A Birmingham chaplain's view on The Passion of the Christ

Thanks to Michael Pahl for this very negative reaction to The Passion of the Christ from a fellow Brummie:

Scandalous travesty of the gospels
The Rev. Stephen Barton, Chaplain to Birmingham Women's Hospital, emerged from the cinema feeling sick and angry.

This quotation will give you and idea of the tone of the review:

Many scenes are stereotypical “Jesus film” stock. There is a flashback to the sermon on the mount, which for me recalled The Life of Brian, but the best Brian moment was the release of Barabbas (again, dubious historically), as the latter’s glee is truly comic.

The other “joke” in the film is in a flashback to Jesus in his workshop turning out a three foot high table. Mary asks who it’s for. “A rich man” says, Jesus, his eye, like Gibson’s firmly on the market. “Must be a tall man” says Mary and she doubts whether anyone will every want such a thing. “It’ll catch on,” says Jesus.

It’s incredibly unfunny, and also racist. Still in Asia most people use low tables or none for eating. But here is Hollywood’s Christ, Founder of Western Civilisation.

Well I thought that scene both funny and delightful (and the line is actually Mary's, "It will never catch on"). To call this scene racist is a serious overreaction, to say the least. It is also not clear to me why the Sermon on the Mount scene would recall Life of Brian. There is nothing in that scene's composition or content that I found reminiscent of the famous scene from Brian.