Well, I think I am almost finished with the subject of true, objective, religious art. But, let me add this. Just because someone can paint a religious subject does not mean that artist has capture the essence of holiness, of virtue.
If I were in the classroom, I would give myriad examples of "religious art" which moves the soul not only into an aesthetic experience, but an experience of God. Excellent art can help the soul, be a tool for the soul to transcend into the spiritual realm. I have experienced this and in the good old days of graduate school, this is a subject we would sit around with coffees and discuss.
Excellent art is meant to be transcendent. It is not meant to draw attention to itself but to lead one on to a higher plane of reality.
I have experienced this in the face of true beauty. This has happened to me through art and music, more so when I was younger than now, as I no longer go to galleries nor do I listen to music. I mostly live in simplicity and silence.
But, the true artist does not want to draw attention to himself or his artwork. He wants the artwork to bring joy, yes, but always move the mind and the soul.
Excellent art is rational.
That is why Bach is superior to Rap. (DUH!)
If a piece of art disturbs the soul and the mind, it has been painted in pure sensuality, in the senses only and not in the spirit. That is why I am objecting to some of the work on EWTN. I have not listed all the paintings which disturb me. Three which are particularly sensual and not spiritual depict Christ in the Garden, in a facial piece stuck in somewhere, and in the Ascension. The artists missed the point and just show a man, not a God-Man. Can it be done? Approximately, yes.
Some of the greatest have done this. But, sadly the appetites have been fed for too many years not to effect even Christian artists. Perhaps, the artists have never met a Godly, righteous man. Perhaps, they do not know what the face of a saint who is a man can look like. Innocence is the first trait, followed by purity and a deep inner peace.
An opportunity for witnessing the Truth has been lost.
I shall not even begin on the music, which is almost totally sensual and not rational and, as the Pope Emeritus would point out, therefore defective for worship. Gregorian Chant would have been the logical choice for the entire series.
Again, the day for true discernment in art may be gone.
Showing posts with label art for the sake of. Show all posts
Showing posts with label art for the sake of. Show all posts
Friday, 12 September 2014
Sunday, 7 September 2014
Writers on Writing
Now, I did teach some of G.K.Chesterton's essays when I taught at university a long time ago, but I never wanted to imitate his great and unique style. Writers have to cope with many issues when writing, and style is part of both training and temperament.
I want to share a short section from his book on Twelve Types. Many of you will know this book already. This section is about Robert Lewis Stevenson, who I consider a truly great writer.
Stevenson’s new biographer, however, cannot make any allowance for this deep-rooted poetry of mere sight and touch. He is always imputing something to Stevenson as a crime which Stevenson really professed as an object. He says of that glorious riot of horror, ‘The Destroying Angel,’ in ‘The Dynamiter,’ that it is ’highly fantastic and putting a strain on our credulity.’ This is rather like describing the travels of Baron Munchausen as ‘unconvincing.’ The whole story of ‘The Dynamiter’ is a kind of humorous nightmare, and even in that story ’The Destroying Angel’ is supposed to be an extravagant lie made up on the spur of the moment. It is a dream within a dream, and to accuse it of improbability is like accusing the sky of being blue. But Mr Baildon, whether from hasty reading or natural difference of taste, cannot in the least comprehend the rich and romantic irony of Stevenson’s London stories. He actually says of that portentous monument of humour, Prince Florizel of Bohemia, that, ’though evidently admired by his creator, he is to me on the whole rather an irritating presence.’ From this we are almost driven to believe (though desperately and against our will) that Mr Baildon thinks that Prince Florizel is to be taken seriously, as if he were a man in real life. For ourselves, Prince Florizel is almost our favourite character in fiction; but we willingly add the proviso that if we met him in real life we should kill him.
I want to share a short section from his book on Twelve Types. Many of you will know this book already. This section is about Robert Lewis Stevenson, who I consider a truly great writer.
Stevenson’s new biographer, however, cannot make any allowance for this deep-rooted poetry of mere sight and touch. He is always imputing something to Stevenson as a crime which Stevenson really professed as an object. He says of that glorious riot of horror, ‘The Destroying Angel,’ in ‘The Dynamiter,’ that it is ’highly fantastic and putting a strain on our credulity.’ This is rather like describing the travels of Baron Munchausen as ‘unconvincing.’ The whole story of ‘The Dynamiter’ is a kind of humorous nightmare, and even in that story ’The Destroying Angel’ is supposed to be an extravagant lie made up on the spur of the moment. It is a dream within a dream, and to accuse it of improbability is like accusing the sky of being blue. But Mr Baildon, whether from hasty reading or natural difference of taste, cannot in the least comprehend the rich and romantic irony of Stevenson’s London stories. He actually says of that portentous monument of humour, Prince Florizel of Bohemia, that, ’though evidently admired by his creator, he is to me on the whole rather an irritating presence.’ From this we are almost driven to believe (though desperately and against our will) that Mr Baildon thinks that Prince Florizel is to be taken seriously, as if he were a man in real life. For ourselves, Prince Florizel is almost our favourite character in fiction; but we willingly add the proviso that if we met him in real life we should kill him.
The fact is, that the whole mass of
Stevenson’s spiritual and intellectual virtues
have been partly frustrated by one additional virtue-that
of artistic dexterity. If he had chalked up his
great message on a wall, like Walt Whitman, in large
and straggling letters, it would have startled men
like a blasphemy. But he wrote his light-headed
paradoxes in so flowing a copy-book hand that everyone
supposed they must be copy-book sentiments. He
suffered from his versatility, not, as is loosely
said, by not doing every department well enough, but
by doing every department too well. As child,
cockney, pirate, or Puritan, his disguises were so
good that most people could not see the same man under
all. It is an unjust fact that if a man can play
the fiddle, give legal opinions, and black boots just
tolerably, he is called an Admirable Crichton, but
if he does all three thoroughly well, he is apt to
be regarded, in the several departments, as a common
fiddler, a common lawyer, and a common boot-black.
This is what has happened in the case of Stevenson.
If ‘Dr Jekyll,’ ’The Master of Ballantrae,’
‘The Child’s Garden of Verses,’ and
‘Across the Plains’ had been each of them
one shade less perfectly done than they were, everyone
would have seen that they were all parts of the same
message; but by succeeding in the proverbial miracle
of being in five places at once, he has naturally
convinced others that he was five different people.
But the real message of Stevenson was as simple as
that of Mahomet, as moral as that of Dante, as confident
as that of Whitman, and as practical as that of James
Watt.
The conception which unites the whole
varied work of Stevenson was that romance, or the
vision of the possibilities of things, was far more
important than mere occurrences: that one was
the soul of our life, the other the body, and that
the soul was the precious thing. The germ of
all his stories lies in the idea that every landscape
or scrap of scenery has a soul: and that soul
is a story. Standing before a stunted orchard
with a broken stone wall, we may know as a mere fact
that no one has been through it but an elderly female
cook. But everything exists in the human soul:
that orchard grows in our own brain, and there it is
the shrine and theatre of some strange chance between
a girl and a ragged poet and a mad farmer. Stevenson
stands for the conception that ideas are the real
incidents: that our fancies are our adventures.
To think of a cow with wings is essentially to have
met one. And this is the reason for his wide
diversities of narrative: he had to make one
story as rich as a ruby sunset, another as grey as
a hoary monolith: for the story was the soul,
or rather the meaning, of the bodily vision. It
is quite inappropriate to judge ‘The Teller of
Tales’ (as the Samoans called him) by the particular
novels he wrote, as one would judge Mr George Moore
by ‘Esther Waters.’ These novels were
only the two or three of his soul’s adventures
that he happened to tell. But he died with a
thousand stories in his heart.
Saturday, 23 August 2014
The Crux of The Matter
And as in the days of Noe, so shall also the coming of the Son of man be.
In our times, the time of the New Testament, the New Covenant, millions of people have been given grace through baptism to hear God daily. We hear God in the daily Scriptures, at daily Mass if we are lucky enough to get to one, through other Catholic, orthodox, praying friends, through Mr. Voris, Father Z, EWTN, Salt and Light, Internet sources, through reading and studying, by being silent and reflecting.
We can hear God because we are in sanctifying grace. Some listen.
In the Old Testament times, not all people heard the Lord, which is why the People of God had the prophets, teachers and leaders who did.
From Abraham down through John the Baptist, the Patriarchs and Prophets shared the Word of God with the people. Some listened.
In a time of tribulation, God allows the world to be covered in a darkness, in order to purify the elect and save many who otherwise are not paying attention.
Pay attention now.
If you are too busy to pray and reflect, you are too busy.
Soon, many if not all of us will find ourselves in a terrible state of not being able to hear God.
Christ warned Jerusalem of its destruction because the inhabitants refused to acknowledge Him as the Messiah.
Some left, most did not.
Hear the Lord while you can.
Pray to respond quickly to His Voice and to know when He is calling, speaking, nudging.
Soon, all human voices which share God's word will be stopped. You must learn to rely on Him alone.
Saturday, 16 August 2014
When We Saw The Faces of Saints
I have studied art all my life. In grade school, I had fantastic nuns who taught us art appreciated from Fourth Grade on up and Introduction to Basic Art. My family visited art galleries regularly, and I took art lessons at the local gallery as a young girl. In college, I was an art minor until I discovered philosophy and switched minors. I have sketched and painted off and on, when I could afford the art supplies. I just gave away two of my easels.
I have taught Art Appreciation and Art History both in high school and in college, as I was asked to do so, even though my main areas are history, theology and philosophy. I loved it. I created an introduction to art class at a high school for bored seniors. Most were guys and they loved it, after some initial murmuring. Art is part of the true Montessori Method, and I had art in my own Montessori school.
Teaching the History of Art at the college level proved to be a treat! I loved every minute of a Humanities Course I taught which included Art History and Music History. Can one imagine getting paid to study and present such fun courses?
One thing I have noticed when studying and and teaching art has been the change in faces painted by the masters.
In the earliest days of portraiture or iconography, in depictions of the saints and the Holy Family, in Crucifixion paintings and paintings of the Scourging and the Crowning of Thrones, one can see a progression of facial expressions in the good and the bad "characters" of those paintings.
One of the things I noticed was that even the secular painters, those doing it for patrons or money, had insights into the soul which have been lost in modern times.
Yes, in our years of psychology and analysis, we have lost the insights into how to portray holiness and sheer evil.
Even Caravaggio, perhaps my favorite painter, understood the good, the bad and the lukewarm. Not a saint himself, and pained by an intemperate personality, this genius still could capture the holiness in the face of Christ, St. John and others. How is it that we have lost this sensitivity, this discernment?
