So I had a rare evening without church commitments tonight. I chose to spend it at the theatre with a friend. We went to see “Anonymous,” a movie that speculates that Edward de Vere, Earl of Oxford, may have been the author of the plays attributed to one William Shakespeare.

At the end of the movie, my friend turned to me and asked what I thought of it. My reply? “I am still thinking.”

I thought about it all the way home (about a 40 drive) and even as I write this, my brain is still turning the movie over and over again. I am quite clear on the fact that I didn’t really enjoy the movie. I mean, it had all kinds of things going for it: good acting, good dialogue, great art direction, great cinematography, and I could go on.

But in the end, and at the centre of the film, is the theory that Shakespeare was not Shakespeare. That the man named William Shakespeare never wrote a play, a sonnet or even his own name. In the movie the man named William Shakespeare is a twerp – a man who fits under the title “village idiot” and is only out to make a buck. And that bugs me.

It bugs me because William Shakespeare is revered (by me, and by so many others), and I don’t like the thought that he doesn’t deserve to be.

Apparently I have a thing about people getting what they deserve. Of course, having said that…a verse of Scripture comes to mind: “But God demonstrates his own love for us in this: While we were still sinners, Christ died for us.” (Romans 5:8)

Or to put it another way – God loves us enough to give us what we do not deserve.

All of this makes my brain tired.