Rev. John B. Ardis will give an invocation later this week at the DNC. He's director of the Paulist Center, a progressive Catholic church and outreach center that focuses largely on social justice income redistribution and hugs. Eric posted about the center recently, commenting on a piece by Jonathan V. Last. The Paulist Center is John Kerry's home parish faith community.
Father Ardis on pro-aborts receiving communion:
...it is "contrary to the meaning of the Eucharist to use it as an instrument of division and as a weapon in political battles" and that it would be a "misuse of our authority" to do so.Father, I reply respectfully that the Eucharist is not a metaphor, it is a Person. The Eucharist is not only a shared meal; it is the sacrifice of Christ who gives Himself freely in atonement for our sins. Christ came to free us from sin, a freedom we find tangibly in the Sacraments. But freedom from sin is not free. We cannot accept so great a gift without an understanding of its demands and implications. We must accept those demands in we are to received Our Lord worthily. Otherwise we eat and drink judgement on ourselves.
I agree with Eric that the Center knows precisely what it is doing. “Woe to those who lead the little ones astray! Better they had died in their mothers’ wombs than to walk the earth to destroy souls.”
The mission statement reads: "Attentive to the Holy Spirit, we are a Catholic community that welcomes all, liberates the voice of each, and goes forth to live the Gospel of Jesus Christ." Liberates the voice of each? As I said, the freedom from captivity that Christ preaches in the Gospel is freedom from sin, not freedom from or of conscience. Freedom of conscience at present means license to do whatever one wants, and this leads to the very enslavement Christ wishes to liberate us from.
Are the Paulist Fathers are getting many vocations these days? No, their order is contracepting vocations with this perversion of the Gospel. They squander and profane our greatest treasure, Chirst in the Eucharist. Where are the post-concilliar reformers as there were after Trent?
Oh boy that's a terrible piece of work.
Actually, I disagree -- I think the tree and the figure of Christ are stunning, and I have little love for modern art. If it were mounted anywhere other than over an altar, it would be almost worthy of contemplation. But it's arrogant to decide that a regular crucifix isn't good enough for your "faith community" and that you have to improve on it.
Eric, I think you're a ninny! I'm kidding. I find the piece to be evocative, but the symbols and symbolism should be explored before we make any judgements about it's worthiness for the sanctuary or for it's contemplation outside of the sanctuary.
I take issue with the cross, or rather the tree trunk that looks something like a cross. It's as if the artist is saying the Cross of Christ wasn't fashioned by men. It makes me think of Hegel and the former proponents of process theology. They said God is working Himself out in history, as though there was something He lacked which the world could give Him. And here we see where the piece breaks down, perhaps not aesthetically, but theologically. Since the piece symbolically points away from a cross fashioned by the sin of man, the piece is anti-incarnational. The substance is separated from the symbol. In Catholic art the symbol should always lead to the substance, or else we have the means alone devoid of message, or worse still the means leading to a false message.
In the Easter Triduum, the original Latin says "on that tree hangs the hope of the world" or words to that effect. I know the word "lignum," or "wood," is used, not "crux." So there is traditional precedent for using the word, if not the image, of a tree.
I don't have any problem with artists exploring the many facets of the Passion or Crucifixion, even if that means a departure from archaeological truth. Who could argue that a crucified Christ wearing a king's crown is "incorrect," from a metaphorical perspective?
Again, my problem with this is work is its departure from the reality of Christ's sacrifice. Anything surrounding the altar should reinforce our faith in the True Presence, not call our minds to speculation.
Eric, I agree with you use of the word "wood" and even the cross called the "tree of life" but not on the image of a tree. I know you are more knowledgeable about art history than I, but I can't for the life of me think of any crucifix-like art that depicted Christ crucified on an actual tree, be it a dead one that looks like the on at the Paulist Center or a live one.
I would not disagree with Christ being depicted with a crown on the Cross, for, as Scripture says, Christ reigned from the Cross.
We agree that this work is a departure from Christ's sacrifice. I go a step farther and say it's anti-incarnational because, I believe, it leads away from the reasons for Christ's sacrifice.
I can see your point, Sal. I agree that it's too abstracted from the actual event; I was just offering a mild defense for the work as an art-object, not as a substitute for a crucifix.
It's my understanding (please correct if I'm wrong) that the Paulist Center is not, and never was, a parish; it's an independent chapel.
The chief problem I see is that Christ is not on the cross in this sculpture, but hanging in space away from it. Seems to be taking ones' thought away from the bloody, tangible reality of the Cross and putting it on some sort of airy-fairy pseudo-spirituality.
Whatever happened to the Vatican suppressing orders that have become heretical? You can add the Reiki nuns of (or so they claim) St. Francis here in town.