The following post contains massive spoilers for the series Midnight Mass. Reader, you have been warned. 

Imagine this next line as read by Stefon, Bill Hader’s character from SNL: 

Midnight Mass has everything. A rural island community; a young, charismatic priest; supernatural shenanigans; stunning liturgical vestments; jokes about Ordinary Time. What more could you want? The poster alone was enough to have me hooked. Hamish Linklater, as Father Paul Hill, stands in his Roman clergy collar flanked by his co-stars with the words, “Be Not Afraid” shining in the darkness next to him. I mean, come on! 

This new limited series from Netflix and the creator of The Haunting of Hill House and The Haunting of Bly Manor centers around an isolated community, Crockett Island, and the mysterious new priest that arrives to fill in at its one and only church. The town is slowly dying; being drained by new regulations on fishing and the subsequent departure of many families to the mainland in search of more stable work. 

The island has one small church, the Catholic parish of St. Patrick’s, which provides a spiritual home for the residents. Like the town, it is clear the church has seen better days. The paint is chipping from the exterior and a handful of devotees worship in the sparse sanctuary each day. Monsignor Pruitt has been at St. Patrick’s for five decades and is away on a sabbatical as he nears the end of his ministry. The good father has taken ill on the mainland and the young Father Paul has been dispatched by the Archdiocese to fill the Monsignor’s shoes. 

The striking, cardigan clad priest is not the only mysterious new arrival on Crockett Island as the show begins.  

Into this setting, the Prodigal Son — Riley Flynn — returns home. The show opens with Riley’s journey back to the island after serving four years in prison for the drunk driving death of a young woman. Riley is haunted by the memory of the life he took, seeing her body each night as he closes his eyes to fall asleep.

From the outset, this show is clearly about these two men as representative figures for the village as a whole and human nature at its core. While the show is violent and almost comically bloody at times, it is also haunting to watch this dramatic and horrifying depiction of the joys and dangers of pastoral ministry.

When Father Paul Hill arrives on the island he is everything the parish has hoped for. He is young, charismatic, funny, and faithful. He has a very high view of the people of the island and what they could be. He is down-to-earth, wearing jeans and a cardigan with his clerical collar, but also reverent and purposeful about things that truly matter. He calls his flock to their better selves and to a deeper faith. 

And then the miracles begin. 

Healing starts spreading on the island like a benevolent plague. One man’s chronic back pain from a career as a fisherman disappears; another woman no longer needs her glasses. In perhaps the most shocking miracle of all, young Leeza Scarborough, who was paralyzed in a hunting accident, stands up out of her wheelchair and walks forward to receive communion. 

For a moment, all is well. The parish is booming as everyone on the island shows up to Mass to see the miraculous things that are happening.

As a pastor, I constantly fall victim to my ego and our cultural pressure to perform. I want the church to grow. I want my sermons to inspire. I want to do everything I can to achieve that most elusive miracle in the modern church — a growing congregation.

When I see Fr. Paul Hill’s congregation go from the faithful remnant to standing room only, I can feel the analysts in my head trying to glean what I can from his ministry. I can quickly ignore the fact that he lives in a horror show. 

When I listen to The Rise and Fall of Mars Hill podcast, I find a similar thing happening. My rational brain can acknowledge that there were so many problems with Mars Hill church and there continue to be very problematic pastoral paradigms that dominate in much of American Christianity. At the same time, I find myself thinking, “What if I took what worked well and wasn’t such an asshole? Could those Mars Hill miracles happen here too?”

The problem with this line of thought is the same problem in Midnight Mass. The miracles are a fabrication and the situation is actually a nightmare. 

In the final episode of Midnight Mass, Fr. Paul Hill has gathered the whole congregation for an Easter Vigil Mass that will finally see every parishioner participate in Fr. Hill’s miracle. Everyone will be given the gift of eternal life. Everyone will be young forever. Everything will be okay, finally. 

The trouble, of course, is that they all have to die first. For the “miracle” of Fr. Hill’s ministry to take place, the walls to the sanctuary must be covered in the blood of his flock.

When the dutiful parish secretary fills trays of cups with poison in a scene reminiscent of the Jonestown massacre, the truth of the situation becomes abundantly clear. Some of the faithful step forward and volunteer to die so that they can be reborn into new life. For a moment, one brief pause, there is actually a tenuous hope that it is all true. 

