Comments for Beauty Has Pride of Place at http://www.thecatholicthing.org , comment 1 to 7 out of 7 comments http://www.thecatholicthing.org Wed, 19 Jun 2013 21:57:52 +0100 FeedCreator 1.7.3 http://www.thecatholicthing.org/columns/2011/beauty-has-pride-of-place.html#comment-7218 A basic tenet of our Catholic doctrine is that Christ is the Word, and the Word embodies Truth, Goodness and Justice as it is the Divine Logos. It is our duty to seek Him where He is. It is a tragedy that our culture has no ambition to do the intellectual blood, sweat and tears to seek out He who Is as He is in the Heart of the World (as in von Balthasar). The role of Art, as comprised in music, art, theater, poetry and literature, and dance, is to inspire us to attain these heights of contemplation. Thank God for this article that calls us back to this very fundamental task of attaining our salvation in calling out the beauty that surrounds us! Does this condemn much of the formal artistic world today, let alone the McDonald's church music culture of today's American Catholic Church? Absolutely. Our task is to call these sincere, but misguided artists to the pursuit of something better! Let us go forth in dedication to the task, each in our chosen field of aesthetic endeavor! - Charles Teachout Tue, 28 Jun 2011 15:49:23 +0100 http://www.thecatholicthing.org/columns/2011/beauty-has-pride-of-place.html#comment-7205 This column struck a nerve. The issue in the US may well be the training of the clergy. Some have no idea of the meaning or the tradition of Catholic art. So they go downstream rather than upstream when making choices about art. Or indeed about liturgy. Clair's point in another part of the speech is that knowing beauty would actually clean up people's arrangements for liturgy and frequently clean up their theology too. A rich and profound point! I am just piggy backing on his superb speech that did not get anything like the recognition that it deserved! - Fr. Bevil Bramwell Tue, 28 Jun 2011 04:31:49 +0100 http://www.thecatholicthing.org/columns/2011/beauty-has-pride-of-place.html#comment-7193 Today it is professional suicide for a visual artist to be a practicing Catholic; not for a homosexual, a Buddhist, a Muslim, or a member of a minority. I can attest to this fact myself, as can the very few Catholic artist I know personally. It has been that way in the US at least for the last 40 years. I don't think my experience is due to lack of talent. - Floyd Alsbach Mon, 27 Jun 2011 13:39:00 +0100 http://www.thecatholicthing.org/columns/2011/beauty-has-pride-of-place.html#comment-7184 In visual art, the great masters followed Aristotle as refined by Aquinas: "beauty" is the mind's delight in the goodness of creation, as manifested by an object's wholesomeness (an incomplete object is less beautiful), proper proportion (ditto for a misshapen object), and clarity ("bright colors are more beautiful," he wrote). The purpose of the visual arts was to lead us to appreciate the goodness of creation and the Creator and to symbolize the goodness of virtue. Modern day "transgressive" art isn't really art, and promoting it and calling it "art" is like promoting toxic waste and calling it "pure water." - Don Schenk Mon, 27 Jun 2011 06:15:06 +0100 http://www.thecatholicthing.org/columns/2011/beauty-has-pride-of-place.html#comment-7182 All you have to do is work/do business in a government building to experience the cult of the ugly and its soul searing utilitarianism first hand. Come to think of it, this also applies to too many contemporary Catholic churches. - Yezhov Mon, 27 Jun 2011 05:01:09 +0100 http://www.thecatholicthing.org/columns/2011/beauty-has-pride-of-place.html#comment-7174 Fr. Bevel, a beautiful essay, thank you. We live in the “cult of the ugly” and the public schools and universities, not to mention the media and all the self rights groups, propagandize ugliness and perversion under the banner of ‘tolerance’. Again, thank you, I always enjoy your essays and find them edifying. - Achilles Sun, 26 Jun 2011 13:43:54 +0100 http://www.thecatholicthing.org/columns/2011/beauty-has-pride-of-place.html#comment-7169 Father, I do not know whether heaven exists, but if it does I have to believe the Mozart and Beethoven will be played there. Ludwig's incomparable Ninth Symphony extolling the brotherhood of man leads me to believe there must be a Fatherhood of God. Every time I hear the Ode to Joy, I cannot help think that there is a better place somewhere where all men will be brothers. - Grump Sun, 26 Jun 2011 04:51:44 +0100