A Twist of Faith...

Once again I have fallen in love . . . with a character from a 2009 Finnish film called "Letters to Father Jacob." Father Jacob has spent untold years living alone in a rectory in the pristine woodlands of outerlying Helsinki. He seems content, he seems patient, he seems dedicated to his mission of receiving letters requesting prayer and returning encouraging words from the Holy Scriptures which we learn later he has never read himself because he has always been blind. Still, he sees far more than most of us.

One day a woman in the nearby penitentiary is pardoned after believing for over a decade she would spend her life imprisoned. The prison official releasing her encourages her to fulfill a priest’s request for an assistant to help him read his mail and pen his responses. With no ties to family or friends, having severed all contact during her incarceration, Leila has no where else to go so finds her way to Father Jacob’s home.

Every day the mailman brings letters, and with deep concern Father Jacob prays and responds as this is his life’s purpose. Leila is a woman of few words; her facial expressions speak loudly of her contempt that the old man is wasting his time. Then one day the letters stop coming.

While the story is somewhat predictable, it is far from cliche. And while things happen that are heartbreaking, the quiet, persistent power of faith—or rather, the power of love—will open anyone’s heart who needs, as Father Jacob says, "to believe that there is someone watching over them."

It is not preachy. Not a sermon. Not even a morality tale. It is not soft. Tender is not the word, either. But it is poignant and beautifully crafted. It is a love letter that ends just like you expect it to. With a profound twist on what you believe, or fear, about having a purpose in life.

The above is a summary review. But here is my further reflection with spoilers. I marvel at how thoroughly and powerfully Christian Catholic the film is. There is a clever and clear message that it isn’t just about the pardon, but about the discipleship—and that word may have become too specialized when really what it means is time and patience are needed in a relationship where one is given the space and invitation to feel safe enough to learn what the gift of being pardoned really and deeply is. But the gift isn’t just one way.

These two characters are revealed in the subtle exchanges. Jacob several times insinuates Leila’s corroboration signifies companionship, a shared mission, and each time he takes that liberty, she summarily slaps him back into his loneliness. Likewise she is hardened against believing these letters matter at all; they seem silly and a waste of time and she even throws more than half of one day’s stack down the well.

When the letters stop coming, it is natural to assume that it’s the terrified mailman who is simply withholding them because of his fear of Leila, the "Lifer." But Jacob has no knowledge of their conflict or the threat the mailman has increasingly felt. All he knows is that every day the mailman on his bicycle turns before coming to the parsonage. He wrestles with this profoundly to the point where he contrives, or hallucinates, that he is needed for a wedding ceremony, needed for a funeral. He fears his life has lost meaning. He visibly struggles in prayer, his spirit is tormented; no one needs him. He struggles with the inevitability of the end of his life. This is his "Gethsemane" where he is coming to terms with death. Leila comes to find him and is horrified by his insanity and when she storms out of the little church, he takes his final Eucharist and stretches out in front of the altar to die.

Leila goes back to the rectory, packs, calls a cab and tries to leave but can’t—not because she can’t leave the old man, as some film reviewers suggest, but because she has despaired that she has no where to go, and Jacob has lost his mind, so she tries to hang herself in the bedroom.

However, Jacob’s purpose isn’t finished yet. He is awakened by the leak in the roof gently dripping water on his face. Leila manages to recover herself and take the rope off her neck when he comes into the house. A momentary sense of hope sweeps over his face in finding she is still there, he’s no doubt heard the taxi come and go. Yet he takes himself to bed as the days continue without letters. Leila confirms it isn’t the mailman hoarding them and instructs him to come the following day at the usual time to announce that there are letters—she intends to retrieve the letters from the well but that is a lost cause, laying the ground work for mutual redemption.

The mailman comes and shouts "Letter for Father Jacob" as he was instructed, but there are no letters; he hands her a catalogue. She will have to make up letters. As Leila takes this profound step of attempting to protect Father Jacob from despair, she succeeds in opening her own heart. Their relationship has become mutual in their gift to one another. Neither is aware of this, of course, but to keep Jacob from wholly losing heart, Leila begins to "read" a letter which is, of course, her own story, and now as they are truly entering the space of trust and reciprocation where they sit together outside under the enormous tree that shelters their wicker chairs and small table, she is at confession. What I find fascinating is that the depth of her confession is not that she murdered the man who was abusing her sister, but that she believed that in doing so, or not doing it sooner, has ruined her sister’s life. This is her guilt, her core for remorse: a broken relationship.

Leila, now at the point of openness, can receive the gift Jacob has had waiting by the side of his bed—the stack of letters her sister wrote asking Jacob for prayer. There were hints all along that he was responsible for her pardon, and we suspect that something like this has transpired. Her sister has "never stopped writing" and longs for word from her sister, longs for the relationship to be restored. Now the journey has come full circle and Leila is not only free from prison, she is free to go home to her sister who has never given up on the hope of reunion.

Ultimately, though, for Leila to be truly pardoned, to fully realize her freedom beyond being physically pardoned from life in prison, Jacob has had to walk a difficult stretch of his own path to the epiphany he is given before death. His revelation is, for me, far more profound than Leila’s. He has believed his whole life that he is helping God, that he is helping to bring people closer to God through his prayers by way of this correspondence. He comes to realize, humbly, that perhaps he is not helping God so much as God is helping him by bringing letters to him so that he feels needed, and this is how God has daily brought him closer to Himself. In this way, the intimacy of a mutually giving relationship is completed for Jacob. All that he has seen on behalf of others lands in his own heart that he, too, has needed someone to watch over him, and now has needed to learn intimately that Someone has been watching over him all along.

The most surprising thing about the film is that it is only 75 minutes long. It is so successfully captivating, enthralling, that immersion is inevitable and transportation into this other world, into the depths of these two characters, is complete and sustaining.

If you have read this whole reflection prior to seeing this film, I sincerely hope it hasn’t taken the place of your desire to experience the film yourself. No doubt, a masterful story like this has the capacity to bring a slightly different gift to each viewer. Please see the film yourself.