We have, as artists, had to face to unfortunate truths in the past 200 years of painting. One is the demise of the person as a topic of interest, even Christ, and the other is the emphasis on the artist's feelings rather than those of the subject matter.
When I lived in Canada, I followed the Toronto International Art Show on the radio, as much of it, at that time, was followed by a certain station. In one interview, a young female artist shared her theory of art. It was this. That art was the expression of the feelings of the artist. Period.
The highly intelligent interviewer pushed this relativistic and subjective philosophy until the young woman finally said that even if she put a splotch of mud on a wooden board, that was art and worthy to be hung in the Toronto Show.
Like the interviewer, I gasped. Mud on a board.
Well, I knew from years of art stalking that the pursuit of beauty was out the window, that political statement art was "in" and that art was practically anything a so-called artist wanted it to be. I remember the students at Notre Dame when I was there making fun of a Christo exhibit by wrapping up the statue of the founder, Father Edward Sorin. Such is art criticism. It was hysterically funny, but the administration was not amused.
Art became propaganda under the Tudors and that idea spread throughout Europe, coming to America way before Stalin and Hitler magnified the problem. Propagandist art became popular again in the sixties, as did pop-art and all kinds of manifestations of the decadence of the modern artistic brain.
We had a respite with the excellent Sister Wendy, who was not afraid to call rubbish rubbish and who could beauty in certain paintings which baffled some critics.
But, in recent times, the purpose of art has been to shock, to "reveal" whatever, and not to praise God or show the dignity of man.
Sadly, the artists did lose their way be separating religion from art and philosophy from the pencil and paintbrush.
Not that I want artists to be philosophers, but an artist has a duty to think as well as feel and the best did: da Vinci, Botticelli, Michelangelo, Caravaggio, and so forth. Artists who are anti-intellectual usually create sentimentality, which, sadly in the Christian world, sells too well.
But the hay-day of sentimental Christian art may be waning, at last. The eighties saw the worst of it, with Evangelical artists taking the pencil and paintbrush into the realm of emotive art, which only appeals to the appetites and not to the intellect. In a way, we have been through the worst of emo Christian art.
But, not EWTN in the 2013 re-do of the mysteries of the rosary.
To whom and to what are they appealing on the staff? Excellent Christian art must appeal to reason and not merely the emotions. It must transcend and be universal and not "subjective" or "personal".
I had the hunch that some of the models for Mary were someone's daughter or wife. Not every model can be a "Mary". Only someone who understands the face of holiness can paint a convincing Mary, Jesus, Joseph.
And, some of the portraits of those people are not exhibiting holiness but sensuality.
It is hard to find an innocent to paint. The elders of our tradition manage. Why? I think more saints walked the earth.
Even young people, even children lose their innocence so early now because, mainly, of television and computer games. Women have been so brainwashed by the feminist lie that few have truly female faces. The face of a woman can capture some of the purity of a saint, if that woman "has it in her".
I am not sure we shall see great Catholic art ever again. Perhaps there is a reason for this. We have lost the time when we saw the faces of saints and could discern holiness.
A beautiful woman, indeed, has a beautiful soul. There are objective standards for beauty in the West. The relativists and subjectivists have destroyed objective female beauty in art. But, God knows what it is and He has shown it to us in the person of His Mother.
I have taught Art Appreciation and Art History both in high school and in college, as I was asked to do so, even though my main areas are history, theology and philosophy. I loved it. I created an introduction to art class at a high school for bored seniors. Most were guys and they loved it, after some initial murmuring. Art is part of the true Montessori Method, and I had art in my own Montessori school.
Teaching the History of Art at the college level proved to be a treat! I loved every minute of a Humanities Course I taught which included Art History and Music History. Can one imagine getting paid to study and present such fun courses?
One thing I have noticed when studying and and teaching art has been the change in faces painted by the masters.
In the earliest days of portraiture or iconography, in depictions of the saints and the Holy Family, in Crucifixion paintings and paintings of the Scourging and the Crowning of Thrones, one can see a progression of facial expressions in the good and the bad "characters" of those paintings.
One of the things I noticed was that even the secular painters, those doing it for patrons or money, had insights into the soul which have been lost in modern times.
Yes, in our years of psychology and analysis, we have lost the insights into how to portray holiness and sheer evil.
Even Caravaggio, perhaps my favorite painter, understood the good, the bad and the lukewarm. Not a saint himself, and pained by an intemperate personality, this genius still could capture the holiness in the face of Christ, St. John and others. How is it that we have lost this sensitivity, this discernment?
We have, as artists, had to face to unfortunate truths in the past 200 years of painting. One is the demise of the person as a topic of interest, even Christ, and the other is the emphasis on the artist's feelings rather than those of the subject matter.
When I lived in Canada, I followed the Toronto International Art Show on the radio, as much of it, at that time, was followed by a certain station. In one interview, a young female artist shared her theory of art. It was this. That art was the expression of the feelings of the artist. Period.
The highly intelligent interviewer pushed this relativistic and subjective philosophy until the young woman finally said that even if she put a splotch of mud on a wooden board, that was art and worthy to be hung in the Toronto Show.
Like the interviewer, I gasped. Mud on a board.
Well, I knew from years of art stalking that the pursuit of beauty was out the window, that political statement art was "in" and that art was practically anything a so-called artist wanted it to be. I remember the students at Notre Dame when I was there making fun of a Christo exhibit by wrapping up the statue of the founder, Father Edward Sorin. Such is art criticism. It was hysterically funny, but the administration was not amused.
Art became propaganda under the Tudors and that idea spread throughout Europe, coming to America way before Stalin and Hitler magnified the problem. Propagandist art became popular again in the sixties, as did pop-art and all kinds of manifestations of the decadence of the modern artistic brain.
We had a respite with the excellent Sister Wendy, who was not afraid to call rubbish rubbish and who could beauty in certain paintings which baffled some critics.
But, in recent times, the purpose of art has been to shock, to "reveal" whatever, and not to praise God or show the dignity of man.
Sadly, the artists did lose their way be separating religion from art and philosophy from the pencil and paintbrush.
Not that I want artists to be philosophers, but an artist has a duty to think as well as feel and the best did: da Vinci, Botticelli, Michelangelo, Caravaggio, and so forth. Artists who are anti-intellectual usually create sentimentality, which, sadly in the Christian world, sells too well.
But the hay-day of sentimental Christian art may be waning, at last. The eighties saw the worst of it, with Evangelical artists taking the pencil and paintbrush into the realm of emotive art, which only appeals to the appetites and not to the intellect. In a way, we have been through the worst of emo Christian art.
But, not EWTN in the 2013 re-do of the mysteries of the rosary.
To whom and to what are they appealing on the staff? Excellent Christian art must appeal to reason and not merely the emotions. It must transcend and be universal and not "subjective" or "personal".
I had the hunch that some of the models for Mary were someone's daughter or wife. Not every model can be a "Mary". Only someone who understands the face of holiness can paint a convincing Mary, Jesus, Joseph.
And, some of the portraits of those people are not exhibiting holiness but sensuality.
It is hard to find an innocent to paint. The elders of our tradition manage. Why? I think more saints walked the earth.
Even young people, even children lose their innocence so early now because, mainly, of television and computer games. Women have been so brainwashed by the feminist lie that few have truly female faces. The face of a woman can capture some of the purity of a saint, if that woman "has it in her".
I am not sure we shall see great Catholic art ever again. Perhaps there is a reason for this. We have lost the time when we saw the faces of saints and could discern holiness.
A beautiful woman, indeed, has a beautiful soul. There are objective standards for beauty in the West. The relativists and subjectivists have destroyed objective female beauty in art. But, God knows what it is and He has shown it to us in the person of His Mother.
Continuing Art Critiques
Years ago, I was tutoring a tweenie in religion in her home. Her mother was home schooling. WE did a section on Our Lady and I told her about the customs of the Jewish women at the time of Christ. We talked about the Circumcision of Christ as part of the Presentation of the Temple. We discussed the two Passovers in John. She was ahead of most children her age and loved Bible History.
After one class, the mother of the house came to me and told me I was fired as a tutor. I was shocked at the abruptness of the announcement. She told me that I had taught her daughter that Jesus and Mary were Jews. The woman's husband was racist and he never wanted his daughter to discuss Jesus, Mary, Joseph and all the apostles as being Jewish.
I left with a sad heart. I had known the mother for years, but I never knew her husband's deep seated antisemitism until then. The denial of the truth won the day.
Sadly, some of the new paintings used for the mysteries on EWTN have dropped the Jewishness of both Jesus and Mary. I do not understand this.
Because of time, I have only two more criticisms. There may be cause for more, but I can only state these two today.
One of the most disturbing image is that of Christ is shown "crawling" out of the tomb at the Resurrection in that Glorious Mystery in a modern depiction. The artist has made no attempt to understand or portray a glorified body. In fact, the body is not beautiful, but contorted, ugly. The body reminds one of paintings of Sisyphus, not Christ. All art should be in context, the cultural context of centuries of art to some extent. Some of the new art reveals ignorance of Catholic symbolism and pagan symbolism. Distortion is not from God, as it purposefully deceives. I do not think the artists I am criticizing want to deceive, but they do distort.
Now, the revelation of the glorified body is hard for us to understand, but we must take St. Paul's words on the glorification of the body, and the fact that the disciples did not recognize Christ on the road to Emmaus until the breaking of the bread.
Christ is not to be depicted merely as some superhero who has overcome a fight, but as far as possible, as the God-Man in a glorified body; yes, with the scars of the Crucifixion, but not as a human looks normally. The Transfiguration scared the apostles and that episode prefigured the Resurrection.
I paint and some of the artists who are doing the new interpretations have great talent, but some do not understand Christ or Christology.
Here are some passages from the greatest Doctor of the Church, Thomas Aquinas:
http://www.newadvent.org/summa/4054.htm
But Christ's body after the Resurrection was truly made up of elements, and had tangible qualities such as the nature of a human body requires, and therefore it could naturally be handled; and if it had nothing beyond the nature of a human body, it would likewise be corruptible. But it had something else which made it incorruptible, and this was not the nature of a heavenly body, as some maintain, and into which we shall make fuller inquiry later (XP, 82, 1), but it was glory flowing from a beatified soul: because, as Augustine says (Ep. ad Dioscor. cxviii): "God made the soul of such powerful nature, that from its fullest beatitude the fulness of health overflows into the body, that is, the vigor of incorruption." And therefore Gregory says (Hom. in Evang. xxvi): "Christ's body is shown to be of the same nature, but of different glory, after the Resurrection."
