Father Stu is a 2022 biography movie written and directed by Rosalind Ross at the beginning of his series. Film star Mark Wahlberg, who also produces, as Stuart Long, a boxer pastor who became a Catholic with inclusion body myositis. Every religion in the world has stories or accounts (as believers can choose) that unexpectedly men turn to faith and find themselves in it for what they see as divine intervention.
The human drama movie “Father Stu” tells the story of one such experience of former American cleric Stuart Long. Despite having heart-wrenching plays from Mark Wahlberg and Mel Gibson, the movie is still a multi-faceted viewing experience, with an amazing first hour when it loses its original appeal and seems forced.
Father Stu: Movie Synopsis
Stuart Long is an amateur boxer from Helena, Montana with a dirty mouth and troubled relationships with his mother and alcoholic father. His brother Stephen died at the age of six, which led to a family breakdown and his parents’ religious intolerance. He moves to southern California to try to make it into an actor and get a job at a grocery store, thinking everyone buys groceries and it will be easier to connect to the entertainment industry. He has been arrested for DUI and is trying to steal his father’s truck to get to the interview.
While working in a store, he met a woman named Carmen, who followed him to the local Catholic church, where she served as a volunteer Sunday-school teacher. Carmen resists her progress at first, but Stu insists. She tells him that she would not even consider dating him unless he was baptized. Stu agrees and starts RCIA in the church. He becomes a friend of the believer Ham but is looked down upon by another man named Jacob. Both Ham and Jacob are on their way to seminary. Stu is baptized in the parish. He and Carmen began dating and later met her parents.
Stu finds a place to stay and tries to clean up his drinking which plays a significant role in the inexperienced. However, he faces a dilemma and returns to the bar one night when a mysterious man gives him advice and tells him not to drive home. Stu ignored the advice and drove off on a drunken motorcycle, crashed into a car, and was thrown into a motorcycle and overturned.
Deeply hurt, he is drowning and losing her mind and has the vision of the Blessed Mother telling him that he will not die in vain. After the arrival of the EMTs, Stu was taken to the hospital, where a doctor told Stu’s mother that he would die. Soon he begins to move to the hospital and begins to miraculously recover. His father visits and regains contact, although their relationship is still very difficult.
Carmen visits Stu as he recovers at home and they both have sex, which she has previously said she will not do before marriage, leading to deep regret for the two of them. Stu confesses his sin and begins to transform himself into the man Mary asked him to be. He begins to feel a call to the priesthood, and after prayer and understanding, he decides to continue the seminary.
He asks Carmen to bring him to the restaurant when she thinks he will propose marriage. When he tells her about his plans, she tries to persuade him not to, as his mother and father did, but to no avail. Stu works at a seminary and was initially rejected, but visits in person to appeal to the pastor and is accepted. Meanwhile, Ham and Jacob are also in the seminary. Ham is a trusted friend, but Jacob is a rival.
One day while playing basketball with some seminary students, Stu falls and cannot stand alone. He was diagnosed with the inclusion of body myositis, a rare muscle disorder similar to Lou Gehrig’s incurable disease that often does not strike young people like he is, and the prognosis is poor. Stu is angry with God but comes to understand his suffering as a gift from God that brings him closer to the sufferings of Christ, and with great difficulty continues in the seminary.
Carmen, now engaged to another man, visits him in seminary and supports his work. After some time, he begins to lose the use of his hands. The pastor tells Stu he cannot be ordained, citing his inability to celebrate the Sacraments of the Catholic Church. Stu returns to Montana with his parents, who care for him as his muscles continue to decompose, his weight increases, and he loses the ability to live independently.
Believers at Stu and Carmen’s church in California asked the Diocese of Helena to ordain Stu, the bishop agreed, and Stu was ordained in Montana with Carmen, Ham, and his parents. Father Stu began the ministry and soon built relationships with the people of Montana. In time, He was confined to a nursing home, where he continued to serve the people of the diocese, who flocked to see him daily. Jacob visits him there and in the midst of confession, he confesses that he never felt he could be a priest but pursued it to please his father.
Father Stu assures him that there are other ways to serve God and that he does not need to be pressured into doing something he is not called to do. After confessing his sins, Jacob thanks Father Stu and wishes him farewell, feeling that this will be the last time. Father Stu, dies at the age of 50. The closing credits show real photos of Stu from his childhood and the turmoil of his young age up to his time in the seminary and as a priest.
Father Stu Ending, Explained: What Happened At The End?
One morning during this time, Stu’s parents dressed him in formal attire, and Bill also dressed very nicely, in contrast to his usual behavior, which made Stu wonder where they might be. The son knows what is going to happen and is even more upset when his father’s truck breaks down in the middle of the road, and the father is confined to a wheelchair.
They finally arrived at the church where Stu was attending the seminary and was met by Kathleen and Carmen. At first thinking about why they wanted to marry him as he had so little time to live, Stu saw a large crowd gathered in the church to attend Mass, with his pastor and other pastors waiting for him. Carmen now tells him that the parishioners had made a special request to the Diocese of Helena to ordain Stu as a priest, and the bishop granted the request.
Stu is anointed, and holds his first Mass where he preaches about his life and character, compares it to the suffering of Jesus Christ himself, and states how he now views his suffering as a great gift from God. He soon had good relations with the religious people in Montana and continued preaching even after he was admitted to the intensive care unit when his condition worsened.
He also holds confession when people line up outside to hear him speak, and Jacob visits him to confess his sins. The young man admits that he was constantly pressured by his parents to become a priest and that they never really cared about him. Father Stu asks him to try other ways of serving God, as forcing actions on him is not true devotion and therefore does not deserve pain.
“Father Stu” ends here with audio and video clips of a boxer who became a real pastor and continued to practice his religion until his death at the age of fifty. The self-esteem that comes with a man, as portrayed in the film, is not only easy for his life but also for his parents, who seem to finally have peace and acceptance in their final lives.
Bill also joins a support group to help with his drinking, and he realizes that despite the loss of both sons, spending his whole life in love and supporting his wife is the only way to have peace. In this way, the once violent man who became a priest did not help thousands of people but perhaps only a few hundred people around him.
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