Sacred* Art by Atheists

Today's question is: can a non-Christian make meaningful Christian art?

David Mach: Crucifixion, Edinburgh, 2011

David Mach, a nonbeliever, was commissioned to recreate biblical scenes out of coat hangers to celebrate the 400th anniversary of the King James Bible. Despite the acclaim of art critics, us ordinary folk have trouble shaking images of "Hellraiser." It makes you wonder exactly what Mach is trying to communicate, aside from pain. Anger? Hatred? Torture? Industry?

In an interview with the Telegraph, Mach admitted to being "irreligious," and said, "I’m sure I’m going to get accused of hijacking something that I don’t really have massive feelings about. It’s not about me. It’s about what I’m making. If I’m asked for opinions I’ll give them, but look at the work and see if you can get something from there."

Then there's atheist Gerhard Richter's design* for the transept window in the Cologne cathedral, Germany. The original window was damaged by air raids in World War II. The design* was created randomly with a computer, and mimics a digital "pixel" pattern. I would describe this as iconoclastic, but throngs of critics—and even parishioners—have described it as "spiritual," "contemplative," even "divine."

*Design implies intention. Something that is random cannot, by definition, be designed.

Gerhard Richter: South transept window, Cologne, 2007

Massimiliano Fuksas takes the cake with his design for a church in Foligno, Italy. Art critics use words like "modest" and "inspiring" to describe this massive concrete cube. These critics are apparently used to building with alphabet blocks, so that is to be expected. Photos of the oddly claustrophobic interior can be found here.

Massimiliano Fuksas: Paolo Church, Foligno, 2009. Photo credit: ARQA.com

Germaine Richier: Crucifix, 1950

Not to be outdone by her male counterparts, Germaine Richier caused a stir in the 1950s when she created this crucifix for the church of Notre-Dame de Toute in Assy, France. She explained its ugliness as depicting the suffering of Christ. She also explained that the figure has no face because God is spirit and therefore has none. This illustrates why we don't ask atheists to make theological statements for us. After complaints from horrified parishioners, the cross was removed from the church, and immediately became the center of much early controversy as to the role of artists (and their faith—or lack thereof) in the church.

Igor Mitoraj: Christ Resurrection, Rome, 2006

The last artist whose work I'm going to show is the odd one of the bunch. Igor Mitoraj produced several huge bronze doors and many other large-scale figurative sculptures in the Renaissance tradition. I've scoured the web for any mention of his faith and came up dry—even his obituary from late last year suggested nothing. But his bronze doors from Basilica di Santa Maria degli Angeli in Rome struck me with their classicism. And while employed with a kind of surrealist, postmodern flair, the Christian symbolism also struck me so much that I cited this door in my thesis. Here is a resurrected Christ figure, reminiscent of Greek gods (and early Christian depictions), but bearing the empty shape of the cross in his body.

There are countless examples that I either am unaware of or have passed over—especially in the architectural realm. The point I'm trying to make is that nonbelievers have made it apparent to believers that their grasp of Christianity is extremely shallow. Even if we didn't have the evidence before our eyes, we know that these truths are only made known by the Spirit, through faith.

This isn't to say that every construction worker who drives a nail into your church must be a believer. But when it comes to designing a church, or producing artwork for that community of faith, it should go without saying that it requires an intimate knowledge of what those people believe and practice and confess. Furthermore, it requires a knowledge of what has come before, and a sincere desire to chart an artistic path into the future that recognizes the eternal and transcendent nature of the Church. What sets Mitoraj's bronze doors apart from the above works is a familiarity with and respect for the pages of art history, many of which were written by artists of faith. Still, even if a blind squirrel occasionally finds a nut, I don't think we should encourage the practice of hiring blind squirrels when we have so many sighted ones...

Judge It by Its Own Standard

If you had walked down the aisle of Holy Name of Jesus in Brooklyn just a few years ago, a peculiar sight would have greeted you in the chancel. Arranged in a semi-circle behind the altar was a grouping of seven post-like objects. The inside face of each object arched toward the altar, and terminated in a recessed light fixture at the top of the arc. The monolithic slabs of drywall gave the impression of a 1980s Stonehenge, if Stonehenge had been painted "Pepto-Bismal pink." The pillars were known to the parish as "the upside down hockey sticks."Aside from a solitary crucifix and plush red carpet, the rest of the church was white and bare.

If you’ve followed my Facebook page for the last couple of years, you’ll notice I’ve begun paying much closer attention to church renovation projects. Everyone loves a good makeover story. But as a liturgical artist, it interests me for a number of other reasons. First, because it shows how others of my trade have been putting their God-given gifts to use, and second, because the renewal projects often come as a result of bad architectural choices made in the past century.

