Henry's Natural Urges

You can sense the extreme tension from the beginning in Henry Gamble’s Birthday Party, streaming on Netflix. Henry is turning 17, and his middle-class suburban parents are throwing him a pool party.

Henry is the son of an Evangelical minister, and his family would like to project a squeaky clean, wholesome, happy image, but everyone in the family and many of their friends are dealing with issues they can’t discuss openly.

***SPOILERS***

Henry invites boys over for sleepovers, and he asks sexy questions about girls they like before drifting off so they’ll need to masturbate. He keeps a bundle of fresh socks by the bed just for the occasion.

His older sister is now a student at a Christian college, and she is so freaked out that she lost her virginity that at first we can’t help but suspect it was date rape, but no, the sex was consensual and the boy was nice and someone she’s known and trusted for a while. It’s just that good Christian girls don’t do “that.”

One of the moms at the party is disturbed by how much skin the girls are showing, and she is obsessed by young people engaged in porn and prostitution. We catch her looking at the girls.

Henry’s mom had an affair with the previous minister right before he died. He made her feel desirable.

Ricky is the son of the deceased minister, and I found him and his situation most fascinating and compelling. He’s a young adult, but apparently his emotional maturity is stunted. He still follows his mother around, and he enjoys youth gatherings like the pool party. He doesn’t know how to make friends outside the church circle.

The previous summer, he went to the annual youth church camp as he probably has done since he was 10, but he got a chubby in the shower in front of two other boys, so now everyone is wondering if Ricky is gay, and they want to limit his contact with their sons. Ricky is feeling the heat. He’s ashamed and confused.

Ricky serves as a counterpoint to Henry. This could be where Henry is headed if he doesn’t break out of this environment.

The camera follows Ricky into the bathroom. We watch him take a dump, and we see the shadow of his penis and balls hanging down. That’s something you don’t usually see in films, and at first I was surprised by it, but then I understood this was a critical scene. All of these people have physical bodies with physical needs and functions. They eat and drink. They like to get drunk and high. They shit and piss. They get horny and want to fuck. They’re alive. But they have turned their religion into a body shaming and denying cult. And it is making them crazy.

Doing The Right Thing

Martin Luther King said, “…we are not satisfied and will not be satisfied until justice rolls down like water and righteousness like a mighty stream.” He was, of course, paraphrasing Amos from the Old Testament. Amos was particularly concerned about the poor and downtrodden and how they were treated. The justice he referred to was social justice, so it’s apt that King would quote him. Just before the part about justice and righteousness, God says, according to Amos, he doesn’t care about your religious festivals, or assemblies, or sacrifices or singing. You want to worship God, then be righteous, which means treat others with kindness and respect.

Bart Ehrman, the agnostic Biblical scholar and early Christian historian, claims in his new book, The Triumph of Christianity, there is a strong possibility that Christianity would have become the dominate religion in the West even if Emperor Constantine hadn’t issued the Edict of Milan and promoted the religion. Ehrman goes on to claim that one of the major reasons for this is because Christianity offered a more compassionate and ethical worldview. He readily admits and points out that Christians could do horrible things in the name of their religion, but still there is this advocacy for righteousness, honesty and concern for the poor and less advantaged.

We are all shaped by our culture no matter if we’re consciously aware of it or not. Every day I see righteous statements from friends, many of whom aren’t particularly religious, and some are hostile toward religion. Christianity has been and continues to be used in nefarious ways. Many of us have been greatly harmed. But I wonder if our society would be as concerned about doing the right thing if Jewish and Christian influences hadn’t been part of our cultural heritage.