THE SECRET
By Stuart Urban
Director Nick Murphy
ITV
The Secret is a four-part mini-series screened recently by ITV.
It recounts a true story – some readers may remember the case being reported on national news some five years ago – of an apparently respectable dentist, Colin Howell (played by James Nesbitt), who murdered his wife and his lover’s husband, making their deaths look like a double suicide. The horror of the situation is brought into sharper focus by the fact that the protagonists and their victims were all members of Coleraine Baptist Church in Northern Ireland.
Controversial
The making of this drama, and indeed its screening on national television, is not without controversy; family members of all those involved are still around, and some of these people, having suffered the consequences of the original crime, have stated in print that they are hurt and angry at the portrayal on screen of their loved ones and the tragedy that engulfed them all. One can only sympathise with their pain.
The story is undoubtedly a powerful one; Howell and his lover, Hazel Buchanan (played by Genevieve O’Reilly), indulge in a destructive, all-consuming affair which leads them to commit an immaculately-planned double murder, all under the convincing cover of an apparently sincere Christian faith and an active church life.
God’s judgement
Having been exonerated at the inquest, they keep the secret for some 20 years, during which time they separate, marry other people and raise families. Eventually Howell confesses to his wife, and she too keeps the secret for years. When his son dies in an accident, he concludes that God is judging him, and finally his wife persuades him to confess to his church elders, leading to the eventual trial. The guilty couple are currently serving long prison sentences for murder.
This drama is an uncomfortable one for a Christian to watch. The hypocrisy of the main characters is breathtaking, and some scenes are painfully graphic in nature, although the quality of the acting and production is of the highest calibre – James Nesbitt is superb in the leading role.
Lessons
What can we learn as Christians from such a tragedy which, although highly unusual, took place in the context of the kind of church with which many en readers will be familiar?
Perhaps principally that the human heart is capable of all kinds of evil, and that the use of a respectable church life as cover is not impossible. Colin Howell can be said to have ‘made God in his own image’, excusing himself for all kinds of wickedness by claiming that ‘God must want us to be together’.
According to the script, church leaders appear to have acted correctly in confronting the adulterers in the early stages, and then eventually informing the police after the confessions years later, and so I feel that the writers have not used the story as an excuse to strike at the church as such. Perhaps the most alarming impact of this tale is, in a sense, how easy it was for the deeds to be done and how plausibly the perpetrators were able to get away with it for so long. Perhaps Howell’s eventual pangs of conscience remind us that in God’s eyes there is no evading his judgment. May all of us who own Christ guard our hearts and always subject ourselves to his Word.