Reply to Objection 3. As Augustine says (De Civ. Dei xiii): "After the Resurrection, our Saviour in spiritual but true flesh partook of meat with the disciples, not from need of food, but because it lay in His power." For as Bede says on Luke 24:41: "The thirsty earth sucks in the water, and the sun's burning ray absorbs it; the former from need, the latter by its power." Hence after the Resurrection He ate, "not as needing food, but in order thus to show the nature of His risen body." Nor does it follow that His was an animal body that stands in need of food.
And
I answer that, Christ's was a glorified body in His Resurrection, and this is evident from three reasons. First of all, because His Resurrection was the exemplar and the cause of ours, as is stated in 1 Corinthians 15:43. But in the resurrection the saints will have glorified bodies, as is written in the same place: "It is sown in dishonor, it shall rise in glory." Hence, since the cause is mightier than the effect, and the exemplar than the exemplate; much more glorious, then, was the body of Christ in His Resurrection. Secondly, because He merited the glory of His Resurrection by the lowliness of His Passion. Hence He said (John 12:27): "Now is My soul troubled," which refers to the Passion; and later He adds: "Father, glorify Thy name," whereby He asks for the glory of the Resurrection. Thirdly, because as stated above (Question 34, Article 4), Christ's soul was glorified from the instant of His conception by perfect fruition of the Godhead. But, as stated above (14, 1, ad 2), it was owing to the Divine economy that the glory did not pass from His soul to His body, in order that by the Passion He might accomplish the mystery of our redemption. Consequently, when this mystery of Christ's Passion and death was finished, straightway the soul communicated its glory to the risen body in the Resurrection; and so that body was made glorious.
Reply to Objection 1. Whatever is received within a subject is received according to the subject's capacity. Therefore, since glory flows from the soul into the body, it follows that, as Augustine says (Ep. ad Dioscor. cxviii), the brightness or splendor of a glorified body is after the manner of natural color in the human body; just as variously colored glass derives its splendor from the sun's radiance, according to the mode of the color. But as it lies within the power of a glorified man whether his body be seen or not, as stated above (1, ad 2), so is it in his power whether its splendor be seen or not. Accordingly it can be seen in its color without its brightness. And it was in this way that Christ's body appeared to the disciples after the Resurrection.
To not try and show Christ in the splendor of glory is to misrepresent the Resurrection. That event was not a "resuscitation" but a resurrection.
I shall continue with the second one in the next post...
After one class, the mother of the house came to me and told me I was fired as a tutor. I was shocked at the abruptness of the announcement. She told me that I had taught her daughter that Jesus and Mary were Jews. The woman's husband was racist and he never wanted his daughter to discuss Jesus, Mary, Joseph and all the apostles as being Jewish.
I left with a sad heart. I had known the mother for years, but I never knew her husband's deep seated antisemitism until then. The denial of the truth won the day.
Sadly, some of the new paintings used for the mysteries on EWTN have dropped the Jewishness of both Jesus and Mary. I do not understand this.
Because of time, I have only two more criticisms. There may be cause for more, but I can only state these two today.
One of the most disturbing image is that of Christ is shown "crawling" out of the tomb at the Resurrection in that Glorious Mystery in a modern depiction. The artist has made no attempt to understand or portray a glorified body. In fact, the body is not beautiful, but contorted, ugly. The body reminds one of paintings of Sisyphus, not Christ. All art should be in context, the cultural context of centuries of art to some extent. Some of the new art reveals ignorance of Catholic symbolism and pagan symbolism. Distortion is not from God, as it purposefully deceives. I do not think the artists I am criticizing want to deceive, but they do distort.
Now, the revelation of the glorified body is hard for us to understand, but we must take St. Paul's words on the glorification of the body, and the fact that the disciples did not recognize Christ on the road to Emmaus until the breaking of the bread.
Christ is not to be depicted merely as some superhero who has overcome a fight, but as far as possible, as the God-Man in a glorified body; yes, with the scars of the Crucifixion, but not as a human looks normally. The Transfiguration scared the apostles and that episode prefigured the Resurrection.
I paint and some of the artists who are doing the new interpretations have great talent, but some do not understand Christ or Christology.
Here are some passages from the greatest Doctor of the Church, Thomas Aquinas:
http://www.newadvent.org/summa/4054.htm
But Christ's body after the Resurrection was truly made up of elements, and had tangible qualities such as the nature of a human body requires, and therefore it could naturally be handled; and if it had nothing beyond the nature of a human body, it would likewise be corruptible. But it had something else which made it incorruptible, and this was not the nature of a heavenly body, as some maintain, and into which we shall make fuller inquiry later (XP, 82, 1), but it was glory flowing from a beatified soul: because, as Augustine says (Ep. ad Dioscor. cxviii): "God made the soul of such powerful nature, that from its fullest beatitude the fulness of health overflows into the body, that is, the vigor of incorruption." And therefore Gregory says (Hom. in Evang. xxvi): "Christ's body is shown to be of the same nature, but of different glory, after the Resurrection."
Reply to Objection 3. As Augustine says (De Civ. Dei xiii): "After the Resurrection, our Saviour in spiritual but true flesh partook of meat with the disciples, not from need of food, but because it lay in His power." For as Bede says on Luke 24:41: "The thirsty earth sucks in the water, and the sun's burning ray absorbs it; the former from need, the latter by its power." Hence after the Resurrection He ate, "not as needing food, but in order thus to show the nature of His risen body." Nor does it follow that His was an animal body that stands in need of food.
And
I answer that, Christ's was a glorified body in His Resurrection, and this is evident from three reasons. First of all, because His Resurrection was the exemplar and the cause of ours, as is stated in 1 Corinthians 15:43. But in the resurrection the saints will have glorified bodies, as is written in the same place: "It is sown in dishonor, it shall rise in glory." Hence, since the cause is mightier than the effect, and the exemplar than the exemplate; much more glorious, then, was the body of Christ in His Resurrection. Secondly, because He merited the glory of His Resurrection by the lowliness of His Passion. Hence He said (John 12:27): "Now is My soul troubled," which refers to the Passion; and later He adds: "Father, glorify Thy name," whereby He asks for the glory of the Resurrection. Thirdly, because as stated above (Question 34, Article 4), Christ's soul was glorified from the instant of His conception by perfect fruition of the Godhead. But, as stated above (14, 1, ad 2), it was owing to the Divine economy that the glory did not pass from His soul to His body, in order that by the Passion He might accomplish the mystery of our redemption. Consequently, when this mystery of Christ's Passion and death was finished, straightway the soul communicated its glory to the risen body in the Resurrection; and so that body was made glorious.
Reply to Objection 1. Whatever is received within a subject is received according to the subject's capacity. Therefore, since glory flows from the soul into the body, it follows that, as Augustine says (Ep. ad Dioscor. cxviii), the brightness or splendor of a glorified body is after the manner of natural color in the human body; just as variously colored glass derives its splendor from the sun's radiance, according to the mode of the color. But as it lies within the power of a glorified man whether his body be seen or not, as stated above (1, ad 2), so is it in his power whether its splendor be seen or not. Accordingly it can be seen in its color without its brightness. And it was in this way that Christ's body appeared to the disciples after the Resurrection.
To not try and show Christ in the splendor of glory is to misrepresent the Resurrection. That event was not a "resuscitation" but a resurrection.
I shall continue with the second one in the next post...
Friday, 15 August 2014
Art Critique, Again
All of us who paint, paint in a context. We either paint in Western traditions, or Eastern traditions, Oriental or African traditions, and so on.
We do not paint in a vacuum. We may choose to depart from centuries of symbolism, but we cannot entirely do that without destroying history, symbolism and imagery. The desconstructionists and post-deconstructionists do this in philosophy and linguistics-destroy the meaning of word and, therefore, destroy context and the search for meaning.
There is no artist who can create something "new" as only God can create out of nothing (poesis), while artists only imitate (mimesis). We, creatures ourselves, "make" art which is already in the mind of God.
Now, there is demonic art, as well as good art. There is art which is pornographic, violent, and prurient. There has been in my lifetime many examples of blasphemous art. One thinks of the horrible statue of the Holy Virgin Mary with elephant dung as part of the depiction. It was rightly declaimed as rude and an insult to Catholics. The use of fetuses in art in England when I was there almost thirty years ago was another example of "statement art" which was horrible and most likely satanic.
But, Christian artists can make mistakes, gross errors of judgement, by ignoring the symbolism and imagery of the last two millennia. David Jones wrote of "The Break", the time in the early Twentieth Century, when art was separated from Western symbolism.
I found this to be true when I was teaching a class on the literature of the Holy Grail. Some students did not know what a chalice was, what the word meant. They knew only the word "cup".
The great symbolism of the Holy Grail cannot be taught without context and the same is true of reading Dante, or Eliot or Jones and many others.
When an artist paints Christ or Mary, there are hundreds of clues which one can read which are like shorthand, telling us the meaning in a painting. Icons are full of these clues. To ignore or purposefully distort these ancient images and symbols indicates a Protestant or secular mindset.
Why show the Wedding Feast at Cana with customs which were not known at the time, or without the traditional symbolism? Why attempt something new just to seem trendy or to supposedly "appeal" to modern, contemporary life? We do not learn anything about Christ and Mary out of context. The Scriptures give us the context. They were Jews, living in a very ordered and stratified culture, plus enduring Roman civilization and conquest.
For example, to depict Our Lady as controlling the entire event of the changing of the water into wine misses the entire point of the event. "Do whatever HE tells you"....Not, "Do whatever I tell you." Mary would have not be prominent after Christ entered into the action, and the older paintings which show her in the background or off to the side make this point.
Small hints in a painting or drawing point to truths and realities of the mind, heart and spirit.
I can tell a modern Protestant painting of the Baptism of Christ, done by someone who believes in the heresy of Christ not knowing He was God until that moment, from a Catholic one, which depicts the humility of Christ in the Presence of the Trinity from all time. All types of hints show us the beliefs of painters.
To show Christ as an Arab is absolutely wrong. He was a Jew and still is as Man of that ethnic group. There is no such thing as a "cosmic Christ" or a Chinese Christ. That Mary has appeared to some as a member of an ethnic group has to do with God allowing Mary to appear to the senses of the person who is witnessing the apparition. So, Our Lady of Guadalupe reveals Mary as an Aztec princess, with many symbols and images to show she is the Mother of God.
But for a Western painter to show Christ as someone other than He is begs the question of whether this artist actually has a relationship with Christ.
Now, missionaries may show Christ as an Inuit Baby in the Manger, but at some point, they would teach Christ as in the line of David, of the Royal House, with a genealogy which includes some Gentiles, like Ruth the Moabitess.
To deny Christ's Jewishness is racist at worst and mythology at best.