And as much as the transformations interest me, I’m just as interested in the responses of people who categorically disapprove of such renovations—especially if the finished design smacks of historical architecture. As far as I can tell, these renewal projects are born from a desire to beautify an otherwise ugly or drab worship space (as opposed to “modernizing” one)—and many that I have seen appear to have succeeded. But nonetheless, you can find plenty of people consistently making the same defenses for bad architecture. This is what they often say:

“Like all churches, this one was just a product of its time. You have to judge it by its own standard.”

Okay, I get that you can’t judge everything by the same standard. A Ming Dynasty Chinese tapestry obviously can’t be judged by the same principles that created a marble sculpture during the Italian Renaissance. But they’ve taken a valid point and run so far with it as to make it utterly useless. If architectural aesthetic standards can’t even carry over from one decade to the next in the same geographical region, or even from one building to the next built in the same year, then there is no point in saying there is such a thing as a “standard.”

Besides, how convenient is it for an architect who makes ugly buildings that we cannot contrast their shortcomings with more beautiful buildings built at a different time? Terribly convenient. And this is why I have so little regard for the architecture that Modernism has pushed on our culture for almost a century. It may be a product of its time, but so is a landfill. Every work of Modernist art came with its own unwritten set of instructions as to how it should be judged. You can see how easy it would be for a long jumper to win the meet if he’s allowed to bring his own tape measure.

“It’s thoughtless and dishonest to go around applying a Gothic veneer to everything, in spite of the original style and intent.”

In this view, everything that isn’t created in a self-consciously “modern” style is viewed as backward looking and therefore unoriginal. It observes Christian architecture only through the lens of Modernism, which values originality above beauty. But judging a church to be unoriginal simply because it incorporates Gothic visual elements is inconsistent with the insistence that every work be judged by its own standard. If we were to actually do that, then a neo-Gothic church should really be judged as an excellent homage to the Gothic. It isn’t intended to make a statement of originality or modernity; it expresses continuity with the church of ages past—and the theology that inspired it.

So even though we could ostensibly avoid criticism by creating our own rules, I think we ought to steer clear of that viewpoint. For those who are “in the world, but not of it,” there is a better way. Christians have historically had standards of holiness, beauty, and excellence instead of the vapid, self-styled standards of Modernism. It isn’t valid to say that a high altar with Gothic pinnacles is somehow dishonest. The Gothic style has been absorbed into the visual culture of the church in the same way that pillars and arches have been absorbed into the repertoire of secular architecture. While I don’t advocate that we all build neo-Gothic churches, I can’t find fault with parishes that have done so in the past. In response to the ugliness of the Industrial Revolution (and later, Modernism), they withdrew to a perfectly valid and beautiful style in the repertoire of Christian architecture.

Now, there are certainly examples of church renovations that are regretful, at least for art historical reasons. It’s a shame that we’ll never know what the church of San Vitale looked like in its original, Byzantine glory, because gaudy frescos in the Rococo style replaced many of its mosaics. And we know that the more radical personalities of the Reformation did more harm than good with the systematic removal or destruction of artwork and the whitewashing of church walls. Not all changes were for the better. Holy Name of Jesus found that out the hard way. The church was originally built in the 1800s; someone had tried to “improve” on it in the 1980s with disastrous results.

But when the changes are made thoughtfully and for the right reasons, a great deal of good can result. Thankfully, the parishioners of Holy Name were so fed up with the pink hockey sticks that they decided to undergo a dramatic renewal of their worship space. With the leadership of a new priest, they hired a company that has an established track record of beautiful transformations in the tradition of the Christian church. The resulting space was truly a remarkable change.

How We've Murdered Liturgical Art: Part II

This series of posts discusses a book written by a professor at Carthage College, published by Concordia Publishing House, and used as a required text at Concordia University NE in the 1970s. It is entitled "The Christian Encounters the World of Painting," by Wendell Mathews. The book purports to be a guide for Christians to approaching and critiquing modern painting. While claiming to be a proponent of Christian art, Mathews is clearly part of the problem—he is one of the many Christian voices that contributed to the murder of the liturgical arts in the past century. I intend to show exactly how.

In his book, Dr. Mathews wields four weapons against the art of the Church. Not surprisingly, they are the standard poison of Modernism, but have been carefully disguised with theological language in order to be more readily swallowed by Christians. They are: 1) undermining tradition, 2) promoting elitism, 3) attacking semantics, and 4) fostering an improper view of vocation.

2. Promoting Elitism

Admittedly, calling someone an elitist is probably one of the most overused name-calling tactics in history. There is nothing that raises the ire of the masses as much as someone who uses his power, wealth, or position in order to exclude those of "lesser" social status. In modern politics, even if the title is not deserving, once it is applied to a person it is difficult to overcome that association.

