Letter To Artists 7b-c: Architecture, Poetry, and Gregorian Chant

With great freedom, Christians offered to believers and to the world great examples of artistic expression. Christian architecture comes into a flowering in late antiquity, at least in the central cities:

When the Edict of Constantine allowed Christians to declare themselves in full freedom, art became a privileged means for the expression of faith. Majestic basilicas began to appear, and in them the architectural canons of the pagan world were reproduced and at the same time modified to meet the demands of the new form of worship. How can we fail to recall at least the old Saint Peter’s Basilica and the Basilica of Saint John Lateran, both funded by Constantine himself? Or Constantinople’s Hagia Sophia built by Justinian, with its splendors of Byzantine art?

Architecture seems to have sparked something deeper, and many saints contributed to the public aural arts:

While architecture designed the space for worship, gradually the need to contemplate the mystery and to present it explicitly to the simple people led to the early forms of painting and sculpture. There appeared as well the first elements of art in word and sound. Among the many themes treated by Augustine we find De Musica; and Hilary of Poitiers, Ambrose, Prudentius, Ephrem the Syrian, Gregory of Nazianzus and Paulinus of Nola, to mention but a few, promoted a Christian poetry which was often of high quality not just as theology but also as literature.

Poetry is often overlooked as Christian art. But this list hardly goes deeper than the surface, and of course, we have many anonymous works.

Their poetic work valued forms inherited from the classical authors, but was nourished by the pure sap of the Gospel, as Paulinus of Nola put it succinctly: “Our only art is faith and our music Christ”.(“At nobis ars una fides et musica Christus”: Carmen 20, 31: CCL 203, 144)

Gregorian chant is compiled by the “Great” pope, and a significant foundation was laid for the Christian music of the West.

A little later, Gregory the Great compiled the Antiphonarium and thus laid the ground for the organic development of that most original sacred music which takes its name from him. Gregorian chant, with its inspired modulations, was to become down the centuries the music of the Church’s faith in the liturgical celebration of the sacred mysteries. The “beautiful” was thus wedded to the “true”, so that through art too souls might be lifted up from the world of the senses to the eternal.

Pope John Paul II’s Letter To Artists is available in its entirety online here.

EG 106: Two Areas Of Progress In Youth Ministry

Pope Francis cites two areas of progress.

106. Even if it is not always easy to approach young people, progress has been made in two areas:

• the awareness that the entire community is called to evangelize and educate the young,
• and the urgent need for the young to exercise greater leadership.

Do you see these among the youth you know, and in your faith communities?

We should recognize that despite the present crisis of commitment and communal relationships, many young people are making common cause before the problems of our world and are taking up various forms of activism and volunteer work. Some take part in the life of the Church as members of service groups and various missionary initiatives in their own dioceses and in other places. How beautiful it is to see that young people are “street preachers” (callejeros de la fe), joyfully bringing Jesus to every street, every town square and every corner of the earth!

From my view, young people are willing enough to make significant commitments, despite the fact that the adult in society generally aren’t, and don’t impart a good example. One or two years of service in a modern young adult’s life is a significant commitment that should be lauded, then encouraged as a future foundation. Let’s talk about that other modern religion, Almighty Sport. How many teams accept players and coaches on the scale of a generation? how many competitors are willing to invest long-term in a single team?

And let’s double back to the Church: how many bishops, once ordained and installed, are in it for life?

Evangelii Gaudium is online here. Worth reading.

Cynic Alert: Phantom Wealth

Our corporations and government are touting how good a year 2013 was. Are higher real estate values due to home improvements like better insulation, more energy efficiency, or repairs to domestic infrastructure? Hardly. The added value only counts if you’re in a neighborhood that’s improving or holding steady, and you can only cash out by selling. Unless you decide you want to borrow money against your nest egg. That’s where our corporate masters probably want an enthusiastic return: showing off our increased value by going deeper into debt.

On my end of the culture, I see students going deeper into debt to get through college. On my domestic front, I’d like to sink several hundred dollars into a bathroom upgrade–the tub and surround are fading, and the plumbing probably needs an assessment. I’d feel better about my home value if I could keep up with a maintenance and upgrade schedule.

This all begs the question of where a society’s real values are. If we’re worth $80 trillion, what good is that? Are the really needy people cared for? We’ve seen lots of value vanish in 2007-09, and it wasn’t because sinkholes developed under thousands of homes. It was because of financial corruption–largely unpunished–and catastrophically poor policies assisting people top to bottom in making poor decisions.

Last cynical point: the Reuters piece was posted last Thursday and I noticed it got a Bing bling this morning. Apparently the one percent doesn’t think we’re paying enough attention.

Mercy, Wide and Late

The concluding hymn at the parish struck me today in a way it has never done before. Two things. First, wideness, wideness, and kindness:

There’s a wideness in God’s mercy,
like the wideness of the sea.
There’s a kindness in God’s justice,
which is more than liberty.

I had this mind’s image of an endless ocean. No shores. Ah well, maybe a water world … but on second thought, that’s still not nearly big enough.

More than liberty: what an unpatriotic thought. Frederick Faber, the hymn’s author was an Anglican who later shifted to Roman Catholicism. But he’s right about liberty. The kindness and justice of God are more profound than our human experiences and expressions of freedom.

