To some this may sound completely baffling. Why would I recommend a film about the journalists who reported on the sex scandal within the Catholic Church to Catholics? Wouldn't they be mad that an important institution within their lives is being criticized? Well, that's exactly why they should watch it.

Like many within my home city, I grew up in a Catholic household. I went to a Catholic grade school and high school. It's safe to say that I've had the teachings of Catholicism ingrained in me since birth. This, however, gives an institution, like the Church, near unquestionable authority in the lives of the people who believe in their teachings.

One of the hardest things to do while I was growing up was coming to terms with the fact that the Catholic Church was a fallible institution run by flawed people. I feel like this is something a lot of religious people need to learn. People need to learn that their spirituality and earthly institutions are not necessarily one in the same and that those institutions need to face the same consequences for their actions that everyone else does.

These are the same problems the characters within the film face. The film takes place in Boston, which is a very Catholic city, and almost all of the characters are or were Catholic. As the story unfolds and the full scope of the scandal begins to show, many of the characters begin to have crises of faith and start feeling depressed that this religious institution that was integral throughout their entire lives.

As hard as it is to deal with these feelings, the reporters decide that they still need to report the story in order to hold the flawed system accountable. As painful as it is to see institutions that we are taught to respect and obey like religion, law enforcement, and the government fail people, it's important that we hold those institutions responsible for their behavior or else people will keep getting hurt.

The film also points out how a church having so much power within the city and its people isn't always a good thing. Throughout the film the reporters face opposition from not just the Catholic Church, but from longtime friends and relatives who are religious people who want to keep a scandal from hurting their church. To them, that seems more important than the institution having to face any justice for protecting pedophile priests. It shows how people of faith within the community can often pressure others into silence, whether intentionally or unintentionally.

"Spotlight" is often regarded as a great example of investigative journalism on film. While I feel that's true, it also serves as a study of institutional religious power within American culture and how it can often condition and manipulate people into staying silent when it comes to the crimes it's committing. Every Catholic, or any religious person, should watch this film because it teaches you to think critically about religious institutions and how we should actually hold them responsible when they hurt others and try to sweep it under the rug. We would all be living in a better place if we learned to keep our institutions in check.