That being said, there are few entities that are so deserving of the title "elitist" as Modernism is. And there are few places where elitism is so wholly inappropriate as the Christian Church. But oddly enough, we so very often find them together.

Modernists firmly believed that their art was the culmination of tens of thousands of years of artistic efforts; that after millennia of mindlessly imitating nature, they had finally thrown off the shackles of realism and representationalism, and the result was an art that was more pure, more expressive, and more intensely human than ever before.

The only problem was that the public wasn't buying it (both figuratively and literally). A 1995 article from the Independent explains:

In the 1950s and 1960s… the great majority of Americans disliked or even despised modern art—President Truman summed up the popular view when he said: “If that’s art, then I’m a Hottentot.”¹

I suspect that Modernism had to become elitist in order to survive. When the new art failed to gather as much enthusiasm as de Kooning, Pollock, Rothko, and their peers thought it deserved, the automatic response was to dismiss the public as uneducated idiots. If you repeat a lie often enough, and believe it strongly enough, and if the CIA secretly funds your lie for decades², eventually everyone will believe it.

Manessier, "Crown of Thorns"

And that is what Mathews believes, as well. In "The Christian Encounters the World of Painting," he tries very hard to distinguish "authentic" painting from that which is not. He writes, "Authenticity is determined by knowledgeable and experienced viewers who have been trained to see these qualities."³ He continues, "The standards of evaluation come from the artists and those who, through learning and exposure, have come to sense the visual language of painting."⁴ And again, "If the viewer has had little or no training and experience with viewing paintings, it is rather presumptuous to think he can judge what is an authentic painting."⁵ No doubt, Matthews counts himself among these "knowledgeable and experienced" viewers, and is therefore qualified to apply the title of authenticity to those works he considers worthy.

By way of clarification, I do not discount knowledge and experience in matters of art. As a student of the arts, I certainly have a deeper understanding and appreciation for art now than I did as a high school graduate. But I object to the notion that an elite class of academics have the right to say what is "authentic" and what is not, while the public—the people for whom art is ostensibly intended—have no right at all.

Mathews even attempts to disqualify clergy and laymen from passing artistic judgement on the art that is made for their churches! He writes, "The church also is finding that it cannot foster creative expression by requesting the artist to cater to the prevailing tastes of clergy and laymen."⁶ I question whether the church has actually found this, or whether this has been dictated to the church by elitist academics. Regardless, Mathews is effectively saying, If you find this new art objectionable, you have bad taste, and you are inhibiting authentic artistic expression. And anyways, who are you? Just a stupid layman.

Why is this dangerous to Christianity—and how did it kill liturgical art?

If neither the laymen nor the clergy are fit to discern what art is and is not fit for use in worship, then who is? The artists? You can see why Modernists are so deserving of the title "elitist." They not only want to monopolize the production of new artwork, but its critique, and—no doubt—its value. You can also see why the church has come to distrust artists on the whole. If Mathews represents the prevailing academic opinion about arts in the church, it is no wonder that many churches would prefer to leave the whole matter alone and worship in a white-washed barn.

Chagall, "White Crucifixion"

An all-important question that Mathews never raises is: who is the art intended for? The book is entitled "The Christian Encounters...", and the author presupposes that his readership are Christians. But he never explicitly states that Christian art is intended for Christians. Now if liturgical art is meant for Christians, then logicaly the intended audience would play a role in judging its worth. But he cannot reveal that inconsistency, so I suspect the question is deliberately avoided. However, from phrases scattered throughout the book, I gather that Mathews never considers that a work should be intended for the edification of the body of believers. He sees art universally as a subjective experience between you, the viewer, and the work itself. This can only ever harm the Church, because it takes away the ability of art to communicate real meaning.

The second all-important question that Mathews never asks is: what is the art's purpose? He doesn't ask, but he does give an answer, though only in passing:

If, however, we conclude that for Christians the quality of artistic expression does not matter and that only the religious message matters, we have moved out of the area of the fine arts. If the church wishes to enunciate the Gospel by means of artistic expressions, it must strive for nothing less than authentic art of quality.⁷ 

Did you catch it? He casually, almost accidentally, says what should have been the central point of the whole book: "to enunciate the Gospel." I wonder how artists are supposed to do that if, in trying to do so, Mathews and his peers dismiss it as unauthentic, or disassociate it with fine art. Or, if an artist tries to follow Dr. Mathews' advice, how he is supposed to enunciate anything by means of the subjective abstractions Mathews is so infatuated with? It's an enormous catch-22 that he hopes you won't notice. Unfortunately, some rather influential voices in the church have been playing the Modernist tune for decades. They are still teaching young artists that liturgical art is a means of self-expression, and not one of enunciating the gospel. The inevitable result is that the church grows either farther estranged from artists, or from the gospel—and possibly both.

