The refusal of beauty
  • Kathy
    Posts: 5,519
    Those who refuse to offer the beautiful are like the managers of a hotel, renowned for its gorgeous views from the lushly landscaped rooftop terraces. All the entrances to the terraces are nailed shut, and every night is 80s night.
  • Guadalupe
    Posts: 50
    Amen, Kathy. I'm feeling quite a bit of discouragement right now, and your words describe well some of the issues I'm facing.
  • Kathy
    Posts: 5,519
    The people deserve beauty and truth. We have the treasuries available to us, and though it isn't always possible, we must do our best to give them out. When we can't, we can make that suffering our prayer for them, that they may find these things.
  • kevinfkevinf
    Posts: 1,204
    But the refusal to offer beauty is related to the notion of truth. And what is beautiful is also true and that is of God. And I believe that part of the issue is that we are afraid of beauty because it puts us in front of God. We would rather stay off to ourselves and play amongst ourselves than face beauty and truth.

    Just my .02.
  • Kathy
    Posts: 5,519
    We close ourselves from the sublime because it is related to God and brings us close to God. It could be a matter of fear, or of pride--of wanting to be in charge ourselves.
  • Adam WoodAdam Wood
    Posts: 6,482
    While I certainly don't disagree with any of these things, I just would like to point out a few dangers here:
    -while there are (probably) universal principles of beauty, the experience of beauty is very culturally specific. Tribal Africans prefer a very dense sound quality, so much so that they tend to prefer broken sound equipment (with a buzz) to new, pristine equipment- this mirrors their ageless tradition of adding jingly things to their instruments (shells, rocks, snares, bells, bottlecaps, etc.). The Balinese use an orchestra (the Gamelan) in which pairs of instruments are deliberately tuned several cents apart from each other. Just a couple examples, I'm sure you all can think of more. It is more than a little too easy to convince ourselves that some particular point in time in a particular culture is the "right" form of beauty.
    -while there are (probably) universal principles of beauty,the experience of beauty is very personally subjective. I, for example, really dislike organ music. This despite my fascination with the instrument itself, my understanding of its venerable place in Christian worship, and my love for several of the musical styles associated with it. On the other hand, I find the loud, abrasive style of traditional shape-note singing to be incredibly beautiful.
    -"beauty is truth, truth beauty" is an idea from Romantic poetry, not an idea from Scripture. We might should be careful to think about the scriptural version of this idea:
    there is no beauty in him, nor comeliness: and we have seen him, and there was no sightliness, that we should be desirous of him: Despised, and the most abject of men, a man of sorrows, and acquainted with infirmity: and his look was as it were hidden and despised, whereupon we esteemed him not.
    -Is 53:2-3


    I do not in anyway mean to suggest that beauty is not something we should aspire to. But beauty, being by nature attractive, can easily become an idol.
    We preach Christ, and him crucified. We do not preach beauty, nor worship at its temple.
  • noel jones, aagonoel jones, aago
    Posts: 6,611
    Living in a community in which 3 out of 10 people are unable to read and write, I can tell you that there is fear of anything different, anything outside of their small, comfortable lives. Things of beauty are in many cases to be feared and treated with suspicion, especially of they require any form of education to recognize them as being beautiful.
  • MaryAnn Carr WilsonMaryAnn Carr Wilson
    Posts: 1,738
    Christian tradition has long held the idea of the Via pulchritudinis, or Way of Beauty.
    From the psalms-
    I have loved, O Lord, the beauty of Thy house; and the place where Thy glory dwelleth.


    Liturgical arts, and the great stretch of Christian art in general, have the ability to reach hearts when reason has been rejected or exhausted. Consider the illiterate masses of folks living in the middle ages, when truths were taught (among other ways) through stained glass windows.
    Timeless art, including music, presents people with an opportunity for recollection at several levels.
  • Mark M.Mark M.
    Posts: 632
    Nicely put, Adam. I would append to that, though, a reminder that there is a culture associated with our faith. Our "Catholic culture" and our Catholic faith are not one in the same — indeed, I suppose that the faith itself is trans-cultural, or perhaps supra-cultural. But the expression of that faith does take on a cultural shape. Perhaps that should be plural — cultural shapes — the Latin rite (and, concomitantly, the norms and expectations concerning "beauty") being one of those shapes.
  • francis
    Posts: 10,882
    wow Kevin... that is a scarey but very good insight to humanity. sad, but true.
  • GavinGavin
    Posts: 2,799
    I think Noel has it correct. Beauty is different, and so must be feared and shunned. This isn't solely a rural thing, but applies to nearly everyone.
  • SamuelDorlaque
    Posts: 318
    I remember an old Viennese prof musing over the fact that throughout the history of Western civilization we have had
    a struggle between the Apollonian & Dionysian, the Platonic & Aristotilian, the objective & the subjective. Palestrina
    had to work in the midst of this struggle, as did Byrd, as did Bach, as did Mozart, etc. Perhaps it is through the struggle
    that beauty breaks forth.
  • Robsc
    Posts: 20
    I think a big problem is, Catholic Liturgy (as it is commonly practiced in the United States) has traded what is beautiful for what is preceived to be exciting.