For artists to take chances or push the envelope regarding the depictions of Christ and His Mother seems not to be the reason for painting. Painting is an act of prayer, or adoration. Those who paint icons know this. One goes to Mass, Adoration, prays and fasts before "writing" an icon.
Sadly, EWTN missed a great opportunity for teaching about the God-Man, about the Incarnation and the truths of the New Testament times in the series of new paintings in the mysteries.
I hope never to see them again. Some are actually disturbing in their falsity. Some are misguided attempts to be inclusive. Some are just not "good" art and many have left the 2,000 year heritage of images and symbols at our command, our shorthand in painting.
Father Z. just highlighted a magnificent print depicting the Wedding Feast at Cana in Japanese terms. But, the real symbolism is still there. The artist has not changed the role of Mary or Christ. There are six wine amphorae, shown as beautiful Ming-like ware. But, the spirit of the work is that of the Scripture passage. There is Christian imagery on the screen. Inculuration is not the same as distortion.
EWTN is an American company. It ministers around the world, but mostly to the English speaking world. I could bet that most of those who watch EWTN are Americans.
I cannot understand dropping centuries of richness for the sake of appeal. It does not work.
We do not paint in a vacuum. We may choose to depart from centuries of symbolism, but we cannot entirely do that without destroying history, symbolism and imagery. The desconstructionists and post-deconstructionists do this in philosophy and linguistics-destroy the meaning of word and, therefore, destroy context and the search for meaning.
There is no artist who can create something "new" as only God can create out of nothing (poesis), while artists only imitate (mimesis). We, creatures ourselves, "make" art which is already in the mind of God.
Now, there is demonic art, as well as good art. There is art which is pornographic, violent, and prurient. There has been in my lifetime many examples of blasphemous art. One thinks of the horrible statue of the Holy Virgin Mary with elephant dung as part of the depiction. It was rightly declaimed as rude and an insult to Catholics. The use of fetuses in art in England when I was there almost thirty years ago was another example of "statement art" which was horrible and most likely satanic.
But, Christian artists can make mistakes, gross errors of judgement, by ignoring the symbolism and imagery of the last two millennia. David Jones wrote of "The Break", the time in the early Twentieth Century, when art was separated from Western symbolism.
I found this to be true when I was teaching a class on the literature of the Holy Grail. Some students did not know what a chalice was, what the word meant. They knew only the word "cup".
The great symbolism of the Holy Grail cannot be taught without context and the same is true of reading Dante, or Eliot or Jones and many others.
When an artist paints Christ or Mary, there are hundreds of clues which one can read which are like shorthand, telling us the meaning in a painting. Icons are full of these clues. To ignore or purposefully distort these ancient images and symbols indicates a Protestant or secular mindset.
Why show the Wedding Feast at Cana with customs which were not known at the time, or without the traditional symbolism? Why attempt something new just to seem trendy or to supposedly "appeal" to modern, contemporary life? We do not learn anything about Christ and Mary out of context. The Scriptures give us the context. They were Jews, living in a very ordered and stratified culture, plus enduring Roman civilization and conquest.
For example, to depict Our Lady as controlling the entire event of the changing of the water into wine misses the entire point of the event. "Do whatever HE tells you"....Not, "Do whatever I tell you." Mary would have not be prominent after Christ entered into the action, and the older paintings which show her in the background or off to the side make this point.
Small hints in a painting or drawing point to truths and realities of the mind, heart and spirit.
I can tell a modern Protestant painting of the Baptism of Christ, done by someone who believes in the heresy of Christ not knowing He was God until that moment, from a Catholic one, which depicts the humility of Christ in the Presence of the Trinity from all time. All types of hints show us the beliefs of painters.
To show Christ as an Arab is absolutely wrong. He was a Jew and still is as Man of that ethnic group. There is no such thing as a "cosmic Christ" or a Chinese Christ. That Mary has appeared to some as a member of an ethnic group has to do with God allowing Mary to appear to the senses of the person who is witnessing the apparition. So, Our Lady of Guadalupe reveals Mary as an Aztec princess, with many symbols and images to show she is the Mother of God.
But for a Western painter to show Christ as someone other than He is begs the question of whether this artist actually has a relationship with Christ.
Now, missionaries may show Christ as an Inuit Baby in the Manger, but at some point, they would teach Christ as in the line of David, of the Royal House, with a genealogy which includes some Gentiles, like Ruth the Moabitess.
To deny Christ's Jewishness is racist at worst and mythology at best.
For artists to take chances or push the envelope regarding the depictions of Christ and His Mother seems not to be the reason for painting. Painting is an act of prayer, or adoration. Those who paint icons know this. One goes to Mass, Adoration, prays and fasts before "writing" an icon.
Sadly, EWTN missed a great opportunity for teaching about the God-Man, about the Incarnation and the truths of the New Testament times in the series of new paintings in the mysteries.
I hope never to see them again. Some are actually disturbing in their falsity. Some are misguided attempts to be inclusive. Some are just not "good" art and many have left the 2,000 year heritage of images and symbols at our command, our shorthand in painting.
Father Z. just highlighted a magnificent print depicting the Wedding Feast at Cana in Japanese terms. But, the real symbolism is still there. The artist has not changed the role of Mary or Christ. There are six wine amphorae, shown as beautiful Ming-like ware. But, the spirit of the work is that of the Scripture passage. There is Christian imagery on the screen. Inculuration is not the same as distortion.
EWTN is an American company. It ministers around the world, but mostly to the English speaking world. I could bet that most of those who watch EWTN are Americans.
I cannot understand dropping centuries of richness for the sake of appeal. It does not work.
Truth And Heresy in Art And A Plea to EWTN
Read today's Gospel again on Christ saying that those who have faith in Him are more blessed than the physical bearing in His Mother's Womb. But, think differently on this. Think like St. Augustine, whose sermon on this passage reminds us that Mary bore Christ through Faith, not through the physical relationship with a man. Christ, the Word of God, entered Mary, and all who listened are blessed, though not in the degree Mary is. Mary's obedience in faith at the Annunciation brought forth the "yes" to the Incarnation. St. John Paul II echoes this in Redemptoris Mater.
43. The Church "becomes herself a mother by accepting God's word with fidelity."122 Like Mary, who first believed by accepting the word of God revealed to her at the Annunciation and by remaining faithful to that word in all her trials even unto the Cross, so too the Church becomes a mother when, accepting with fidelity the word of God, "by her preaching and by baptism she brings forth to a new and immortal life children who are conceived of the Holy Spirit and born of God."123 This "maternal" characteristic of the Church was expressed in a particularly vivid way by the Apostle to the Gentiles when he wrote: "My little children, with whom I am again in travail until Christ be formed in you!" (Gal. 4:19) These words of Saint Paul contain an interesting sign of the early Church's awareness of her own motherhood, linked to her apostolic service to mankind. This awareness enabled and still enables the Church to see the mystery of her life and mission modelled upon the example of the Mother of the Son, who is "the first-born among many brethren" (Rom. 8:29
Mary's relationship with Christ is of the order of perfection, the unitive state to the utmost degree. As fully perfect from her Incarnation, Mary had no sin, no concupiscence and no effects of Original Sin.
I make a plea to EWTN, which in view of the Teaching Magisterium, depicts Mary as not perfect and not Ever-Virgin.
I was visiting someone who has EWTN on their cable television. When the rosary came on, I was asked to join the woman and I said, of course, yes.
However, by the end of the rosary, I was saddened and disturbed to the point where I have to write this post.
Some of the art used to depict some of the mysteries include heretical references. In other words, the paintings are "Protestant".
Now, a Catholic knows the Gospel and the teaching of the Church regarding Mary. I want to clarify and argue against some of the depictions of Mary in the art used by EWTN.
First of all, I shall start with the most obvious and the least complicated. In all of the apparitions of Mary, the saints who saw her said over and over that she was the most beautiful woman they had ever seen. Some of the artwork in the EWTN mysteries shows Mary not only as not beautiful, but plain and even ugly.
This is contrary to almost 2,000 years of iconography and paintings, sculptures and friezes of Our Lady. To depict her as ugly or plain is not in keeping with tradition with a small t, nor with the wisdom handed down within the Catholic culture. Nor are the paintings in keeping with the approved apparitions, even Fatima and Lourdes, where the saints said that the Woman was beautiful.
Here is St. John Paul II on the art pertaining to Mary from Redemptoris Mater:
33. This year there occurs the twelfth centenary of the Second Ecumenical Council of Nicaea (787). Putting an end to the wellknown controversy about the cult of sacred images, this Council defined that, according to the teaching of the holy Fathers and the universal tradition of the Church, there could be exposed for the veneration of the faithful, together with the Cross, also images of the Mother of God, of the angels and of the saints, in churches and houses and at the roadside.84 This custom has been maintained in the whole of the East and also in the West. Images of the Virgin have a place of honor in churches and houses. In them Mary is represented in a number of ways: as the throne of God carrying the Lord and giving him to humanity (Theotokos); as the way that leads to Christ and manifests him (Hodegetria); as a praying figure in an attitude of intercession and as a sign of the divine presence on the journey of the faithful until the day of the Lord (Deesis); as the protectress who stretches out her mantle over the peoples (Pokrov), or as the merciful Virgin of tenderness (Eleousa). She is usually represented with her Son, the child Jesus, in her arms: it is the relationship with the Son which glorifies the Mother. Sometimes she embraces him with tenderness (Glykophilousa); at other times she is a hieratic figure, apparently rapt in contemplation of him who is the Lord of history (cf. Rev. 5:9-14).85
It is also appropriate to mention the icon of Our Lady of Vladimir, which continually accompanied the pilgrimage of faith of the peoples of ancient Rus'. The first Millennium of the conversion of those noble lands to Christianity is approaching: lands of humble folk, of thinkers and of saints. The Icons are still venerated in the Ukraine, in Byelorussia and in Russia under various titles. They are images which witness to the faith and spirit of prayer of that people, who sense the presence and protection of the Mother of God. In these Icons the Virgin shines as the image of divine beauty, the abode of Eternal Wisdom, the figure of the one who prays, the prototype of contemplation, the image of glory: she who even in her earthly life possessed the spiritual knowledge inaccessible to human reasoning and who attained through faith the most sublime knowledge. I also recall the Icon of the Virgin of the Cenacle, praying with the Apostles as they awaited the Holy Spirit: could she not become the sign of hope for all those who, in fraternal dialogue, wish to deepen their obedience of faith?
34. Such a wealth of praise, built up by the different forms of the Church's great tradition, could help us to hasten the day when the Church can begin once more to breathe fully with her "two lungs," the East and the West. As I have often said, this is more than ever necessary today. It would be an effective aid in furthering the progress of the dialogue already taking place between the Catholic Church and the Churches and Ecclesial Communities of the West.86 It would also be the way for the pilgrim Church to sing and to live more perfectly her "Magnificat."