Christianity is not a religion of subjective realities, but of objective, unchanging truths. It sees humankind as unique creations, but ones that are fundamentally the same—equally corrupt and sinful, and equally in need of a Savior. This is why we come to worship. We need to hear that Jesus was delivered over to death for our sins, and was raised to life for our justification.⁸

Whatever works of art we choose to place in our sanctuaries, they must certainly reflect these truths. Those works should be accessible to the people they are meant to communicate to. There is no room in the Church for elitism.

To be continued...

_______________

¹ Frances S. Saunders, "Modern art was CIA 'weapon'," The Independent (October 1995), http://www.independent.co.uk/news/world/modern-art-was-cia-weapon-1578808.html
² Ibid.
³ Wendell Mathews, The Christian Encounters the World of Painting (St. Louis, MO: Concordia Publishing House, 1968), 90.
⁴ Mathews, 91.
⁵ Ibid, 100.
⁶ Ibid, 91-92.
⁷ Ibid, 101.
⁸ Romans 4:25

How We've Murdered Liturgical Art: Part I

This series of posts discusses a book written by a professor at Carthage College, published by Concordia Publishing House, and used as a required text at Concordia University NE in the 1970s. It is entitled "The Christian Encounters the World of Painting," by Wendell Mathews. The book purports to be a guide for Christians to approaching and critiquing modern painting. While claiming to be a proponent of Christian art, Mathews is clearly part of the problem—he is one of the many Christian voices that contributed to the murder of the liturgical arts in the past century. I intend to show exactly how.

In his book, Dr. Mathews wields four weapons against the art of the Church. Not surprisingly, they are the standard poison of Modernism, but have been carefully disguised with theological language in order to be more readily swallowed by Christians. They are: 1) undermining tradition, 2) promoting elitism, 3) attacking semantics, and 4) fostering an improper view of vocation.

1. Undermining the Christian Tradition

A hallmark of Modernism was the sudden break from tradition. Spectacular mental acrobatics were required by Modernist art critics—championed by Clement Greenberg—in order to attach abstract expressionism (and other -isms) to some kind of linear, historical significance. Greenberg felt it necessary to historically justify that which had nothing at all to do with thousands of years of artistic precedent. Other Modernists, however, felt the need to neither deny nor justify the obvious break from tradition. The Futurists, for example, would have burned the museums to the ground, if Marinetti's manifesto had been carried out in reality.¹

Dr. Mathews is not one of those overtly iconoclastic Modernists, however. He has good intentions. But he appears to be under two related delusions: that Modernist painting is a continuation of the artistic tradition, but that the painting of past eras has no significance to people living in the present:

After a long period of indifference to the major stylistic trends of recent decades, the church is questioning whether it can relate adequately to the present age by means of outmoded art styles. Some in the church have known for some time that the use of past styles has alienated artists interested in stylistic innovations that emerge from creative activity.¹

I quoted a portion of this statement in the Introduction post, but Mathews apparently believes it so strongly that he says it twice. But take special notice of the things he glosses over as though they were self-evident: that traditional styles are "outmoded," and that the use of past styles "alienates" creative artists. Mathews does not spend much time trying to explain exactly why something that was painted for Christians in 1600 cannot relate to Christians of today. Mathews does explain, however, that symbols used in past centuries may fall out of use. He writes,

Visual symbols are born and die. They die when they can no longer produce the special response that the viewer associates with the object. For this reason, many old visual symbols once alive to church members have now lost their power to communicate. But out of the contemporary involvement should arise new and meaningful symbols.²

Okay. So by this are we to believe that when people no longer know what a shepherd is, we should substitute "Jesus is my homeboy?" Well, he has an answer for that.

Some have suggested that all the old visual symbols... should be discarded because they communicate only when they are explained. It is true that some symbols have lost their power to communicate, but this should not apply to a large number of symbols that come to us directly from the Bible. We should not discard symbols of the lamb and the Good Shepherd because we are now more urban-oriented than people of Bible times. ... If such symbols lose their meaning, it reflects weakness on the part of the members of the Christian church.³

I suspect that it's rare for someone to so thoroughly shoot himself in the foot as Mathews has done here. So far, this has been his only concrete reason for doing away with "past styles" of art, and it really has nothing at all to do with the styles, but with the substance. But after saying that symbols that no longer communicate should be replaced with new symbols, he then rebukes this viewpoint as a weakness of faith. And even though he argues that only biblical symbols should enjoy a special protection from disuse, it still requires educating the believers as to their meaning and value. What possible excuse could one have, then, for ignorance toward other well-established but non-biblical symbols (for instance, the Chi-Rho)? None whatsoever.

