The Hand That Pulls The Strings: Godfather Trilogy Series

In the book, Don Corleone proclaims to the other dons, ’We are all men, who have refused to be fools, who have refused to be puppets dancing on a string, pulled by the men on high.’ But what does control us? Don’t we all, to some degree or other, have strings attached?

Take the past, for example. We can’t seem to escape it, and it affects us all. It is no good pretending otherwise. Then there is the issue of genetics: at a biological level, we are all complex chains of DNA, which seem in some way to determine who we are and who we are to become. Of course, it’s becoming ever easier to blame our behaviour on our genetic make-up. It’s tempting to abdicate responsibility for our actions, suggesting instead that it’s the fault of our genes.

You often hear people blaming their present behaviour on the way their parents have brought them up. ’I had a lousy background,’ they say. ’I only do what I saw my parents doing. It’s too late to change.’

The present also comes with strings attached. In today’s environment of global capitalism and market forces, there is enormous pressure to have everything, and to want more. Peer pressure also affects us. Have you ever done something wrong, only to say, ’My mates made me do it’? Force of habit is another good excuse: ’I have always done it; I can’t get out of it; I can’t break the bonds.’ And, of course, there’s the small matter of fate, destiny, bad luck or even a curse . . .

Freedom from the Ties that Bind

The strings of both the past and the present can only be broken by Jesus Christ. In the Bible, Psalm 129 states that ’the Lord is good; he has cut the cords used by the ungodly to bind me’. Elsewhere, God tells the prophet Hosea: ’I led them [the people of Israel] with cords of human kindness, with ties of love; I lifted the yoke from their neck and bent down to feed them’ (Hosea 11:4).

Can we ever escape our strings? In one sense, no. After all, a puppet without strings is a pile of wood. But we need oversight and guidance, not control.

At the beginning of time, Adam and Eve were tempted to break free from God, and disastrous consequences followed. They put themselves, and us, under the control of someone else, who pulls our strings and makes us dance towards destruction.

God holds the strings to salvation, but he never pulls them for us. He won’t force us into anything. He offers us the free gift of salvation through what Jesus has done on the Cross. But he will never compel us to accept that gift. We must choose of our own free will, and we must express that choice by honestly admitting our need of forgiveness.

Clip Two: Confession in the Garden

In another very powerful scene from the third film, Michael Corleone is speaking to an old priest outside a beautiful church building bordered with flowers. The priest picks a stone from a fountain, and asks Corleone to look at it. He smashes it open, and shows him that even though it’s been in water, the stone is bone dry inside. This, he says, is exactly the same as the people of Europe. They have been surrounded by the Christian faith, and yet Jesus does not live within them.