"Questioning Faith" Documentary to be Shown at University of Richmond
February 18, 2005
“Questioning Faith,” Macky Alston’s feature documentary about people wrestling with faith in the face of tragedy or hardship, will be shown Feb. 24 at the University of Richmond.
The movie will begin at 6:30 p.m. in Cannon Memorial Chapel. Following the screening, Alston will lead a discussion.
Upon the death of his former seminary classmate and close friend, Alan Smith, a young inner-city chaplain, Alston returns to the seminary and decides to make the film. Viewers see Alston study with cutting-edge theologians, work as a hospital chaplain and search for people who are wrestling with similar questions. He travels from Memphis to Maine in his search to learn how people can maintain faith in the face of the seemingly random devastations of life.
Along the way, he meets people like a teenager who suffered the loss of her father to suicide and her cousin to murder only to find herself through Buddhism. He also meets a seminary doorman who “partly” lost his faith in Dachau along with his Orthodox Rabbi father and the rest of his family, a Muslim woman who sees angels during brain surgery and an African-American pastor who sees his 15-year struggle with cancer as an opportunity to connect with other suffering people in her congregation.
The program, which is sponsored by the University of Richmond Office of the Chaplaincy, is free and open to the public.