This leads us to conclude that this cannot be his real and only reason for marginalizing Christian art of the past. Dr. Matthews' motives are only hinted at when he defines what "authentic" art is: "A Christian painting should be authentically artistic. In the world of painting, a work is authentic within a particular cultural and artistic continuum."⁴ He goes on to say that "individual style, however, should show also the style of his own historical and artistic epoch."⁵ This is his ace in the sleeve. Whatever a person might say about timelessness, symbolism, or the power to communicate, he can simply counter by saying, "But that art does not participate in the current artistic idiom; therefore it isn't authentic."

So let's recap. Remember how Mathews began by saying that certain styles cannot "relate adequately to the present age?" As it turns out, that was just the first part of a classic bait-and-switch. His argument really has nothing to do with whether or not past art can relate or communicate with Christians today, because he knows this argument has no legs. Instead, he tries to convince you that any art that isn't a product of the mainstream culture cannot ever be "authentic."

Why is this dangerous to Christianity—and how did it kill liturgical art?

It turns out that Dr. Mathews is not really saying anything new. He has fallen prey to the age-old infatuation with the present—that the best music, poetry, art, science, and everything, is happening now. It must be exhilarating to think of one's self riding on the crest of progress, even affecting that progress. The trouble is that this kind of ego- and sociocentricity has nothing to do with Christianity. Christianity teaches that since the Fall into sin, man is utterly corrupt and has nothing to offer God. Furthermore, society at large has been on the express train to hell—and it's picking up speed. Mathews doesn't deny this. He correctly describes the Christian's relationship to the world as one of "mediation." He then explains,

The Christian relationship centers in God's grace, mediated to man in and through the God-man, Jesus Christ, the Son of God. This gift was bought with His great sacrifice, revealing the fullness of divine love. Christ's love becomes the power for Christian action. The Christian's faith is to be active in love.⁶

The wording is theologically vague, but I think we could all agree with that statement. However, the problem is that what Mathews calls mediation is, to him, social activism. "This acceptance of responsibility means having a critical voice regarding cultural elements contrary to Christian truths."⁷ The most charitable view of Mathews' writing would be that he wants art to engage nonbelievers in a theological dialogue. But this is impossible. You can tell the Parable of the Good Samaritan to an atheist, and he will fancy himself to be the Good Samaritan. Images do not change a person's orientation to God. As highly as I regard ecclesiastical art, it does not have the power to evangelize nonbelievers—it is not a means of grace.

Vestment for Mass by Manessier

Besides the futility of this supposed evangelism effort, all it has accomplished is to scrape the beauty and meaning from art in order to present to an unbelieving culture something that Dr. Mathews hopes they can "relate" to. Where does that leave Christians? I did not find one single sentence in the book that distinguished art made for galleries from art made for worship. To Mathews, I suspect that they are the same thing. And this is why it is so fatally damaging to liturgical art. In 2000 years of art history, Christian art was made primarily for either devotional purposes or for worship. In both respects, it was made for Christians. No one deluded himself into believing that showing an image of Jesus would convert the heathens. (They suffered from other delusions, but probably not this one.) So it is exceedingly stupid to expect that the church of this age should lower its artistic standards to the tastes and aesthetic of a culture that is in every respect ruled by Satan.

But the biggest reason why this disconnect from tradition is damaging to liturgical art and to Christianity is that, while attempting to use the visual language of Modernism, it has jettisoned the narrative of Salvation in exchange for the subjective feelings of the artist. Modernist painting and sculpture, because it abandoned representational art, could only use abstraction to convey a visceral, barely definable, subjective experience. This art is incapable of expressing the reality of the Incarnation, because it refuses to acknowledge any reality at all.

History has now played out this costly artistic experiment. It has failed utterly. The attempt to make Christian art that "relates" to the iconoclastic culture of our times has resulted in: no significant theological dialogue, no new converts as a result, a Christian church disenchanted with art, talented artists who have either been estranged by the church or who have squandered their talent in an effort to gain mainstream acceptance, and a lifeless body of liturgical art.

To be continued...

_______________

¹ "Come on! Set fire to the library shelves! Turn aside the canals to flood the museums! ... Oh, the joy of seeing the glorious old canvases bobbing adrift on those waters, discoloured and shredded. ... Take up your pickaxes, your axes and hammers and wreck, wreck the venerable cities pitilessly!" Filippo Tommaso Marinetti, “The Foundation and Manifesto of Futurism” (1909), quoted in: Michael Darling, Target Practice: Painting Under Attack, 1949-78 (Seattle: Seattle Art Museum, 2009), 130.
² Wendell Mathews, The Christian Encounters the World of Painting (St. Louis, MO: Concordia Publishing House, 1968), 92.
³ Ibid, 93.
⁴ Ibid, 90.
⁵ Ibid.
⁶ Ibid, 89.
⁷ Ibid.

