"Passion" on Review at the Vatican

Exclusive Interview With Father Di Noia of the Doctrinal Congregation

VATICAN CITY, DEC. 8, 2003 (Zenit.org).- Several high-ranking Vatican officials who attended a private screening of Mel Gibson's "The Passion of the Christ" this past weekend in Rome came away impressed.

Members from the Vatican Secretariat of State, the Pontifical Council for Social Communications, and the Congregation for the Doctrine of the Faith, the group that oversees Catholic doctrinal questions, expressed unanimous appreciation and approval of the film.

The following is an exclusive ZENIT interview with one of the viewers, Dominican Father Augustine Di Noia, undersecretary of the doctrinal congregation. Father Di Noia taught theology in Washington, D.C., for 20 years, and served for seven years as the theologian for the U.S. bishops' conference before coming to work for Cardinal Joseph Ratzinger at the doctrinal congregation a little over a year ago.

The film is scheduled for release in 2004.