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A few weeks ago, I received an e-mail message from a reporter who was working on a story about sexual abuse allegations against the former Roman Catholic bishop of Springfield, Massachusetts. “I’m looking for a religion scholar,” the reporter wrote, “who could speak to how an organized religion maintains or reaffirms its role as moral arbiter when there is scandal within.”

However one assesses Mel Gibson’s The Passion of the Christ, the film has drawn attention to the death of Jesus in a way that preachers and teachers, who annually labor to place Good Friday before their people, can only envy. One could scarcely have imagined that the crucifixion would become a topic for movie reviewers and talk show hosts.