Intro: How We've Murdered Liturgical Art

Anyone who has heard me talk about Modernism probably has heard me refer to it as the "twentieth century iconoclasm." At a presentation I gave last week, I explained that anyone interested in making artwork for the church, was, by the 1950s, being trained in the paradigm of "art for art's sake." Christians were readily abandoning the artistic tradition of the church and pounding Jackson Pollack over the heads of anyone who picked up a brush. And I only recently realized how true this really was.

A few months ago, my aunt was downsizing, and asked if I wanted any of her art books from college. She attended Concordia University Nebraska in the 1970s, where she studied art. I couldn't turn down the opportunity to add to my library, no matter how old or outdated the books were, so I took them all home with me. On the top of the box I saw a book entitled: "The Christian Encounters the World of Painting," by Wendell Mathews. The book was published by Concordia Publishing House in 1968. According to the biography on the back, Dr. Mathews was a professor and chair of the art department at Carthage College (ELCA) in Kenosha, Wisconsin. I am always interested in the convergence of art and theology, so I picked it up and began to read.

By the second paragraph of the preface, my hopes of reading an informative, insightful book were extinguished by some very familiar Modernist rhetoric:

Many Christians—both ministers and laymen—are encouraging a fresh consideration of the church's relation to the arts. After a long period of indifference to the major stylistic trends of recent decades, the church should question whether or not it can relate adequately to the present age by means of outmoded art styles.

After a brief moment of disgust, my curiosity was piqued and I began to read with more interest. This musty, yellowed book was a time capsule; it afforded me the opportunity to read what was actually being taught at a Lutheran college in the 1970s. This was the smoking gun I had been looking for. It became clear to me exactly how involved Lutherans have been in the cold-blooded murder of liturgical art.

The one indisputable fact concerning this murder is the state of the deceased. Anyone can observe the cold, naked state of our churches built in the past 60 years or so. As obvious as it is to me, however, it's the sort of thing one can get used to, and after a few generations, maybe only a handful of people can see a corpse for what it is. I suspect that it requires only a glance at the thousands of churches that were built and furnished in a time when the liturgical arts were very much alive to convince the apathetic layman that a murder has, in fact, occurred. But upon becoming aware of it, the problem does not therefore solve itself. ("Awareness" doesn't cure cancer, either.) The point of educating Christians about what has happened is not to elicit sympathy; neither is it to point fingers. It is to change their perceptions and behavior—to cause them to stop participating in this ongoing iconoclasm and work toward reversing it.

Once their minds have been changed, then the healing can begin. "God is not the God of the dead, but of the living" (Mt 22:32). He who raised Christ from the dead can certainly resurrect the visual arts in his Church. I firmly believe that God will do this. The pendulum has been too long the other way; it is time to bring it back.

But until that happens, there's a lot of work to be done. We've got a corpse on a slab, and I mean to find out how exactly the Bride of Christ was so badly mistreated, and why. And I'm darn sure not going to let it happen again, so help me God.

To be continued...

The Message of the Cross

"For the message of the cross is foolishness to those who are perishing, but to us who are being saved it is the power of God." 1 Corinthians 1:18

"For I resolved to know nothing while I was with you except Jesus Christ and him crucified." 1 Corinthians 2:2

The cross has been a symbol in Christian churches since at least the second century. But given the theological importance the evangelists often ascribe to the cross, one would expect to see it earlier and more often in Christian art. But in fact, we see only disguised hints of it in the early church. And we never find literal depictions of the crucifixion until well into the middle ages. One reason for this is the persecution of Christianity until the fourth century. But evangelical author Philip Yancey suggested another reason; that the cross did not fully take form in Christian churches until anyone who had ever witnessed an actual crucifixion had died.

I think Yancey's observation is an astute one. There is something in our human nature—and especially in American culture—that shrinks from the thought of death. Of torture and execution, doubly so. But for centuries the Church has embraced this symbol of execution, because, as Paul states, "to us who are being saved it is the power of God." How foolish this must seem to the world! Imagine a church in which a corpse dangles from a hangman's noose or sits limply in an electric chair, and you will perhaps understand how strange it must seem for Christians to embrace the crucifix.

In American Lutheran churches of the past half century or more, there seems to have arisen the misconception that the crucifix with corpus is a Catholic fixture, whereas the empty cross is a Lutheran/Protestant one. In addition, it is commonly explained that the empty cross signifies the resurrection, whereas the crucifix somehow fails to acknowledge (or lessens the significance of) Christ's rising. But it should first be observed that Lutheran churches have prominently displayed crucifixes from the Reformation to the present. The crucifix has never been viewed by believers as a denial of the resurrection, nor has the empty cross ever carried any special signification of it, until recent decades. To the Church, the crucifix has only ever been a symbol of God's tremendous love made manifest.

