CONCLAVE

CONCLAVE is a fictional drama about the election of a new Catholic Pope where liberal, conservative and corrupt factions in the Roman Catholic Church vie for power, resulting in a couple big twists at the end. CONCLAVE is well acted with some highly dramatic moments, but the movie’s politically correct ending promotes moral and theological relativism, inserts a false definition of faith, deliberately mocks the leader of the conservative faction who warns against violent Muslim immigrants, and pushes deceitful LGBTQ propaganda.

Ralph (“Rafe”) Fiennes (“Finez”) plays Cardinal Lawrence, who’s tasked with leading the conclave to pick a new pope when the Pope dies. Mystery surrounds the dead pope’s actions before he died toward Cardinal Tremblay (John Lithgow), a man who Lawrence and his friend, Cardinal Bellini (Stanley Tucci), believe is corrupt. Also, the dead pope just recently promoted an unknown Latin American priest, Father Benitez, to Cardinal, which makes him part of the conclave.

Meanwhile, Cardinal Lawrence would like to see his liberal friend, Bellini, become the new pope. Both are strongly opposed to the leader of the conservative faction, Cardinal Tedesco, who strongly wants to be pope, to correct its liberal slide toward alleged heresy. Finally, a Cardinal from Africa named Adeyemi wants to be the first African pope. He seems to be a bit center-right.

Cardinal Lawrence is surprised when the new Cardinal Benitez starts leading a groundswell of support for Lawrence to become pope. This threatens Cardinal Bellini’s chances. It also enhances the chances that the corrupt Tremblay or the conservative Tedesco may become pope. Especially when Tremblay uncovers a scandal involving the African priest.

However, Lawrence and Bellini uncover some corrupt actions on Cardinal Tremblay’s part. They aren’t above using it against Tremblay, but it strengthens Tedesco’s hand.

Some major plot twists occur, leading to an unexpected ending.

CONCLAVE is well acted. So, it has several highly dramatic moments. However, it has a decidedly politically correct and leftist surprise ending promoting multiple examples of unbiblical, immoral and heretical ideas.

For example, the Cardinal Lawrence character gives a false, unbiblical, irrational definition of faith. In one scene, he starts railing against the very idea of “certainty.” He says certainty removes all sense of “doubt and, as such, destroys the Christian, biblical idea of faith. In the first place, his statement is totally irrational, because, at the same time this character attacks the idea of certainty, he comes across as totally certain about his belief about certainty. His statement is inherently self-contradictory and therefore self-refuting and irrational. In addition, the Bible defines faith in Hebrews 11:1 as having confidence in the hope for eternal life that Jesus presented to his followers in His teachings and the “evidence” of the actions and teachings about Jesus that He and His followers present to us in the biblical text and in the living line of apostles, apostles, followers and church leaders that came in the wake of early Christianity from the Book of Acts, onward, including the New Testament epistles and the writings of the early Christians that followed the apostles. Thus, biblical faith, which is based on Divine revelation undermines all sense of doubt and ultimately eliminates it. The movie’s speech on certainty, doubt and faith is extremely shallow and superficial.

Secondly, the movie’s ending promotes moral and intellectual relativism. For example, the conservative cardinal starts railing against the moral and intellectual relativism that’s infected the Catholic Church and modern society. He says such relativism has destroyed all sense of moral truth and knowledge. He says this has led to churches and society teaching that Christianity, Islam and other Non-Christian religions are morally and intellectually equivalent instead of teaching that Christianity or Roman Catholicism are morally and intellectually superior. At this point, the movie has the conservative cardinal go into an hysterical rant against Muslims that becomes extremely bigoted. In having this scene play out in this way, the movie validates the moral and intellectual relativism that Cardinal Lawrence and his friend, Cardinal Bellini, have embraced and promoted in the movie, especially at the end. Like Lawrence’s lecture about certainty, the movie’s promotion of moral relativism is self-contradictory and therefore false and irrational. Like many relativists, Lawrence and Bellini are self-righteously certain and adamant about their uncertainty and moral, intellectual relativism.

Thirdly, by having the conservative cardinal go into such an emotional and bigoted rant, CONCLAVE superficially mocks and ridicules the cardinal’s conservative positions. In doing that, the movie doesn’t really refute the conservative cardinal’s well-reasoned opposition to moral and intellectual relativism in the beginning of his speech. It also doesn’t refute people’s concerns about all the Anti-Christian, Antisemitic and violent Muslim immigrants that have invaded Italy and Europe for the last 30 years. Not all cultures are morally equivalent. The Islamic culture has many bad traits that undermine the biblical heritage that played such a huge role in creating Western Civilization in Europe, Great Britain and the United States. That biblical heritage has already been undermined in the last 150 years by secular, atheist and pagan elements in Western society. Islam represents another big threat, especially since it’s based on an Anti-Christian, Antisemitic, hateful ideology filled with false historical assertions that have little basis in fact.

Finally, the movie’s politically correct ending pushes LGBTQ lies and propaganda. For example, without giving away the movie’s final twist, the ending adopts the false term of “intersex” promoted by LGBTQ activists in recent years. In doing so, the movie pushes the false, unscientific notion that sexual identity is a continuum. This notion is totally false. Every person, including males who have some physical traits associated with females, and females who have some physical traits associated with males, are still born as male or female. Even people born with physical traits of both sexes will tend to favor one sex or another. Also, contrary to what the movie’s ending claims, no one is ever born with fully functional male reproductive organs and hormones AND fully functional female reproductive organs and hormones. In reality, there is no such thing as an “intersex” person. Also, persons with significantly undeveloped or mutated reproductive organs and/or hormones account for, at the most, only one in every 1500 people.

Some real life Roman Catholic cardinals, priests and nuns tolerate, support or even promote homosexual and/or transgender ideology. Such leaders are in severe error biblically and according to Catholic doctrine and teachings, as well as Protestant and Orthodox Church doctrine and teachings. They’re also in severe error scientifically. CONCLAVE is in serious error as well. The movie’s promotion of moral and intellectual relativism and its promotion of a false definition of faith are also abhorrent. Finally, its badly written mockery and ridicule of the conservative cardinal is a shallow, bigoted and hateful straw man argument, a clear example of artistic slander.

“Do not bear false witness” – God, Exodus 20:16.