal of a nun in The Bells of St Mary's, had recently had a highly publicized affair, resulting in a birth out of wedlock. From Miracles and Sacrilege

"""Some critics hailed The Miracle not only as a tour de force by [Anna] Magnani but as a reverent and even a 'Catholic' work. Francis Cardinal Spellman, the head of the Catholic Church in the United States, was not of that view, proclaiming that 'Satan alone' would make such a film. For many years the New York Board of Regents, that state's highest educational authority, had delegated a panel of professional film censors the task of deciding which films should be granted licenses for exhibition in movie theatres. Although these censors had approved The Miracle, the Regents, following Cardinal Spellman's accusation, overruled them, thereby forcing the theatre[s] to stop showing the film... From the perspective of Spellman and his advisers, by getting New York State to ban The Miracle, they had vindicated the chastity of Mary and the miracle of the Virgin Birth at a time when these and other essentials of the Catholic faith were being trampled upon by atheistic Communism. That Rossellini specifically intended to mock Catholic values seemed to them particularly evident because of hearsay comments to the effect that he was a 'Communist,' and because he and Ingrid Bergman, beloved for her portrayal of a nun in The Bells of St Mary's, had recently had a highly publicized affair, resulting in a birth out of wedlock. From Miracles and Sacrilege"""

Author Information

William Bruce Johnson is an attorney and writer based in New York. He holds a PhD from the University of London.

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