Benedict on beauty and Beauty More than a via media Blog

Benedict on beauty and Beauty
Benedict XVI's address to artists this week is a model of how
Christians can use the experience of beauty to encourage postmoderns
to be be open to the transcendent:

"What is capable of restoring enthusiasm and confidence, what can
encourage the human spirit to rediscover its path, to raise its eyes
to the horizon, to dream of a life worthy of its vocation 6 if not
beauty? Dear friends, as artists you know well that the experience of
beauty, beauty that is authentic, not merely transient or artificial,
is by no means a supplementary or secondary factor in our search for
meaning and happiness; the experience of beauty does not remove us
from reality, on the contrary, it leads to a direct encounter with the
daily reality of our lives, liberating it from darkness, transfiguring
it, making it radiant and beautiful".

The fact that the grand narrative of the Christian Scriptures has
inspired artists across the generation led Benedict to point to the
"close proximity" between faith and art:

"Art, in all its forms, at the point where it encounters the great
questions of our existence, the fundamental themes that give life its
meaning, can take on a religious quality, thereby turning into a path
of profound inner reflection and spirituality. This close proximity,
this harmony between the journey of faith and the artist2s path is
attested by countless artworks that are based upon the personalities,
the stories, the symbols of that immense deposit of 'figures' 6 in the
broad sense 6 namely the Bible, the Sacred Scriptures. The great
biblical narratives, themes, images and parables have inspired
innumerable masterpieces in every sector of the arts, just as they
have spoken to the hearts of believers in every generation through the
works of craftsmanship and folk art, that are no less eloquent and
evocative".

Appropriately for the days leading to Advent, Benedict began and ended
by reflecting on Michelangelo's fresco of the Last Judgement:

"Dear friends, let us allow these frescoes to speak to us today,
drawing us towards the ultimate goal of human history. The Last
Judgement, which you see behind me, reminds us that human history is
movement and ascent, a continuing tension towards fullness, towards
human happiness, towards a horizon that always transcends the present
moment even as the two coincide. Yet the dramatic scene portrayed in
this fresco also places before our eyes the risk of man2s definitive
fall, a risk that threatens to engulf him whenever he allows himself
to be led astray by the forces of evil. So the fresco issues a strong
prophetic cry against evil, against every form of injustice ...

"Saint Augustine, who fell in love with beauty and sang its praises,
wrote these words as he reflected on man2s ultimate destiny,
commenting almost ante litteram on the Judgement scene before your
eyes today: 'Therefore we are to see a certain vision, my brethren,
that no eye has seen, nor ear heard, nor the heart of man conceived: a
vision surpassing all earthly beauty, whether it be that of gold and
silver, woods and fields, sea and sky, sun and moon, or stars and
angels. The reason is this: it is the source of all other beauty'".

Perhaps there is a theme for consideration during Advent: at the end
of the ages, we will behold beauty restored. We will gaze upon what
Benedict called "infinite Beauty" in all of its fullness.

The closing reference to Saint Augustine brings to mind Tracy
Rowland's Ratzinger's Faith, with its emphasis on the pontiff's
Augustinianism. At one point in the book, however, Rowland quotes
Balthasar (admittedly a favourite theologican of More Than a Via
Media):

"anyone enamoured of beauty will shiver in the barn of the
Reformation".

Such a judgment misses the beauty promoted, nurtured and revered by
the traditions of the Reformation. The paintings of the Reformed
Rembrandt. The liturgical music of the Anglican Tallis and the
Lutheran Beethoven. The language of Cranmer. And - something I am
hoping to hear tomorrow - the austere beauty of the rhythms of
Presbyterian Gaelic psalm singers from the Hebrides.

The traditions of the Reformation, it is true, have not always valued
the revelation of the transcendent in beauty - just as Counter-
Reformation Rome's Baroque gaudiness often lacked the authentic beauty
of which Benedict has spoken. But our barn has its beauty too.

Back to Balthasar. Benedict quotes his The Glory of the Lord 6 a
Theological Aesthetics, with its suggestion that the aesthetic journey
is a journey of faith, of theological enquiry. In a culture in which
beauty is devalued and demeaned, church and artist should share a
common desire to restore beauty. And allow ourselves and others to
glimpse the Beautiful.

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