Tricked by God

Shia Labeouf Padre Pio

The platypus is no longer the best evidence of God’s sense of humor.

Actor Shia LaBeouf said he converted to Christianity while shooting his upcoming film “Padre Pio” and has become a member of the Roman Catholic Church.

Kidding aside, this is joyous news and still more proof that where sin abounds, grace abounds all the more.

The actor first engaged with the church while living with a monastery of Franciscan Capuchin friars in order to better understand the late mystic St. Padre Pio, whom LaBeouf portrays in the upcoming movie.

Heading into the project, LaBeouf said that he was at the darkest point in his life after a series of public scandals. He was drawn to spirituality and joined a variety of faith groups to find meaning, fighting thoughts of helplessness and suicide.

“I had a gun on the table. I was outta here,” Shia recalled in the nearly 90-minute interview. “I didn’t want to be alive anymore when all this happened. Shame like I had never experienced before — the kind of shame that you forget how to breathe. You don’t know where to go. You can’t go outside and get like, a taco.”

“But I was also in this deep desire to hold on,” he added.

The pleasures of this world just do not suffice to fulfill a man. By the same token, if God were not man’s true final end, temporal goods could fulfill us.

He continued, “I know now that God was using my ego to draw me to Him. Drawing me away from worldly desires. It was all happening simultaneously. But there would have been no impetus for me to get in my car, drive up [to the monastery] if I didn’t think, ‘Oh, I’m gonna save my career.'”

While researching and performing the role, however, LaBeouf said he felt “tricked” by God.

This interview gives you the sense of Shia as an earnest and highly expressive man of unexpected depth. He doesn’t come off as your typical Hollywood airhead.

At the same time, he gained infamy during the early days of the Trump phenomenon as an especially fanatical Death Cultist. Which goes to show that it’s better to be hot or cold than lukewarm.

LaBeouf described talking through his feelings and learning about the Christian understanding of sin and forgiveness as key to pulling him out of a dark time in his life.

That makes sense. One of the Death Cult’s worst evils is banishing the concept of mercy from the popular consciousness. Sure, it lets its adherents indulge all the deadly sins without judgment. But its condemnations for violations of its own boutique pieties are ruthless. To the Cult, an apology is an admission of reprobation, not an occasion to extend forgiveness.

The Cult shows you what they fear by what they mock. A frequent call and response among Cultists entails mocking Christian forgiveness with the hypothetical of a rapist repenting on his deathbed and so meriting entry into Heaven with his victim. St. Maria Goretti testifies to the perversion of their thinking.

It’s no wonder that the more self-aware Cultists find the Christian doctrine of remission of sins so compelling. Emphasizing Christ’s offer of absolution for one’s past transgressions seems like a good method of evangelizing to the Death Cult.

“It was seeing other people who have sinned beyond anything I could ever conceptualize also being found in Christ that made me feel like, ‘Oh, that gives me hope,'” LaBeouf told the bishop. “I started hearing experiences of other depraved people who had found their way in this, and it made me feel like I had permission.”

LaBeouf plays the titular character in “Padre Pio,” a film helmed by Abel Ferrara exploring the life of the Franciscan Capuchin mystic.

No one who still draws breath is beyond saving. LaBeouf’s conversion story is an important reminder that even the most fervent enemies of the Church can have Road to Damascus moments.

We should pray for the same for all our enemies.

Read the whole article here.

And watch Bishop Barron’s interview with Shia.

I’ve been asked if the Padre Pio movie will be any good, or just another Hollywood skinsuit.

The director, Abel Ferrara, is a lifelong Catholic known for operating outside the Hollywood system. He’s already made a movie about the Blessed Virgin Mary, so this isn’t his first time tackling religious subjects.

We’ll have to wait and see.

Meanwhile, for a horror-adventure grounded in Catholic theology, read my debut novel.

Nethereal - Brian Niemeier

19 Comments

  1. Jim

    “because it feels like they’re not selling me a car”

    Damn, he nails it. Shia LeBeouf is my brother now. Neat!

    Also, that kid saint thing… I don’t think I have that capacity for forgiveness.

    • Xavier Basora

      Brian,

      I listen to the first part of the interview. I’ll listen to the rest. But based on the first 20 minutes,I concour with your assessment, he seems to have a depth I don’t notice in other Hollywood actors. Perhaps his suffering and Padre Pio’s intercession played roles? In any case, I hope he grows and I’m sure he’s ready to be mocked and cancelled.
      Well I’ll keep in my prayers.
      xavier

    • One of my friends who’s converting was in the process of choosing between a NO and a Latin mass parish. One thing that decided him on the latter was his sense that when they struck up the pipe organ for the Mystery of Faith in the NO church, it was like they were cutting to commercial.

  2. “It’s no wonder that the more self-aware Cultists find the Christian doctrine of remission of sins so compelling.”

    Back when I was a practicing pagan and occultist, there was a fellow I watched on Youtube very heavily who emphasized that Christians were bad and were basically the prototype for progressivism because they believed in forgiveness. He emphasized that certain people should never be forgiven, that forgiveness and charity and humility were unmanly, etc…

    He also worshipped the devil under the name of some roman deity, did satanic rituals in a nazi “temple” and by his own admission had a vision of the Virgin Mary where he was utterly terrified and traumatized for life.

    Food for thought.

  3. CantusTropus

    God Be Praised indeed! It goes to show us that God really is all-powerful and that we really aren’t as smart as we think we are. After all, who would ever have predicted that the most serious Christians in entertainment would be Kanye West and Shia LaBeouf?

  4. Rudolph Harrier

    The only way not to be divided is to be one in Christ.

  5. Saint Maria Goretti is the answer I always give to “What do you have to say about good Christians who are tortured and murdered?”

    We say that we love our enemies and do good to those who persecute us.

  6. Abel Ferrara, in his own words, has as much respect for Buddha and Muhammed as he does for Jesus Christ, claiming all three changed the world with their passion and love of other human beings. He denies his interest in Buddhism is even a conversion, the implication being that he was basically only Catholic because he happened to live in Italy.

    His earlier film on Mary is a very weird movie about a woman who played Mary Magdalene in a fictional film about Jesus (unless you’re thinking of another film of his I’m unaware of), and the director of that fictional movie, grappling with their faith. This director is also known for making pornography in the past.

    All of this is to say, be hopeful, but temper your expectations.

      • Update: St. Pio is shown dropping F-bombs and some of the clips I’ve seen look sussy.

        I don’t doubt Shia had a personal conversion, but I’m not so sure about his director given that and what Bellomy just said.

        • *Shia in the movie St. Pio, just want to make that 100% clear, Michael Lofton covered it on his show.

        • My understanding is that Padre Pio was not known for using foul language, so I9m still cautiously hopeful.

          • We’ll have to wait and see. I’m definitely not seeing it on opening night – not until I get the word from people I trust.

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