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For Marks, it was something Detweiler told him in their dorm room all those years ago that cracked the structural integrity of his faith: "God doesn't like artists because they ask too many questions." While Detweiler is the first to balk at the comment (the irony being that he now spends his life convincing Christian artists to ask the hard questions), it led to Marks making the resolution that if it came down to God or the truth art represents, he was siding with art.

Marks's spiritual egress was measured and methodical. He left the faith long before he left God. It was not a backsliding binge, but a slow, fully cognizant retreat. He sincerely wanted to believe, but found he simply could not. Some of Marks's issues are hardly new, though that makes them no less reconcilable or comprehensible.

Marks sees the Bible as a set of blinders, not binoculars. For him, the Bible acts as a barrier, cutting him off from Detweiler, and the Christian from true contact with suffering humanity. He views God as someone who "murdered his own son to make a point" and authored a book that "promises a mass murder of the kind that Charles Manson could only dream of."

For Marks, embracing hell, should it exist, is a moral choice. When asked about his reaction to the judgment seat, he says, "Why in hell should I allow you, who have been the head of a church that has persecuted and killed untold numbers of people, make me answer that question? The only moral choice I have, based upon what your son taught, is to say no, I will not believe. You, the God of this story, do not have the right to ask that question of me."

Marks's vitriol is not based on liberal texts or atheist playbooks. While working as a reporter in the Balkans, he witnessed firsthand the atrocities of which humankind is capable. He saw with his own eyes a situation in which a religious war of words became a war of all-too-real bullets and bombs.

"If you can tell me there is a God who presides over some meaning there, I would have to say I don't give a crap. Because if that God exists, I am in permanent contention with him."

Detweiler possesses enough epistemological humility to know that he doesn't have all the answers. He sees Marks as a protest theologian, following in the long tradition of Job, parts of the Psalms and Ecclesiastes. Marks is the prophet whose anger and bitterness at God cannot help but find expression. And has its place.

Though Purple State of Mind is balanced by the polarity of its opinions, the film may find a wider religious than skeptical audience. And some of them may find Detweiler's stance untenable. Detweiler is not interested in winning the argument. Ultimately Detweiler knows he starts, not finishes the conversation. Fundamentalists may find Detweiler's faith even more dangerous than Marks's disbelief. Some might tar Detweiler with a liberal brush, even if he would refute the claim, just as he does all labels. Detweiler's views on homosexuality, political activism and even abortion, welcome as they might be to some (this author included), may not sit well with others. Marks even admits that it is difficult to position himself as the non-believer when Detweiler admits he has wrestled with so much doubt and difficulty embracing his own people.

Detweiler and Marks have been presenting their film everywhere from tiny coffee houses to churches to packed convention centers (click here for their schedule). Heady Q&A sessions inevitably follow. What is perhaps most surprising is that a film this deep, this raw and this emotionally charged could also be this funny. Detweiler goes so far as to call Purple State a comedy—and based on the boisterous response, audiences seem to agree.

The film acts as a cinematic bridge to plug the cultural gap across which the battle lines of left vs. right, gay vs. straight, atheist vs. believer have been drawn. It is a sincere, often messy plea to push beyond our respective political enclaves and wade into the middle ground where most people reside.

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