"...these men: wrapped in blankets, their piercing eyes sunk in gaunt faces framed by matted hair, they had an ascetic otherness that was inescapably Christlike and unforgettable for a child of the time." - McQueen (Director)
"When Jesus was baptized, his baptism was not only the inauguration of his mission, but also a revelation of the shockingly unexpected nature of his mission. His baptism becomes a vignette of his own ministry. Why so shocking? On two occasions, Jesus uses "baptism" to refer to his own impending death. He asks his halfhearted disciples, 'Can you drink the cup that I must drink, or be baptized with the baptism with which I must be baptized?'
...Jesus 'baptism', begun in the Jordan and completed on Golgotha, is repentence, self-denial, metanoia to the fullest...seek[ing] even more radical metanoia. His message is not the simple one of [John] the Baptist, 'Be clean'. Jesus' word is more painful - 'Be killed'." - Willimon (Lenten Reading)
"So that's what I see reflected in the mirror of Christ's crucifixion: my death. My rightful punishment. My sin and it's just consequence. Me. And precisely because it is so accurate, the sight is nearly intolerable." - Wangerin (Lenten Reading)
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