The Silence of God: The Meaning of Our Suffering and Redemption

Makoto Fujimura, world-famous contemporary painter with global cultural influence, talks about his art, his thinking and writing about Shūsaku Endō's novel Silence (1966), and his work on Martin Scorsese's film Silence (2016). I ask him about Scorsese’s long collaborative friendship with Akira Kurosawa and his participation in Kurosawa’s Dreams (1990).

Mako also describes his work with his wife, Haejin Shim Fujimura, for Embers International and Kintsugi Academy, protecting and serving women and children in the brothels of Mumbai who are in danger of exploitation and trafficking.

Both in the lives of the suffering poor and in the trials of struggling Christians, Mako sees redemptive beauty that he compares to the Japanese art of kintsugi in which broken vessels are lovingly restored with gold and lacquer and to our Lord, Jesus Christ, who is always pictured with His five wounds.

• Embers International website.
• Silence (2016), official trailer
• Art & Theology: Mr. Fujimura explains 'Kintsugi Theology'
• Mr. Fujimura's essay, 'Kintsugi Generation'
• Mr. Fujimura's paintings, 'The Four Holy Gospels'
• David Brooks about Mako Fujimura, The New York Times, “Longing for an Internet Cleanse”
• Michael John Cusick with Mako Fujimura, Restoring the Soul Podcast, “Silence and Beauty: Part I, Ep. 13, and Part II, Ep. 14,” and again, “Kintsugi Reflects Life, Ep. 193”

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