“Be not afraid!”, Fr. Paul yells over the increasingly loud, terrified cries from the congregation, but to no avail. Chaos breaks out and people turn on each other, literally devouring their neighbor to feed their insatiable hunger. Quickly, our miraculous pastor realizes that the miracles are not from God and he is not an angel after-all. But the damage is done. 

Riley Flynn is the Prodigal and, ultimately, a sort-of irreligious Christ figure. He sees the island as it actually is and not as it should be. In this way, he provides the ultimate model for the quiet, boring, and eventually self-sacrificial pastoral ministry. 

Riley is depressed when he arrives, still carrying the weight of his wrongs. He is skeptical of religion, having investigated many holy books while in prison. It is not surprising that he is skeptical of Fr. Paul Hill and his miracles. He can see that the people of Crockett Island don’t need flashy miracles, at least not the ones that are being peddled at St. Patrick’s.

When Riley somewhat accidentally becomes one of the first villagers that “receives the miracle” and becomes a vampire, he is under no illusion about the situation. Riley has killed someone before. He is haunted by the ghost of his actions and knows what happens after you take a life. 

Instead of chasing the blood-thirst that is taking over him, Riley warns his family about what is to come. He writes them notes explaining the truth behind Fr. Paul’s miracles. In his final moments, he tells this truth to his romantic interest as the sun rises, destroying him in her sight and proving that “the miracle” is a sham. 

This is the true image of pastoral ministry. It is not Fr. Paul Hill in his beautiful robes performing the double miracle of healing people and filling his pews. Those signs of wonder are actually a nightmare. Instead of real healing, his ministry offered poison and blood soaked walls. Just like the Mars Hill podcast, it was great for a moment. And then the sun rose.

Midnight Mass (and Mars Hill) is an old story. It holds up the fantasy of the miracle, the myth of progress, the dream of the right pastor, program, or ministry that will redeem us and make all things right. Behind every one of those stories is a nightmare. But that doesn’t keep us from telling the story and trying to live it out ourselves — it is hard to accept that the miracles that Jesus offers are not flashy. 

Miracles still happen every day but they often go unnoticed on Crockett Island and in our own lives.

Leeza Scarborough attends Mass everyday in her wheelchair, entering on a ramp that a church volunteer no doubt built for her. The town drunk gives sobriety one more try. Riley Flynn tells the truth and then offers himself to save those he loved.

The reconciled relationship, the second chance, the playful spirit that fills a once hardened heart. These are all miracles — boring, mundane miracles.

The biggest miracle of all is that God’s grace shines on us all, like that sun that insists on beaming brightly each morning. God’s grace shines on the self-righteous parish secretary who served poison as a means to a seemingly holy end. God’s grace shines on the pastor who’s Messiah complex has led to a bloodbath.       

Pastoral ministry is telling the truth and letting the Light destroy you. Or as Nikolaus Zinzendorf wrote, the call is to “preach the Gospel, die, be forgotten.” 

The world is a vampire. People come to church or click on the live streams after barely surviving a week of life-sucking misery. Everyone is being told to do more, work harder, hustle, grind, and perform miracles. People are losing jobs and loved ones. The distance between who people wish they were and who they actually are is vast.  

They are drained. We are drained. I am drained.

The church is the one place that should not suck the life out of you. The church offers the Good News that we don’t have to do it all. In fact, we can’t do it all. The church offers the Good News that we can come to the altar and be filled, but not by the poison of self-actualization that promises us new life or with the blood of our neighbors who dared to stand in the way of our march to perfection. 

Instead, we are filled with life that is offered by Jesus who “gave himself up for us, a fragrant offering and sacrifice to God.”

When Jesus appears to his disciples after the Miracle of all miracles, he does not desperately cry out, “Be Not Afraid!” or even “Look at me!” He does not return with a list of tasks or a poison cup to drink. Instead, he joins the disciples in their pain and grief. He comes to them at the point of their desperation and he offers his peace, his wounds, his new life. He sees them as they are and calls them by their names. Jesus offers the same to us now.

A miracle, indeed. 

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