I had never noticed the play of the human mind and the heart of God in this phrase before today:

For the love of God is broader
than the measures of the mind.
And the heart of the Eternal
is most wonderfully kind.

I once disliked this hymn. For some reason, I’ve felt awkward playing the tune In Babilone. I know that’s on me. Finding that right tempo that suits the piano or ensemble and respecting the lyrics–that can be tough.

Earlier this morning, I fretted inwardly–this tune is too “happy” for Lent. And then I let it go. It did seem quite suitable for the context of the first Sunday of Lent, of the morning sun streaming in the eastern windows, and in what I’ve been hearing, especially from Pope Francis, about mercy.

So I received an email from an upset student a little while ago, apologetic for missing the shift to DST and missing her turn as a lector at 10:30 Mass. No problem, for “there is welcome … and more graces … there is mercy … there is healing.” After all: it’s Lent.

Letter To Artists 7a: The Origins of Christian Art

Numbered sections 7 through 9 give the readers a brief overview of art history in a Christian context. This is more of a professor talking and a philosopher reflecting than  an artist. But after all, John Paul II was all these things.

The earliest days, of which we have very little remains to speak of …

7. The art which Christianity encountered in its early days was the ripe fruit of the classical world, articulating its aesthetic canons and embodying its values. Not only in their way of living and thinking, but also in the field of art, faith obliged Christians to a discernment which did not allow an uncritical acceptance of this heritage. Art of Christian inspiration began therefore in a minor key, strictly tied to the need for believers to contrive Scripture-based signs to express both the mysteries of faith and a “symbolic code” by which they could distinguish and identify themselves, especially in the difficult times of persecution. Who does not recall the symbols which marked the first appearance of an art both pictorial and plastic? The fish, the loaves, the shepherd: in evoking the mystery, they became almost imperceptibly the first traces of a new art.

Pope John Paul II’s Letter To Artists is available in its entirety online here.

Cosmos, The Next Generation

I’ve been noticing the advance media (like here) on the Cosmos reboot one-third of a century after Carl Sagan popularized astronomy for the tv masses.

It’s a good idea. Neil deGrasse Tyson is the right choice to front the show. He says:

The task for the next generation of Cosmos is a little bit different because I don’t need to teach you textbook science. There’s a lot of textbook science in the original Cosmos, but that’s not what you remember most. What most people who remember the original series remember most is the effort to present science in a way that has meaning to you that can influence your conduct as a citizen of the nation and of the world–especially of the world.

Sounds like inspiration to me–filling the human spirit with wonder rather than just the mind with information. There are easily enough new discoveries in astronomy over the past thirty-four years to cover another miniseries’ worth of episodes.

Producer Ann Druyan, Dr Sagan’s widow, apparently had a hard time selling the remake idea to network suits. Typical. Cosmos was only the top-rated PBS miniseries until Ken Burns trotted out The Civil War.

I was intrigued with some of the reasons for doing the show now. Animator Seth MacFarlane cites a “culture of lethargy.” He also said:

We’re obsessed with angels and vampires and whatnot, when there are many more exciting and very real and much more spectacular things to be excited about, that are right in our own planetary backyard.

Ms Druyan spoke of science being under attack. I notice a similar worried tone in people like Pope Benedict XVI, though about the realm of faith.

How can this be? Aren’t religion and science antagonists? How can they both be under attack by elements in our culture? Isn’t one of them in supremacy and effectively stamping out all opposition? Isn’t one of them the cruelly oppressed?

I think that things of the natural world, especially in the universe out there, provide wonder in abundance. Very much like faith. And to some people in our world, they want to tamp down the wonder, the inspiration. Too many powerful people just want cogs in the machine: simple reliable parts to keep the engines of modernity running.

You longtime readers are certainly aware that I see a great harmony between the universes of faith and nature. I may have a few college degrees, but I’m also a skeptic on reason triumphant. We need fewer textbooks, fewer catechisms. More inspiration. So if the new Cosmos delivers, I’ll be pleased.

EG 105: Youth Ministry

Pope Francis turns an eye to youth ministry in Evangelii Gaudium. We should carefully listen to this.

105. Youth ministry, as traditionally organized, has also suffered the impact of social changes. Young people often fail to find responses to their concerns, needs, problems and hurts in the usual structures. As adults, we find it hard to listen patiently to them, to appreciate their concerns and demands, and to speak to them in a language they can understand. For the same reason, our efforts in the field of education do not produce the results expected. The rise and growth of associations and movements mostly made up of young people can be seen as the work of the Holy Spirit, who blazes new trails to meet their expectations and their search for a deep spirituality and a more real sense of belonging. There remains a need, however, to ensure that these associations actively participate in the Church’s overall pastoral efforts.[Cf. Propositio 51]

Youth ministry does suffer when it becomes a self-contained subsystem within a faith community. I’ve known many college students who wish their association with NCYC could continue. At what point do we begin a conversation about mainstreaming young people into parishes and directing the efforts of youth ministries to accomplish this? And more importantly, how do we convince adults outside of youth ministry to make the effort to listen?