*Spoilers are to be expected*
“For Satan himself often masquerades as an angel of light.”
– 2 Corinthians 11:14
In the 2024 horror film, Immaculate, Sydney Sweeney plays Cecilia Jones, a woman from the outskirts of Detroit who believes she was rescued by God at the age of seven when she fell through some ice and into freezing water. While seeking the purpose God had spared her life for in this metaphorical baptism, she accepts an invitation to practice as a nun at a convent in the Italian countryside, her own church back in the States having closed due to low attendance.
While in this foreign land where she does not speak the language, she discovers that the convent contains a Holy Relic acquired during the Crusades: one of the iron nails that had suspended Christ from the cross. She later discovers that Father Sal Tedeschi, played by Álvaro Morte, has been using the genetic material derived from the blood, tissue and bone found on the nail to try and resurrect Jesus. There had been 20 years of failure in this endeavour but now, according to Tedeschi, Sister Cecilia will be the first woman to successfully give birth to a biological replica of the Messiah.
Commentary on the film has mentioned that both the title and plot refer to the common misapprehension that the ‘Immaculate Conception’ refers to the virgin birth of Jesus Christ when it actually refers to Mary herself being born without sin. At time of writing there are two ‘factual errors’ mentioned on IMDb, both of which make the same point.
Unfortunately, this is one of those cases where people, having discovered something they believe to be misunderstood by others, disdainfully correct them by adding a further layer of misinformation and obfuscating the reality. Neither the title nor the plot of the film necessarily refer to ‘The Immaculate Conception’ of Mary, though It is perhaps understandable that audiences, upon seeing the title and discovering that the plot features a ‘virgin birth’, make the connection in their own head and think it an error on the part of the filmmakers.
Aside from in the title of the film, the word ‘immaculate’ never appears in the script and therefore neither does the phrase ‘immaculate conception’. The only time it comes close to being mentioned is when Sister Cecilia is told, having discovered that she is pregnant despite never having had sexual intercourse, that the child will be ‘born without sin’, which is the meaning of the word ‘immaculate’ in this context. Jesus was also without sin, as the bible itself mentions on more than one occasion, for example, in 2 Corinthians 5:21:
‘Christ was without sin, but for our sake God made him share our sin in order that in union with him we might share the righteousness of God.’
The whole point of Mary herself being immaculately conceived is so that Jesus himself would also be born without sin. In this instance, however, the clone of Jesus would also be without sin, having never been conceived in the sinful act of procreation at all. There is also the remote possibility that Sister Cecilia, as the second incarnation of Christ’s mother, could have been immaculately conceived, as we are never told anything about her parentage. In fact, we are never told anything of Cecilia’s history apart from the incident with the ice, about which the convent retains a copy of an article printed in a local newspaper. It is implied that because of this history she might be more susceptible to the temptations of being one of their experimental subjects, but they could also have been following her progress because they believe she had been immaculately conceived.
Whether or not this is the case can only be a matter of speculation, but Sister Cecilia herself is also ‘immaculate’ in another sense, that of being clean and spotless. She takes the vows of obedience, poverty and chastity, and at the beginning of the film is so pure that she is unable to cut the head off a chicken they are presumably going to eat. Later, she must have overcome her reluctance to kill in order to use a chicken’s blood to fake a miscarriage and thereby be taken to hospital and escape the convent. By the time the credits roll it is implied, though not shown, that she is entirely capable of killing not just a human, but her own baby. She is no longer immaculate.
It is implied that she kills the baby because, while she is pregnant, she comes to believe that the mission of the convent in producing the second coming of Christ is neither their real intention nor what God would have wanted. Because we see the events of the film from the point of view of Sister Cecilia, we are inclined to agree with her assessment of the situation that the institution is not benevolent, but there is scant evidence for her belief within the film itself. One of the moments that nudges the audience towards this frame of mind is when Sister Cecilia sees the excerpt from 2 Corinthians 11:14 scrawled behind a portrait in her bedroom, that ‘Satan himself often masquerades as an angel or light’. She comes to believe the quote is applicable to the inhabitants the convent.
While the actions undertaken by the religious of the convent suggest they are not good people, as when they cut out the tongue of Sister Gwen, played by Benedetta Porcaroli, because she vociferously dissents in front of the other nuns, this does not necessarily mean that their intentions in bringing about the second coming of Christ are not sincere. In fact, it could be argued that this act is brought about to quell any potential revolt and thereby ensure the birth of the saviour.
The final few scenes see Sister Cecilia escape the convent while giving birth to what could be a clone of Jesus but could also be the Antichrist. In the very final scene before it cuts to the credits, we see Sister Cecilia about to smash the infant with a rock and kill it. She hears a deep gurgling sound coming from the baby, so unlike the bawling of newborns, and comes to believe it is evil, just as the audience are also encouraged to believe. We, however, never see the infant in this scene, and there remains the possibility that the child she about to murder is actually the second coming of Jesus; that Sister Cecilia has just murdered the Messiah; and that it is Sister Cecilia who is Satan himself masquerading as an angel of light.