Thursday, March 28, AD 2024 7:36am

Let There Be Light

To the Virgin and her suppliants, as to us, who though outcasts in other churches can still hope in hers, the Last Judgment was not a symbol of God’s justice or man’s corruption but of her own infinite mercy. The Trinity judged, through Christ;— Christ loved and pardoned, through her. She wielded the last and highest power on earth and in hell. In the glow and beauty of her nature, the light of her Son’s infinite love shone as the sunlight through the glass, turning the Last Judgement itself into the highest proof of her divine and supreme authority. The rudest ruffian of the middle-ages, when he looked at this Last Judgment, laughed, for what was the Last Judgment to her! An ornament, a play-thing, a pleasure! a jewelled decoration which she wore on her breast! Her chief joy was to pardon; her eternal instinct was to love; her deepest passion was pity! On her imperial heart the flames of hell showed only the opaline colors of heaven.

Henry Adams, Mont Saint Michel and Chartres (1904)

 

 

 

From his film F for Fake (1973).  The melancholy is striking as Welles realizes how Western Man has lost his way from the Age of Faith.  The phrase, Poor banished children of Eve, comes strongly to mind.  The generations that reared Chartres and the other great cathedrals of the Middle Ages lived in a time of intellectual ferment, with the Faith giving a certainty and order to the ever questing intellect of Man.  We live in a time of doubt.  This doubt encompasses everything, but most especially Faith and Reason.  Time to awaken from this nightmare of doubt to a new dawn where Faith and Reason will both be at the center of our lives.  Kenneth Clark put it well at the conclusion of his series Civilisation fifty-two years ago:

Shortly before his death Clark converted to Catholicism.  The series Civilisation is available on You Tube.  I strongly recommend it to everyone who has not seen it.  It reminds us that in this vale of tears Faith and Reason must walk together and when they do not calamity ensues for the sons of Adam and the daughters of Eve.  Let there be light, the light of God in Faith and Reason.

 

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Michael Dowd
Michael Dowd
Sunday, January 17, AD 2021 6:05am

I think we are now in times close to the end. Note today’s post by Laramie Hersch:
https://forge-and-anvil.com/2021/01/17/the-beast-hates-the-whore/

T. Shaw
T. Shaw
Sunday, January 17, AD 2021 8:54am

Connecting the ‘dots.’

In The First Joyful Mystery of the Most Holy Rosary of the Blessed Virgin Mary, The Annunciation, the angel Gabriel greets Our Blessed Mother with, “Hail full of grace!” Our Lady then reveals to us Faith and the love of humility.

In The Second Joyful Mystery, The Visitation, Our Holy Mother shows us Charity when she traveled to stay for three months with her cousin, St. Elizabeth, in her old-age pregnancy. Here St. Elizabeth prophesies that Mary is the Mother of Our Redeemer: St. John the Baptist leapt in her womb!

St. John in his Gospel contributes to it when he tells that St. John the Baptist proclaimed Jesus as “The Lamb of God” and two of his followers went with Jesus. .

If today you hear His voice, harden not your hearts.

O Mary conceived without sin, pray for us who have recourse to Thee. .

Live Jesus in our hearts. Forever.

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