    Rob
  • dad29
    Posts: 2,233
    "Beauty/truth" is not of Romantic origin.

    It is Aristotelian--he included goodness as the third part of the trio.

    See: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Golden_mean_(philosophy)

    Aquinas, of course, followed Ari's lead.
  • Michael O'Connor
    Posts: 1,637
    This younger American professor still teaches this, but not as a struggle. Rather it is a natural human desire to want one when he/she tires of the other. Usually takes about 100 years. ;-)
  • Jeffrey Quick
    Posts: 2,103
    Rob, why the disconnect between the beautiful and the exciting? Beauty is exciting. Ask any 18 year old male. ;-)
  • Maureen
    Posts: 679
    Re: the true, the good and the beautiful, there's a wee little Scriptural reference or two between Aristotle and Aquinas. Just sayin'. :)
  • Daniel Bennett PageDaniel Bennett Page
    Posts: 837
    Truth and beauty are alien concepts where I live. Indeed, both the EF and OF here are rigorously anti-beauty and anti-theological.
  • JamJam
    Posts: 636
    I think Puritanism is essentially the refusal of beauty: believing purity to be somehow antithetical to physical beauty and anything sensuous.

    In America, we are still living with the consequences of that mindset.
  • Kathy
    Posts: 5,519
    Interesting thought!
  • David Sullivan
    Posts: 355
    Not necessarily rejection of beauty, maybe better described as obliviousness to beauty, is the movie "Babette's Feast."
    A fabulous 19th-century Parisian chef ends up in exile on a remote Scandinavian island, cooking for the local Lutheran pastor and his sisters.
    The film raises many thoughts about art in a strongly Eucharistic (banquet) context.
  • dad29
    Posts: 2,233
    Yes, Maureen.

    I always found it VERY interesting that He said "I am the Way, Truth, Life."

    Thus, if one agrees w/Ari and TA, the trio becomes FIVE: Life, Truth, Beauty, Goodness, Way.

    So Beauty is Life (eternal).
  • Charles in CenCA
    Posts: 2,416
    In the discursive sense, isn't our Savior just amplifying by three nouns, for our benefit, the all-encompassing declaration of our Father when He replied to Moses, "I AM, " or simply "AM"? As Creator, "AM" encompasses "beauty, goodness, holiness...." oui?
  • dad29
    Posts: 2,233
    Well, yes. For that matter, TA and Ari posited that God IS the Perfection of those (Ari did not know of God, but reasoned to Him.) So Christ both self-identified with the Father (AM) and laid out the 'other parts' of the three, adding "life" and "way" to the mix, which I think is very thought-provoking.
  • Adam WoodAdam Wood
    Posts: 6,482
    FWIW, the Chinese philosophical idea of "Tao" (which was co-opted into a religion) means all those things: Way, truth, life, beauty, etc.
    It's usually translated into English as "the Way," but that's remarkably reductive.
    Also, in many Chinese translations of Scripture, logos (the Word in Jn 1) is translated as... Tao.

    Among that word's other meanings (known and conjectured, along with it's etymological meaning):
    -guide
    -measure (as of a portion of food)
    -channel (as in: something through which water flows)
    -quote, or words spoken
    -conduit, path or channel between two places
    -doctrine
    -pattern of ethical behavior; rule
    -to instruct, teach, or guide
    -to head (lead) something or some people
    -to proceed along the right path (the root ideograph in this case being related to the concept of "proceeding from")
  • JamJam
    Posts: 636
    http://www.stherman.com/Catalog/Sunrise_of_the_East/Tao_book.htm
  • Adam WoodAdam Wood
    Posts: 6,482
    To further push the implications here....
    Considering
    IF a=b, then b=a....

    JN 14 could be translated:
    I am the Tao, the Tao, and the Tao.

    OR simply

    I AM who I am, who I am, who I am.
Add a Comment