My second point of contention, which is much more serious to consider, is that Mary is an Ever-Virgin, before, during and after the Birth of Christ. In some of the paintings on EWTN, Mary is seen doing the breathing exercises for birth and has a midwife. There was no midwife and Mary did not experience a natural Birth of Christ, but a supernatural Birth. I was shocked, and so was the older woman, in her eighties, sitting next to me. She said, "I was taught Mary was in ecstasy". I agreed, and said that was the teaching I received as well. These several depictions of the midwife are scandalous, as is the specific on showing Mary doing the birth-exercises for breathing. This is a Protestant view of the Virgin Birth. Protestants do not understand the way of perfection on this earth, which is why they do not honor Mary or other saints. They do not understand the Mystical Marriage.
As I was taught in school and in theology class, through the long teaching of the Church, Mary's hymen was never broken. Christ miraculously was born, and Mary was in ecstasy when the Incarnate God came into the world. Many taught pre-Vatican II heard this in grade-school and in high school, if not college. Catholics always understood her as the new-Eve, not experiencing the curse of Genesis 3:16, To the woman also he said: I will multiply thy sorrows, and thy conceptions: in sorrow shalt thou bring forth children, and thou shalt be under thy husband' s power, and he shall have dominion over thee.
The earliest painting, and most in the Medieval and Renaissance show Mary in contemplation at the Birth of Christ. She did not need pain management techniques. The Birth of Christ was miraculous.
Mary was free of Original Sin and all its consequences. That is one reason we celebrate today, the Assumption. She was freed from corruption in any way.
And, the Popes back us up. Here are a few references, which I found through the Catechism of the Catholic Church entry on the Virgin Birth:
from Mystici Corporis Christi, Pope Pius XII.
110. Venerable Brethren, may the Virgin Mother of God hear the prayers of Our paternal heart - which are yours also - and obtain for all a true love of the Church - she whose sinless soul was filled with the divine spirit of Jesus Christ above all other created souls, who "in the name of the whole human race" gave her consent "for a spiritual marriage between the Son of God and human nature."[216] Within her virginal womb Christ our Lord already bore the exalted title of Head of the Church; in a marvelous birth she brought Him forth as the source of all supernatural life, and presented Him newly born, as Prophet, King and Priest to those who, from among Jews and Gentiles, were the first to come to adore Him. Furthermore, her only Son, condescending to His mother's prayer in "Cana of Galilee," performed the miracle by which "his disciples believed in Him."[217] It was she, the second Eve, who, free from all sin, original or personal, and always more intimately united with her Son, offered Him on Golgotha to the Eternal Father for all the children of Adam, sin-stained by his unhappy fall, and her mother's rights and her mother's love were included in the holocaust. Thus she who, according to the flesh, was the mother of our Head, through the added title of pain and glory became, according to the Spirit, the mother of all His members. She it was through her powerful prayers obtained that the spirit of our Divine Redeemer, already given on the Cross, should be bestowed, accompanied by miraculous gifts, on the newly founded Church at Pentecost; and finally, bearing with courage and confidence the tremendous burden of her sorrows and desolation, she, truly the Queen of Martyrs, more than all the faithful "filled up those things that are wanting of the sufferings of Christ...for His Body, which is the Church";[218] and she continues to have for the Mystical Body of Christ, born of the pierced Heart of the Savior,[219] the same motherly care and ardent love with which she cherished and fed the Infant Jesus in the crib.
from Ineffabilis Deus, from Pope Pius IX, on Mary's body being inviolate.
In like manner did they use the words of the prophets to describe this wondrous abundance of divine gifts and the original innocence of the Virgin of whom Jesus was born. They celebrated the august Virgin as the spotless dove, as the holy Jerusalem, as the exalted throne of God, as the ark and house of holiness which Eternal Wisdom built, and as that Queen who, abounding in delights and leaning on her Beloved, came forth from the mouth of the Most High, entirely perfect, beautiful, most dear to God and never stained with the least blemish.
The Annunciation
When the Fathers and writers of the Church meditated on the fact that the most Blessed Virgin was, in the name and by order of God himself, proclaimed full of grace[22] by the Angel Gabriel when he announced her most sublime dignity of Mother of God, they thought that this singular and solemn salutation, never heard before, showed that the Mother of God is the seat of all divine graces and is adorned with all gifts of the Holy Spirit. To them Mary is an almost infinite treasury, an inexhaustible abyss of these gifts, to such an extent that she was never subject to the curse and was, together with her Son, the only partaker of perpetual benediction. Hence she was worthy to hear Elizabeth, inspired by the Holy Spirit, exclaim: "Blessed are you among women, and blessed is the fruit of your womb."[23]
Mary Compared with Eve
Hence, it is the clear and unanimous opinion of the Fathers that the most glorious Virgin, for whom "he who is mighty has done great things," was resplendent with such an abundance of heavenly gifts, with such a fullness of grace and with such innocence, that she is an unspeakable miracle of God -- indeed, the crown of all miracles and truly the Mother of God; that she approaches as near to God himself as is possible for a created being; and that she is above all men and angels in glory. Hence, to demonstrate the original innocence and sanctity of the Mother of God, not only did they frequently compare her to Eve while yet a virgin, while yet innocence, while yet incorrupt, while not yet deceived by the deadly snares of the most treacherous serpent; but they have also exalted her above Eve with a wonderful variety of expressions. Eve listened to the serpent with lamentable consequences; she fell from original innocence and became his slave. The most Blessed Virgin, on the contrary, ever increased her original gift, and not only never lent an ear to the serpent, but by divinely given power she utterly destroyed the force and dominion of the evil one.
Biblical Figures
Accordingly, the Fathers have never ceased to call the Mother of God the lily among thorns, the land entirely intact, the Virgin undefiled, immaculate, ever blessed, and free from all contagion of sin, she from whom was formed the new Adam, the flawless, brightest, and most beautiful paradise of innocence, immortality and delights planted by God himself and protected against all the snares of the poisonous serpent, the incorruptible wood that the worm of sin had never corrupted, the fountain ever clear and sealed with the power of the Holy Spirit, the most holy temple, the treasure of immortality, the one and only daughter of life -- not of death -- the plant not of anger but of grace, through the singular providence of God growing ever green contrary to the common law, coming as it does from a corrupted and tainted root.
Explicit Affirmation . . .
As if these splendid eulogies and tributes were not sufficient, the Fathers proclaimed with particular and definite statements that when one treats of sin, the holy Virgin Mary is not even to be mentioned; for to her more grace was given than was necessary to conquer sin completely.[24] They also declared that the most glorious Virgin was Reparatrix of the first parents, the giver of life to posterity; that she was chosen before the ages, prepared for himself by the Most High, foretold by God when he said to the serpent, "I will put enmities between you and the woman."[25]-unmistakable evidence that she was crushed the poisonous head of the serpent. And hence they affirmed that the Blessed Virgin was, through grace, entirely free from every stain of sin, and from all corruption of body, soul and mind; that she was always united with God and joined to him by an eternal covenant; that she was never in darkness but always in light; and that, therefore, she was entirely a fit habitation for Christ, not because of the state of her body, but because of her original grace.
. . . Of a Super Eminent Sanctity
To these praises they have added very noble words. Speaking of the conception of the Virgin, they testified that nature yielded to grace and, unable to go on, stood trembling. The Virgin Mother of God would not be conceived by Anna before grace would bear its fruits; it was proper that she be conceived as the first-born, by whom "the first-born of every creature" would be conceived. They testified, too, that the flesh of the Virgin, although derived from Adam, did not contract the stains of Adam, and that on this account the most Blessed Virgin was the tabernacle created by God himself and formed by the Holy Spirit, truly a work in royal purple, adorned and woven with gold, which that new Beseleel[26] made. They affirmed that the same Virgin is, and is deservedly, the first and especial work of God, escaping the fiery arrows the the evil one; that she is beautiful by nature and entirely free from all stain; that at her Immaculate Conception she came into the world all radiant like the dawn. For it was certainly not fitting that this vessel of election should be wounded by the common injuries, since she, differing so much from the others, had only nature in common with them, not sin. In fact, it was quite fitting that, as the Only-Begotten has a Father in heaven, whom the Seraphim extol as thrice holy, so he should have a Mother on earth who would never be without the splendor of holiness.
from Redemptoris Mater of St. John Paul II
The Coptic and Ethiopian traditions were introduced to this contemplation of the mystery of Mary by St. Cyril of Alexandria, and in their turn they have celebrated it with a profuse poetic blossoming.81 The poetic genius of St. Ephrem the Syrian, called "the lyre of the Holy Spirit," tirelessly sang of Mary, leaving a still living mark on the whole tradition of the Syriac Church.82 In his panegyric of the Theotókos, St. Gregory of Narek, one of the outstanding glories of Armenia, with powerful poetic inspiration ponders the different aspects of the mystery of the Incarnation, and each of them is for him an occasion to sing and extol the extraordinary dignity and magnificent beauty of the Virgin Mary, Mother of the Word made flesh.83
It does not surprise us therefore that Mary occupies a privileged place in the worship or the ancient Oriental Churches with an incomparable abundance of feasts and hymns.
32. In the Byzantine liturgy, in all the hours of the Divine Office, praise of the Mother is linked with praise of her Son and with the praise which, through the Son, is offered up to the Father in the Holy Spirit. In the Anaphora or Eucharistic Prayer of St. John Chrysostom, immediately after the epiclesis the assembled community sings in honor of the Mother of God: "It is truly just to proclaim you blessed, O Mother of God, who are most blessed, all pure and Mother of our God. We magnify you who are more honorable than the Cherubim and incomparably more glorious than the Seraphim. You who, without losing your virginity, gave birth to the Word of God. You who are truly the Mother of God."
from Pope Emeritus, then Benedict XVI, from a General Audience, January 2, 2008:
All other titles attributed to Our Lady are based on her vocation to be the Mother of the Redeemer, the human creature chosen by God to bring about the plan of salvation, centred on the great mystery of the Incarnation of the Divine Word. In these days of festivity we have paused to contemplate the depiction of the Nativity in the crib. At the centre of this scene we find the Virgin Mother, who offers the Baby Jesus for the contemplation of all those who come to adore the Saviour: the shepherds, the poor people of Bethlehem, the Magi from the East. Later, on the Feast of the "Presentation" which we celebrate on 2 February, it will be the elderly Simeon and the prophetess Anna who receive the tiny Infant from the hands of his Mother and worship him. The devotion of the Christian people has always considered the Birth of Jesus and the divine motherhood of Mary as two aspects of the same mystery of the Incarnation of the Divine Word, so it has never thought of the Nativity as a thing of the past. We are "contemporaries" of the shepherds, the Magi, of Simeon and of Anna, and as we go with them we are filled with joy, because God wanted to be the God-with-us and has a mother who is our mother.
