One of the main problems of the Church is that since Vatican II there has been a flight from common sense and an embrace of the deranged. Culture, religion and government throughout the West have followed the same path of lusting after the barking mad.
Ugly as Sin
- Donald R. McClarey
Donald R. McClarey
Cradle Catholic. Active in the pro-life movement since 1973. Father of three, one in Heaven, and happily married for 43 years. Small town lawyer and amateur historian. Former president of the board of directors of the local crisis pregnancy center for a decade.
Looks like demon vomit.
Years ago, I was backpacking in Europe, and visited the Vatican museum for the first time. I was traveling solo, and spent an entire leisurely day there. It is quite the labyrinth, and at one point I found myself in the galleries Pope Paul VI had (at great expense) filled with groovy, hip ‘60s and ‘70s religious ‘art’. Aside from a Matisse-designed chasuble, what wasn’t forgettable was regrettable.
It took me a while to find my way out of that warehouse of trash. And on that crowded day at the Vatican museum, there wasn’t one other person in the Paul VI galleries besides myself, and I was only there by accident.
I don’t think it’s an accident that so-called ‘modern’ art styles are not best suited to expressing religious truths.
Modern art was always about disrupting the status quo. Beginning from the Impressionists. Sometimes it hit the mark and sometimes it failed miserable ie. contemporary “art”.
That backdrop is morbid.
I would love to see Pope Leo create a group of those well-versed in *actual* sacred art and architecture, along with some wealthy private donors, to identify (for starters) something like 20 of these types of projects to be overhauled and made beautiful and sacred. They could then work to solicit plans and proposals for renovations.
Once the proposals are in place, basically make it into a crowd-funding opportunity for the laity of the world. It wouldn’t cost the Vatican a dime, it would probably be fully funded with breath-taking speed, and he would gain deserved acclaim as a patron of art and as someone who listens to the concerns the laity, not to mention as someone who made all this happen without deepening the financial crisis.
It could be worse.
Rupnik’s cube.
“… since Vatican II there has been a flight from common sense and an embrace of the deranged.”
There. Said it all in about 17 words.
From “the Catholic Church as a firm anchor” for those seeking guidance— to Captain Hook and his crew running the ship.
And if you say anything, you’ll get keel-hauled.
When I was in college, we were told that late Roman art was inferior to art from the Early Empire because they had declined in prosperity.
As I experience first hand the second fall of the West, I have come to think that the decline of art is actually a *cause* of material decline, not an effect.
Any culture that stops loving itself is in deep trouble.
Steve-
Being keel-hauled is just pirate speak for martyrdom.
The hard part of white martyrdom is that there is so much time to “reconsider”
I wonder if it’s flammable.
[…] and Punditry:The Pope Paul VI Hall is Ugly as Sin – Emily Zanotti & Don McClarey at The American CatholicThe Left is About the Utter […]
We can lay the responsibility for this shlock-fest squarely at the feet of Pope Paul. He loved Expressionism–probably the most un-Roman, un-Catholic art movement since Iconoclasm.
I think–to use real estate agent jargon–it’s a “total tear-down.”