In Christian freedom, we of course have the option of displaying our faith in Jesus in many different forms. Neither a corpus nor an empty cross is wrong or harmful—both may be equally worshipful. But when we make choices about artwork in our churches, they should at least be made from an informed perspective. It appears that the crucifix is falling out of use in our churches—but the worst of it is that no one really knows why. If the myth that the crucifix is a particularly Catholic fixture continues, along with the belief that everything "Catholic" should be avoided, this valuable symbol of our faith may fall entirely out of use among Lutherans.

We have no need to fear that a lack of crucifixes will cause the gospel not to be preached. But I do see a potential danger. Children have difficulty with the abstract concepts that adults are fluent in. Children learn primarily by observing. Where may children observe Jesus? I grew up in churches that displayed only empty crosses. In fact, there were no depictions of Jesus anywhere. If it had not been for the illustrated Bible story books my parents read to me, and the great care they took in teaching me about my Savior, I don't know for certain if I could have maintained faith in an abstract notion of God.

I am by no means trying to discredit the Holy Spirit for his work. But if Jesus taught with pictures, why should not the church? How great a teaching tool would it be to have a crucifix in the front of our churches? Then our children would know that we do not worship an abstract god, but a God who was made flesh and blood, as we are. He entered into human history, was born of a woman, ate food and drink, made friends and enemies, suffered and died on a cross, and rose from the dead. He is not the transcendent god of Modernism or the impersonal god of dualism. He is our brother, our friend, and our Savior.

"Hearts and Hands" Part III

Several days before the "Hearts and Hands of David" workshop, it was decided that a few of the workshops scheduled for two days would be reduced to one, for the sake of attendance. I was a bit wary of that, but it turned out to be a blessing—because instead of having 11 attendees, I had at least 22. Judging from the enthusiastic discussion and positive feedback, I think the presentation was a success. Certainly not because I'm a wonderful speaker or anything, but because it seemed to have gotten some gears turning. And that was the whole point. So I'll conclude today by attempting to do the same for my readers.

After digesting the opening sermon and keynote a little, I was able to verbally insert some relevant points into my lecture that were not included in the paper. With any discussion on worship, music, and art, I think it is important to include real-world applications and examples. It's one thing to agree with an abstract or theological statement; it's quite another to put it into practice in our own congregations. The following are some of my expanded thoughts on those "side notes" in the presentation.

I think there are abundant examples of people who have the "heart" to serve God, to create new places of worship and works of art, but they don't have the "hands," or the gifts, to create it themselves. But instead of finding someone from that third group, someone with both the "heart and hands," it often occurs that they find artists from the first group—those who have artistic gifts, but no particular desire to use them to God's glory or the edification of his Church. How can this be expected to work? How can we expect people who do not worship God to create something that will take into account the many facets of Christian theology and worship?

Sometimes, despite the contradiction, this can produce desirable results—but only if the church's building committee is well-informed, has a good idea of what they want, and holds its ground in matters of theological symbolism, tradition, aesthetics, function, etc. There are a few examples of this. For instance, Faith Lutheran Church (WELS) in Antioch, IL, built a beautiful structure that, while modern, reflects a strong level of involvement by the theologians, musicians, and informed laymen (see below). Martin Luther College's Chapel of the Christ is another great example. Both of these worship spaces feature a triptych, oddly enough. And they are both undeniably beautiful, superbly functional, deeply symbolic, traditional, and yet modern worship spaces.

Source: www.faithantioch.org

So while it is possible to achieve good results with this approach, I think it will always be an uphill battle. But I most often see cases where the battle was resigned before it began. In other words, the "vision" of the architect or the artist took priority over considerations of tradition, symbolism, aesthetics, and function. I can think of dozens of examples. But one that sticks out in my mind, and is probably familiar to many members of the WELS, is St. Croix Lutheran High School's chapel (see below). It's a clear example of an artist or team of architects using the worship space as a billboard for their artistic ingenuity, originality, and expression.

Source: www.stcroixlutheranhs.org

It dispenses with every single artistic convention of nearly 2,000 years of church history. Even the familiar latin cross is replaced by the "tau" cross—reportedly in order to "draw attention." I wonder if they realized that the "tau" was only used because displaying the sign of the cross would draw unwanted attention from those who were hunting Christians. That is to say, they created an oxymoron. The chapel is designed in the round, with the altar in the center (which sounds like a good idea to anyone who has never tried it). I think the chapel is also an example of architects taking advantage of Christians who desire sincere symbolism in their churches. For instance, the exposed girders in the chapel ceiling were described as representing the framework of the body of Christ. It seems that many Christians feel that since they aren't artists, they have to quietly go along with things that seem strange or even ridiculous to their sensibilities—for instance, bogus symbolism. (F.Y.I. Girders are always girders, and it's okay to call their bluff.)