43. The Church "becomes herself a mother by accepting God's word with fidelity."122 Like Mary, who first believed by accepting the word of God revealed to her at the Annunciation and by remaining faithful to that word in all her trials even unto the Cross, so too the Church becomes a mother when, accepting with fidelity the word of God, "by her preaching and by baptism she brings forth to a new and immortal life children who are conceived of the Holy Spirit and born of God."123 This "maternal" characteristic of the Church was expressed in a particularly vivid way by the Apostle to the Gentiles when he wrote: "My little children, with whom I am again in travail until Christ be formed in you!" (Gal. 4:19) These words of Saint Paul contain an interesting sign of the early Church's awareness of her own motherhood, linked to her apostolic service to mankind. This awareness enabled and still enables the Church to see the mystery of her life and mission modelled upon the example of the Mother of the Son, who is "the first-born among many brethren" (Rom. 8:29
Mary's relationship with Christ is of the order of perfection, the unitive state to the utmost degree. As fully perfect from her Incarnation, Mary had no sin, no concupiscence and no effects of Original Sin.
I make a plea to EWTN, which in view of the Teaching Magisterium, depicts Mary as not perfect and not Ever-Virgin.
I was visiting someone who has EWTN on their cable television. When the rosary came on, I was asked to join the woman and I said, of course, yes.
However, by the end of the rosary, I was saddened and disturbed to the point where I have to write this post.
Some of the art used to depict some of the mysteries include heretical references. In other words, the paintings are "Protestant".
Now, a Catholic knows the Gospel and the teaching of the Church regarding Mary. I want to clarify and argue against some of the depictions of Mary in the art used by EWTN.
First of all, I shall start with the most obvious and the least complicated. In all of the apparitions of Mary, the saints who saw her said over and over that she was the most beautiful woman they had ever seen. Some of the artwork in the EWTN mysteries shows Mary not only as not beautiful, but plain and even ugly.
This is contrary to almost 2,000 years of iconography and paintings, sculptures and friezes of Our Lady. To depict her as ugly or plain is not in keeping with tradition with a small t, nor with the wisdom handed down within the Catholic culture. Nor are the paintings in keeping with the approved apparitions, even Fatima and Lourdes, where the saints said that the Woman was beautiful.
Here is St. John Paul II on the art pertaining to Mary from Redemptoris Mater:
33. This year there occurs the twelfth centenary of the Second Ecumenical Council of Nicaea (787). Putting an end to the wellknown controversy about the cult of sacred images, this Council defined that, according to the teaching of the holy Fathers and the universal tradition of the Church, there could be exposed for the veneration of the faithful, together with the Cross, also images of the Mother of God, of the angels and of the saints, in churches and houses and at the roadside.84 This custom has been maintained in the whole of the East and also in the West. Images of the Virgin have a place of honor in churches and houses. In them Mary is represented in a number of ways: as the throne of God carrying the Lord and giving him to humanity (Theotokos); as the way that leads to Christ and manifests him (Hodegetria); as a praying figure in an attitude of intercession and as a sign of the divine presence on the journey of the faithful until the day of the Lord (Deesis); as the protectress who stretches out her mantle over the peoples (Pokrov), or as the merciful Virgin of tenderness (Eleousa). She is usually represented with her Son, the child Jesus, in her arms: it is the relationship with the Son which glorifies the Mother. Sometimes she embraces him with tenderness (Glykophilousa); at other times she is a hieratic figure, apparently rapt in contemplation of him who is the Lord of history (cf. Rev. 5:9-14).85
It is also appropriate to mention the icon of Our Lady of Vladimir, which continually accompanied the pilgrimage of faith of the peoples of ancient Rus'. The first Millennium of the conversion of those noble lands to Christianity is approaching: lands of humble folk, of thinkers and of saints. The Icons are still venerated in the Ukraine, in Byelorussia and in Russia under various titles. They are images which witness to the faith and spirit of prayer of that people, who sense the presence and protection of the Mother of God. In these Icons the Virgin shines as the image of divine beauty, the abode of Eternal Wisdom, the figure of the one who prays, the prototype of contemplation, the image of glory: she who even in her earthly life possessed the spiritual knowledge inaccessible to human reasoning and who attained through faith the most sublime knowledge. I also recall the Icon of the Virgin of the Cenacle, praying with the Apostles as they awaited the Holy Spirit: could she not become the sign of hope for all those who, in fraternal dialogue, wish to deepen their obedience of faith?
34. Such a wealth of praise, built up by the different forms of the Church's great tradition, could help us to hasten the day when the Church can begin once more to breathe fully with her "two lungs," the East and the West. As I have often said, this is more than ever necessary today. It would be an effective aid in furthering the progress of the dialogue already taking place between the Catholic Church and the Churches and Ecclesial Communities of the West.86 It would also be the way for the pilgrim Church to sing and to live more perfectly her "Magnificat."
My second point of contention, which is much more serious to consider, is that Mary is an Ever-Virgin, before, during and after the Birth of Christ. In some of the paintings on EWTN, Mary is seen doing the breathing exercises for birth and has a midwife. There was no midwife and Mary did not experience a natural Birth of Christ, but a supernatural Birth. I was shocked, and so was the older woman, in her eighties, sitting next to me. She said, "I was taught Mary was in ecstasy". I agreed, and said that was the teaching I received as well. These several depictions of the midwife are scandalous, as is the specific on showing Mary doing the birth-exercises for breathing. This is a Protestant view of the Virgin Birth. Protestants do not understand the way of perfection on this earth, which is why they do not honor Mary or other saints. They do not understand the Mystical Marriage.
As I was taught in school and in theology class, through the long teaching of the Church, Mary's hymen was never broken. Christ miraculously was born, and Mary was in ecstasy when the Incarnate God came into the world. Many taught pre-Vatican II heard this in grade-school and in high school, if not college. Catholics always understood her as the new-Eve, not experiencing the curse of Genesis 3:16, To the woman also he said: I will multiply thy sorrows, and thy conceptions: in sorrow shalt thou bring forth children, and thou shalt be under thy husband' s power, and he shall have dominion over thee.
The earliest painting, and most in the Medieval and Renaissance show Mary in contemplation at the Birth of Christ. She did not need pain management techniques. The Birth of Christ was miraculous.
Mary was free of Original Sin and all its consequences. That is one reason we celebrate today, the Assumption. She was freed from corruption in any way.
And, the Popes back us up. Here are a few references, which I found through the Catechism of the Catholic Church entry on the Virgin Birth:
from Mystici Corporis Christi, Pope Pius XII.
110. Venerable Brethren, may the Virgin Mother of God hear the prayers of Our paternal heart - which are yours also - and obtain for all a true love of the Church - she whose sinless soul was filled with the divine spirit of Jesus Christ above all other created souls, who "in the name of the whole human race" gave her consent "for a spiritual marriage between the Son of God and human nature."[216] Within her virginal womb Christ our Lord already bore the exalted title of Head of the Church; in a marvelous birth she brought Him forth as the source of all supernatural life, and presented Him newly born, as Prophet, King and Priest to those who, from among Jews and Gentiles, were the first to come to adore Him. Furthermore, her only Son, condescending to His mother's prayer in "Cana of Galilee," performed the miracle by which "his disciples believed in Him."[217] It was she, the second Eve, who, free from all sin, original or personal, and always more intimately united with her Son, offered Him on Golgotha to the Eternal Father for all the children of Adam, sin-stained by his unhappy fall, and her mother's rights and her mother's love were included in the holocaust. Thus she who, according to the flesh, was the mother of our Head, through the added title of pain and glory became, according to the Spirit, the mother of all His members. She it was through her powerful prayers obtained that the spirit of our Divine Redeemer, already given on the Cross, should be bestowed, accompanied by miraculous gifts, on the newly founded Church at Pentecost; and finally, bearing with courage and confidence the tremendous burden of her sorrows and desolation, she, truly the Queen of Martyrs, more than all the faithful "filled up those things that are wanting of the sufferings of Christ...for His Body, which is the Church";[218] and she continues to have for the Mystical Body of Christ, born of the pierced Heart of the Savior,[219] the same motherly care and ardent love with which she cherished and fed the Infant Jesus in the crib.
from Ineffabilis Deus, from Pope Pius IX, on Mary's body being inviolate.
In like manner did they use the words of the prophets to describe this wondrous abundance of divine gifts and the original innocence of the Virgin of whom Jesus was born. They celebrated the august Virgin as the spotless dove, as the holy Jerusalem, as the exalted throne of God, as the ark and house of holiness which Eternal Wisdom built, and as that Queen who, abounding in delights and leaning on her Beloved, came forth from the mouth of the Most High, entirely perfect, beautiful, most dear to God and never stained with the least blemish.
The Annunciation
When the Fathers and writers of the Church meditated on the fact that the most Blessed Virgin was, in the name and by order of God himself, proclaimed full of grace[22] by the Angel Gabriel when he announced her most sublime dignity of Mother of God, they thought that this singular and solemn salutation, never heard before, showed that the Mother of God is the seat of all divine graces and is adorned with all gifts of the Holy Spirit. To them Mary is an almost infinite treasury, an inexhaustible abyss of these gifts, to such an extent that she was never subject to the curse and was, together with her Son, the only partaker of perpetual benediction. Hence she was worthy to hear Elizabeth, inspired by the Holy Spirit, exclaim: "Blessed are you among women, and blessed is the fruit of your womb."[23]
Mary Compared with Eve
Hence, it is the clear and unanimous opinion of the Fathers that the most glorious Virgin, for whom "he who is mighty has done great things," was resplendent with such an abundance of heavenly gifts, with such a fullness of grace and with such innocence, that she is an unspeakable miracle of God -- indeed, the crown of all miracles and truly the Mother of God; that she approaches as near to God himself as is possible for a created being; and that she is above all men and angels in glory. Hence, to demonstrate the original innocence and sanctity of the Mother of God, not only did they frequently compare her to Eve while yet a virgin, while yet innocence, while yet incorrupt, while not yet deceived by the deadly snares of the most treacherous serpent; but they have also exalted her above Eve with a wonderful variety of expressions. Eve listened to the serpent with lamentable consequences; she fell from original innocence and became his slave. The most Blessed Virgin, on the contrary, ever increased her original gift, and not only never lent an ear to the serpent, but by divinely given power she utterly destroyed the force and dominion of the evil one.