This is the difficult thing. Christians are hesitant to cause offense, especially in matters we consider to be adiaphora. But sometimes it cannot be avoided. We are not doing ourselves any favors when we compromise our values of excellence in worship for the sake of being polite. Someone has to say that the Emperor is naked.

Art of the past century has indoctrinated us to believe two things: 1) that art is subjective, and 2) that "real" art is too deep for anyone but the "elite" to understand. We are supposed to stand in awe of Jackson Pollack because the artistic elite in the 1950s thought his "action painting" was only the culmination of five millennia of art history. And so our laymen are tricked into going along with this or that architectural plan, mosaic mural, or zen rock garden because 1) art is subjective anyway, and 2) what do we laymen really know about art?

Until people start to listen to their gut—their consciences, even—and object to this silliness, it will continue to find its way into our churches. You have every right and responsibility to speak out, because: 1) art for worship is not subjective. It is as objective as art can be. It submits itself to the Word of God, to the gospel, to the sensibilities of faithful Christians, and to the wisdom of the historical Christian Church. 2) Art for worship is not elitist. It must be as universal as art can be. It must be readily accessible to laymen. It submits itself to the clear communication of the gospel message.

These are objective measuring rods. If the art in our churches does not measure up, we must seek to replace it with "whatever is true, whatever is noble, whatever is right, whatever is pure, whatever is lovely, whatever is admirable...excellent or praiseworthy," and to look upon such things. There are Lutheran artists and architects who have a heart to worship God and the gifts to create excellent and worshipful art. Seek them out, and the Church will benefit from it.

"Hearts and Hands" Part I

This summer I was invited to speak at a worship arts conference at Wisconsin Lutheran College, entitled "Hearts and Hands of David." They asked if I would give two sessions of a 75-minute presentation, and the topic they left open to me (as long as it had something to do with the visual arts and worship). I was very honored to accept this invitation, and began by researching my intended audience.

The workshop was co-hosted by Koiné, a Lutheran music group that seeks to put strong and beloved hymns to contemporary instrumentation. So when I looked up the web page for the workshop, I began having second thoughts. There were break-out sessions for guitarists, bassists, drummers, vocalists, etc., and I feared I had just agreed to present at a "How to praise God with your electric guitar" workshop. (Thankfully, that turned out not to be the case.)

When I asked myself what it was that I most wanted people to learn about the arts in worship, I knew that the focus needed to be on the "worship" aspect. An improper theological understanding of worship serves as a flimsy foundation, regardless of what you build on it. Worship that is self-centered will naturally produce self-centered artwork. We've seen it all before. A simple web search of "worship art" returns scores of images of people with upraised hands, hands folded in prayer, etc. The fact is that many Christians believe that worship is an act that is performed for God.

I entitled my presentation: Vehicles of the Gospel: The Visual Arts in Lutheran Worship (feel free to read, download, and distribute). In the first part of the paper, I examined what worship is from a biblical perspective. I cited examples of worship and discussed the sacramental focus of worship in Old and New Testament. Every song recorded in the Bible declares the works of God, from the song of Miriam at the Red Sea to the song of the redeemed in heaven. There is no such thing as "empty praise." If a song does not declare God's salvation for us, it is not praise! In addition to proclaiming his gospel through song, God fills our worship with his life-giving gifts: the forgiveness of sins, Word, and sacrament.

The presentation continued with the theological distinction between personal worship (Christian living) and public (corporate) worship. What may be appropriate and worshipful in the former may be distracting and even harmful in the latter. I then discussed Luther's evolving view on the arts, and how that affected artistic practice in the early Protestantism. While some reformers were radically iconoclastic, it is noteworthy that Luther (eventually) sanctioned the artistic tradition as a vehicle through which the gospel could be proclaimed. He argued that it should therefore not be discarded, despite its abuses in the church. There are many examples of art that was very "Catholic" in flavor, but was retained in churches that had adopted Lutheranism. (See photo: "The Annunciation" in St. Lorenz Church, Nuremberg. Note the large rosary beads hanging from the circumference of this near-life-size wooden sculpture.)

(source: wikipedia)

The presentation continued with a brief outline of art history from the sixteenth century to the twentieth. There are countless factors that probably contributed to the decline of artwork in the church, but certainly one of the most important was Modernism. It embraced church art and architecture as a means of self-expression and of meditation on transcendence. It emphasized newness and altogether despised and discarded tradition. Christian artists who were trained in the Modernist aesthetic apparently did not sense the oxymoron in the notion of self-expression in liturgical art. If Christ or the gospel message appears at all in Modernist and Postmodernist worship art, it is usually forced to compete with the artist's emotions or stylization for our attention. (I'll give you one guess as to which one usually wins out.)

(source: liturgicalartblog)

My next post will continue with a discussion of the "Hearts and Hands of David" workshop.