Biblical Figures
Accordingly, the Fathers have never ceased to call the Mother of God the lily among thorns, the land entirely intact, the Virgin undefiled, immaculate, ever blessed, and free from all contagion of sin, she from whom was formed the new Adam, the flawless, brightest, and most beautiful paradise of innocence, immortality and delights planted by God himself and protected against all the snares of the poisonous serpent, the incorruptible wood that the worm of sin had never corrupted, the fountain ever clear and sealed with the power of the Holy Spirit, the most holy temple, the treasure of immortality, the one and only daughter of life -- not of death -- the plant not of anger but of grace, through the singular providence of God growing ever green contrary to the common law, coming as it does from a corrupted and tainted root.
Explicit Affirmation . . .
As if these splendid eulogies and tributes were not sufficient, the Fathers proclaimed with particular and definite statements that when one treats of sin, the holy Virgin Mary is not even to be mentioned; for to her more grace was given than was necessary to conquer sin completely.[24] They also declared that the most glorious Virgin was Reparatrix of the first parents, the giver of life to posterity; that she was chosen before the ages, prepared for himself by the Most High, foretold by God when he said to the serpent, "I will put enmities between you and the woman."[25]-unmistakable evidence that she was crushed the poisonous head of the serpent. And hence they affirmed that the Blessed Virgin was, through grace, entirely free from every stain of sin, and from all corruption of body, soul and mind; that she was always united with God and joined to him by an eternal covenant; that she was never in darkness but always in light; and that, therefore, she was entirely a fit habitation for Christ, not because of the state of her body, but because of her original grace.
. . . Of a Super Eminent Sanctity
To these praises they have added very noble words. Speaking of the conception of the Virgin, they testified that nature yielded to grace and, unable to go on, stood trembling. The Virgin Mother of God would not be conceived by Anna before grace would bear its fruits; it was proper that she be conceived as the first-born, by whom "the first-born of every creature" would be conceived. They testified, too, that the flesh of the Virgin, although derived from Adam, did not contract the stains of Adam, and that on this account the most Blessed Virgin was the tabernacle created by God himself and formed by the Holy Spirit, truly a work in royal purple, adorned and woven with gold, which that new Beseleel[26] made. They affirmed that the same Virgin is, and is deservedly, the first and especial work of God, escaping the fiery arrows the the evil one; that she is beautiful by nature and entirely free from all stain; that at her Immaculate Conception she came into the world all radiant like the dawn. For it was certainly not fitting that this vessel of election should be wounded by the common injuries, since she, differing so much from the others, had only nature in common with them, not sin. In fact, it was quite fitting that, as the Only-Begotten has a Father in heaven, whom the Seraphim extol as thrice holy, so he should have a Mother on earth who would never be without the splendor of holiness.
from Redemptoris Mater of St. John Paul II
The Coptic and Ethiopian traditions were introduced to this contemplation of the mystery of Mary by St. Cyril of Alexandria, and in their turn they have celebrated it with a profuse poetic blossoming.81 The poetic genius of St. Ephrem the Syrian, called "the lyre of the Holy Spirit," tirelessly sang of Mary, leaving a still living mark on the whole tradition of the Syriac Church.82 In his panegyric of the Theotókos, St. Gregory of Narek, one of the outstanding glories of Armenia, with powerful poetic inspiration ponders the different aspects of the mystery of the Incarnation, and each of them is for him an occasion to sing and extol the extraordinary dignity and magnificent beauty of the Virgin Mary, Mother of the Word made flesh.83
It does not surprise us therefore that Mary occupies a privileged place in the worship or the ancient Oriental Churches with an incomparable abundance of feasts and hymns.
32. In the Byzantine liturgy, in all the hours of the Divine Office, praise of the Mother is linked with praise of her Son and with the praise which, through the Son, is offered up to the Father in the Holy Spirit. In the Anaphora or Eucharistic Prayer of St. John Chrysostom, immediately after the epiclesis the assembled community sings in honor of the Mother of God: "It is truly just to proclaim you blessed, O Mother of God, who are most blessed, all pure and Mother of our God. We magnify you who are more honorable than the Cherubim and incomparably more glorious than the Seraphim. You who, without losing your virginity, gave birth to the Word of God. You who are truly the Mother of God."
from Pope Emeritus, then Benedict XVI, from a General Audience, January 2, 2008:
All other titles attributed to Our Lady are based on her vocation to be the Mother of the Redeemer, the human creature chosen by God to bring about the plan of salvation, centred on the great mystery of the Incarnation of the Divine Word. In these days of festivity we have paused to contemplate the depiction of the Nativity in the crib. At the centre of this scene we find the Virgin Mother, who offers the Baby Jesus for the contemplation of all those who come to adore the Saviour: the shepherds, the poor people of Bethlehem, the Magi from the East. Later, on the Feast of the "Presentation" which we celebrate on 2 February, it will be the elderly Simeon and the prophetess Anna who receive the tiny Infant from the hands of his Mother and worship him. The devotion of the Christian people has always considered the Birth of Jesus and the divine motherhood of Mary as two aspects of the same mystery of the Incarnation of the Divine Word, so it has never thought of the Nativity as a thing of the past. We are "contemporaries" of the shepherds, the Magi, of Simeon and of Anna, and as we go with them we are filled with joy, because God wanted to be the God-with-us and has a mother who is our mother.
All the other titles with which the Church honours Our
Lady then derive from the title "Mother of God", but this one is
fundamental.
Let us think of the privilege of the "Immaculate Conception", that is,
of Mary being immune to sin from conception: she was preserved from any
stain of sin because she was to be the Mother of the Redeemer. The same
applies to the title "Our Lady of the Assumption": the One who had
brought forth the Saviour could not be subject to the corruption that
derives from original sin.
And we know that all these privileges were not granted in order to
distance Mary from us but, on the contrary, to bring her close; indeed,
since she was totally with God, this woman is very close to us and helps
us as a mother and a sister.
The unique and unrepeatable position that Mary occupies in the Community
of Believers also stems from her fundamental vocation to being Mother
of the Redeemer.
Precisely as such, Mary is also Mother of the Mystical Body of Christ,
which is the Church. Rightly, therefore, on 21 November 1964 during the
Second Vatican Council, Paul VI solemnly attributed to Mary the title
"Mother of the Church".
One may also look at the Councils of Ephesus and Lateran.
Here is the CCC section to look up. I read footnotes.
I appeal to EWTN to remove the artwork which contradicts the teaching of the Church on Mary's complete virginity and the depictions of her as anything but beautiful.
to be continued...there are other issues as well with some of the other mysteries.
Tuesday, 18 February 2014
The Death of Creativity-Part Two
Slaves do not create. Free people create. Creativity grows out of three things in a civilization: the first is leisure time to create; the second is a spiritual view of the world, not merely a materialistic one; the third is a group of patrons who will support those in the community who are artists.
As a poet and a painter, as a writer of fairy tales and stories, novellas and plays, I write more and more in a vacuum of those who cannot understand symbols or images.
David Jones wrote a long time ago that WWI was the "Break" of Western Civilization. Before that war, most people, even "peasants" knew the common symbols and images of the West, such as chalices, the fleur-de-lis, the unicorn, and such symbols of authority as crowns, scepters, and orbs.
Now, without a common Christian basis, without a common world view which includes the spiritual and not merely the material, civilization turns into a utilitarian machine geared at the god Mammon.
A stressful life full of activity either seen as necessary or necessary, destroys the ability to create.
Without prayer, creativity becomes an image of the wicked witch in the mirror desiring only power and control over the lives of others. Ugliness comes from sin and the evil one. Period. Are you allowing ugliness to take over the culture of your house? Have you lost the ability to judge what is beautiful and what is not?
The Death of Creativity-Part One
Man and woman were created by God in His Image and Likeness. That Image and Likeness includes free will, the intellect, and creativity. I have noticed a huge lack of creativity in the arts of all kinds. Most fine art and music is either retro or derivative.
Most fashions, except for a few "houses" now reveal only a desire to sexualize men and women even more, and provide a glimpse of further degradation of gender.
Most architecture seems to revert back to the ugliest types of monumental and tasteless designs, as the rational bends under the weight of imperialism of all sorts.
Men and women cannot be truly creative without God within the core of the soul, heart, mind. As we are made in God's image and likeness, we either submit to His Rule and become like Him, or try to become like little gods, making all in the image and likeness of ourselves.
Making music or fine art into our own image and likeness may be called "idolatry".
One humans become the centers of creativity, satan follows quickly, as men and women become bored with themselves and seek a false titillation.
America has fallen into an ugliness which has never been seen before in human creations.
If parents let their children be surrounded by ugliness, these parents will watch these young people slip away from religious sensibilities.
For the pursuit of religion is the pursuit of beauty and truth.
Ask yourself these questions. Is there beauty in my life? Do I listen to beautiful music and look at beautiful fine art to feed my soul? Do I know that God is Beauty? Do I pursue Beauty?
Do I know that my own seeking the Image and Likeness of God forms part of my seeking Truth?
Most fashions, except for a few "houses" now reveal only a desire to sexualize men and women even more, and provide a glimpse of further degradation of gender.
Men and women cannot be truly creative without God within the core of the soul, heart, mind. As we are made in God's image and likeness, we either submit to His Rule and become like Him, or try to become like little gods, making all in the image and likeness of ourselves.
Making music or fine art into our own image and likeness may be called "idolatry".
One humans become the centers of creativity, satan follows quickly, as men and women become bored with themselves and seek a false titillation.
America has fallen into an ugliness which has never been seen before in human creations.
If parents let their children be surrounded by ugliness, these parents will watch these young people slip away from religious sensibilities.
For the pursuit of religion is the pursuit of beauty and truth.
Ask yourself these questions. Is there beauty in my life? Do I listen to beautiful music and look at beautiful fine art to feed my soul? Do I know that God is Beauty? Do I pursue Beauty?
Do I know that my own seeking the Image and Likeness of God forms part of my seeking Truth?
Sunday, 22 December 2013
Now for something completely different....again
http://2ibygz1ao7vbqwokr2sm7gf5gi.wpengine.netdna-cdn.com/wp-content/uploads/Ghan.pdf
Aggers and wife may a trek across Australia after the horrible English loss of the Ashes. He mentions the book A Town Like Alice by Nevil Shute, one of my favorite authors. And, I like that book.
There is a road in Portsmouth named after Nevil Shute, for his days there in WWII, but the city officials in charge of signs spelled his name wrong at least years. I wonder if that was ever corrected? Online, it is correct.
The only pub with a real name mentioned in his novels is in Sussex, and I wonder it is still there?
Shute went to Australia in 1949, had his 50 birthday there and returned to England and began writing A Town Like Alice. He settled there and died there.
I have read many of his books and recommend these for a start and the above, Trustee From The Toolroom, Requiem for a Wren.
Shute was more than a novelist....he was a brilliant engineer and designer. Check out this site...http://www.nevilshute.org/index.php Photos are from this site.
The first comprehensive biography of Shute is available here. It was published in 2011, but I have not read it as of yet. http://www.amazon.com/Parallel-Motion-Biography-Nevil-Norway/dp/1889439371/ref=sr_1_1?s=books&ie=UTF8&qid=1311256818&sr=1-1
Aggers and wife may a trek across Australia after the horrible English loss of the Ashes. He mentions the book A Town Like Alice by Nevil Shute, one of my favorite authors. And, I like that book.
There is a road in Portsmouth named after Nevil Shute, for his days there in WWII, but the city officials in charge of signs spelled his name wrong at least years. I wonder if that was ever corrected? Online, it is correct.
The only pub with a real name mentioned in his novels is in Sussex, and I wonder it is still there?
Shute went to Australia in 1949, had his 50 birthday there and returned to England and began writing A Town Like Alice. He settled there and died there.
I have read many of his books and recommend these for a start and the above, Trustee From The Toolroom, Requiem for a Wren.
Shute was more than a novelist....he was a brilliant engineer and designer. Check out this site...http://www.nevilshute.org/index.php Photos are from this site.
The first comprehensive biography of Shute is available here. It was published in 2011, but I have not read it as of yet. http://www.amazon.com/Parallel-Motion-Biography-Nevil-Norway/dp/1889439371/ref=sr_1_1?s=books&ie=UTF8&qid=1311256818&sr=1-1
Sunday, 15 September 2013
The Sphere Within A Sphere-Synchronity
This sphere within the sphere is here in Dublin, one exactly like it in Iowa, in Des Moines, and one in Rome. The sculpture is by Pomodoro, If it is not raining on Monday, I shall go see it.
Thursday, 12 September 2013
Portia's Speech from The Merchant of Venice
The quality of mercy is not strained.It droppeth as the gentle rain from heaven,
Upon the place beneath.
It is twice blessed.
It blesseth him that gives and him that takes.
It is mightiest in the mightiest,
It becomes the throned monarch better than his crown.
His sceptre shows the force of temporal power,
An attribute to awe and majesty.
Wherein doth sit the dread and fear of kings.
But mercy is above this sceptred sway,
It is enthroned in the hearts of kings,
It is an attribute to God himself.
And earthly power dost the become likest God's,
Where mercy seasons justice.
Therefore Jew,
Though justice be thy plea, consider this,
That in the course of justice we all must see salvation,
We all do pray for mercy
And that same prayer doth teach us all to render the deeds of mercy.
I have spoke thus much to mittgate the justice of thy plea,
Which if thou dost follow,
This strict court of Venice
Must needs give sentance gainst the merchant there.
Saturday, 7 September 2013
Killing Creativity: Obamacare Does Not Cover: writers, photographers, freelance artists, musicians, disc jockeys,
http://www.weeklystandard.com/articles/creative-destruction_751425.html
Groups which covered our creative people are dropping coverage because of Obamacare.
Are these people to disappear from our culture?
Groups which covered our creative people are dropping coverage because of Obamacare.
Are these people to disappear from our culture?
 |
| The Death of Socrates |
Sad day in Kashmir
http://www.washingtonpost.com/world/kashmir-in-turmoil-over-peace-concert-featuring-zubin-mehta/2013/09/06/33f17c9c-1658-11e3-961c-f22d3aaf19ab_story.html?utm_source=dlvr.it&utm_medium=twitter
Art and music use to bring people together, but there is one religion which hates music....and peace....
Art and music use to bring people together, but there is one religion which hates music....and peace....
Wednesday, 28 August 2013
Sunday, 25 August 2013
With 100 Hundred Years Anniversary of This Poem Coming Up, A Comment
Comment First-Yeats was writing about the ineptness and naivete of his own people in this poem. He decries the end of what he calls "Romantic Ireland", a term which could mean the end of idealism, or patriotism, or the end of a sense of morality.
I choose to post this not necessarily because I am a republican, but because the death of Ireland surely has happened now with the passing of the abortion law, and the coming ssm law.
The Celtic Tiger was a symptom of the same greed mentioned in this poem. After one hundred years, there is no difference in the apathy, greed, selfishness and pie-in-the-sky lack of reality of the people here.
Yeats, for all his involvement in the occult and his own romantic fantasies, would not recognize his green island.
The real Catholics are now the exiles, those who are orthodox and love the Church. The rest are blind.
September 1913
What need you, being come to sense,
But fumble in a greasy till
And add the halfpence to the pence
And prayer to shivering prayer, until
You have dried the marrow from the bone;
For men were born to pray and save;
Romantic Ireland's dead and gone,
It's with O'Leary in the grave.
Yet they were of a different kind,
The names that stilled your childish play,
They have gone about the world like wind,
But little time had they to pray
For whom the hangman's rope was spun,
And what, God help us, could they save?
Romantic Ireland's dead and gone,
It's with O'Leary in the grave.
Was it for this the wild geese spread
The grey wing upon every tide;
For this that all that blood was shed,
For this Edward Fitzgerald died,
And Robert Emmet and Wolfe Tone,All that delirium of the brave?
Romantic Ireland's dead and gone,
It's with O'Leary in the grave.
Yet could we turn the years again,
And call those exiles as they were
In all their loneliness and pain,
You'd cry `Some woman's yellow hair
Has maddened every mother's son':
They weighed so lightly what they gave.
But let them be, they're dead and gone,
They're with O'Leary in the grave.
Friday, 23 August 2013
~The Aungier Street Report Hot Off The Press
| http://www.designweek.ie/2012/pivot-dublin-aungier-street-historical-exhibition/ |
Later today and tomorrow, I shall highlight some of the historical references and interesting tidbits from the tour yesterday. I am so glad I went on Thursday as the sun was shining and the temperature about 67 F. Today, it is colder and raining. I shall go back further in history than this second post, the first was written yesterday. http://supertradmum-etheldredasplace.blogspot.ie/2013/08/small-tour-of-dublin-dutch-billys.html
The area of interest is called Aungier Street, one, if not, the first modern street built in Dublin, built over an ancient medieval way. The building up of this area in the 17th century involves a long story, but the Dublin City Council tour guide provided me with a file of information, some of which I shall share here. This history is fascinating. I have a busy day, but will try and provide readers with a few snippets.
I love local history and one of the reasons I love London so much is that thirty years ago, I started studying local history of areas there. One becomes part of what one knows, and knowledge brings love.
The Irish Times has this article today http://www.irishtimes.com/culture/heritage/strategy-to-regenerate-one-of-dublin-s-first-post-medieval-streets-1.1502879
Wiki has a short history on the namesake.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Francis_Aungier,_1st_Baron_Aungier_of_Longford
My information is directly from the report of the Dublin City Council, published today. Exciting. And, to make it all more exciting, the Aungier family had a branch in Wonersh, where someone's very special son is studying to be a priest. Small world. http://www.wonershchurch.org.uk/oldlocalfamilies.htm
This little section is from the Aungier Street Report.
Nuala Burke’s article ‘An Early
Modern Dublin Suburb: The
Estate of Francis Aungier, Earl of
Longford’, published in Irish Geography,
VI (1972), is the definitive work to date on
the Aungier Estate. Primary research
undertaken for this project has been limited
to the examination of leases in the
Registry of Deeds. Research on the
Aungier family has not been pursued but
this is an objective when resources permit.
Sir Francis Aungier,
1st Baron Longford
It is reported that the Aungier family first
came to prominence as a result of their
successful campaigning for Oliver
Cromwell during his conquest in Ireland
in the 1650s.
The estate of Whitefriars (Carmelite)
monastery, dissolved in 1539, was subsequently bought by Sir Francis Aungier,
1st Baron of Longford (1558–1632). Sir
Francis, or Lord Aungier of Longford,
came to Ireland as a man of means
through marriage to the sister of the Earl
of Kildare, one of Ireland premier peers.
He had inherited his wealth from his
father, a bencher of Gray’s Inn in London
and a prominent Cambridgeshire
landowner, who is most remarkable for
having been murdered by one of his own
sons.
Friday, 26 July 2013
Eye Candy and Meditations from the Canons Regular of St. John Cantius-St. Anne's in Krakow
http://www.canons-regular.org/go/our-patron-reflections/
“St. John Cantius lived in times of enormous tension and rather complex change, that was felt in almost all aspects of life in the West,…”
“St. John Cantius lived in times of enormous tension and rather complex change, that was felt in almost all aspects of life in the West,…”
Thursday, 18 July 2013
On Pink Witches, David Jones and The Death of Symbolic Language
http://www.telegraph.co.uk/education/educationnews/8786641/Dress-witches-in-pink-and-avoid-white-paper-to-prevent-racism-in-nuseries-expert-says.html
Ok you have to read the article above to understand my comment. But, basically, one can no longer identify evil with black or good with white.
What does that tell you about relativism? We have to be politically correct about evil. Death of the West.
When Shrek came out, I hated it, and no one could understand my point that Love created Beauty, not ugliness and that we all are beautiful in God's Eyes. It is wrong to want to become ugly for another person. That is not the basis for true love. The inversion of fairy tales destroys ancient meanings, destroys cultural references.
Only one Person had to become ugly, had to be scourged and crucified so that all of us could be made beautiful in Him. The Resurrection is the promise of Beauty.
There a deep cultural reasons why a prince turned into a toad is a nasty punishment, or why a selfish prince with anger issues becomes a beast.
Now, we see that the neo-pagans cannot bear the long Christian symbolism in the West that black means bad and white means good. White horses, white cowboy hats, white wedding dresses for the past 100 years or so, white flowers, all signigy for most Westerners purity and goodness.
The witches have been seen in black for a reason.
Of course, as I wrote a million years ago on my old blog, there are no such things as good witches, as they all adore the Nature Goddess rather than the Trinity. But, to change colours of long standing meaning is the death of poetry, literature, cinema, etc.
And, have you noticed how many rock bands and even actors have taken Christian or Biblical names and twisted the symbols of names? Just try googling some common Christian saints and see what happens.
I would NEVER have my child in a day care, child care or even a public school at this juncture. But, of course, I home schooled
My son knows the signification of symbol. All priests do. All Catholics should. We are people of symbol and poetry. We are the people who know that some signs are efficacious-the sacraments.
David Jones wrote an essay on this "Art and Sacrament" (Epoch and Artist). Find it and read it.
Hard times are a comin'. Do not let your children be confused. Do not lose the important of symbols
Wednesday, 19 June 2013
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