Architect Steve Mouzon offers the following comment on the connection between love, sustainability, and living tradition:
“Inventiveness is great… I love inventing things. But I want those things to be lovable so that they have a chance of being sustained long beyond my lifetime. If we want to sustain things long into an uncertain future, we really should stack the deck in our favor by doing work that embodies principles proven to produce things humans love, and that can become part of a living tradition… one with a heartbeat… shouldn’t we?” Continue reading →
Fr. Douglas Martis writing in Tidings, the Newsletter of the Liturgical Institute offers an excellent synopsis of the past half century, and what we have learned through the reform of the Roman Rite.
“We have rediscovered that church architecture is not simply a “skin for liturgical action,” not a “space” solely for the purpose of gathering the community, but rather a formative place of presence
charged with sacramental meaning…. Sacred art, architecture, music, catechesis, justice, the ars celebrandi and many other things each make a particular contribution to the beauty, meaning and authenticity of liturgical expression.” Continue reading →
Mark Shea, writing for Our Sunday Visitor offers a worthwhile understanding of Beauty placed in the service of God.
“This matters because at one of the most famous banquets of all — held to celebrate the raising of Lazarus from the dead — we see the old familiar charge of obscene waste as it is leveled, not against corrupt Renaissance popes or negligent bishops, but against Jesus himself…”
Continue reading →
Mystagogy is an introduction into the Mystery of Christ, the holy knowledge of our vocation to a new life in and with Christ, instruction in the practice and development of this life. In this central task of religious education, the proper training in Christian worship, that is the liturgy, takes an important part. Continue reading →
David Bonagura argues that, “two actions in particular, the use of Latin and the priest facing east toward God rather than the people” would assist us in focusing on the Lord in our liturgical celebrations. Continue reading →
Abp Chaput: “Human beings have an instinct for worship. Our longing for the good, the beautiful, and the true, is really a longing for God. Not the theoretical idea of a Creator, but a relationship with the loving, intimate, personal God – revealed in Christ Jesus. …Catholic life hinges on the worship of God and the experience of his love in glory.”
… Continue reading →
Deacon Keith Fournier at Catholic Online provides an excellent recap of Pope Benedict’s recent comments on Beauty and the role of the Artist in works of sacred art and architecture.
“…Separation between the arts and a living faith has no place in a mature Christian worldview. It proceeds from a poor anthropology, a misunderstanding of the nature of man/woman. It represents an inadequate understanding of the scope and implications of the Incarnation of Jesus Christ.” Continue reading →
Posted in Architecture and Design, Culture, Sacred Art & Artists
|
Tagged Beauty, Benedixt XVI, Culture, Incarnation, Liturgy, Sacramental Worldview, Sacred Art, Signs and Symbols, tradition
|
I was very pleased to attend recently an excellent conference hosted by The Liturgical Institute at the University of Saint Mary of the Lake in Mundelein, Illinois. The conference was entitled The Glory of Catholic Architecture, and the participants – Architects, Artists, Clergy, and Laity – were encouraged to appreciate and articulate the order and hierarchy that are beautifully arrayed in Creation, yet still awaiting the return of the Redeemer. This “awaiting” is of course at the heart of our active participation in the Liturgy… Continue reading →
Posted in Architecture and Design, Building a Church, Lectures, Liturgy and Liturgical Resources
|
Tagged Benedict XVI, Catechism, church buidlings, Conference, Denis McNamara, Liturgy, Sacred Architecture, tradition
|
For there is no longer any question of man’s… agonizing longing for transcendence. It is a question rather of man being led by the God who goes before toward a genuinely human fulfillment – to a land “flowing with milk and honey”.
Continue reading →
When we allow ourselves to wonder at the abundant generosity of the created order – including the reality of its having been created for our good, as a means to our salvation, and for God’s glory – we can appreciate more fully that all Creation is being gathered up by Christ and is offered back to the Father in and through the Spirit. Thus, Creation is, through Christ’s redemptive sacrifice, involved in the very life and love of the Trinity. Continue reading →
“When you pass through those doors, you are climbing Mount Tabor!” ~ Fr. Peter Mussett Continue reading →
Readers will appreciate this excellent short video from the website One Billion Stories that discusses how inspired beauty in art captures our imagination and leads us closer to the love of Christ. Continue reading →
Nestled in the San Luis Valley, not too far from the New Mexico border, is the community of Conejos, Colorado. In 1858 the first Mass was said in Conejos in a wood and mud, adobe-like, church by the parish’s first pastor Fr. V.S. Montaño. This humble structure was the first Catholic Church built in Colorado and is today the state’s oldest.
Continue reading →
Professor David Lyle Jeffrey offers a lengthy essay in the current Adoremus Bulletin regarding the mutiplicity of Bible translations… “In all these cases, what has been lost in translation is nothing less than the main point—the sacral, sacramental element of divine giftedness, …as intrinsically necessary to a holy work and worship. ” Continue reading →
As an Architect focused on the renewal of Catholic sacred architecture, I enjoyed How to Read a Church quite a bit. Author Richard Taylor presents the material well, in a readable manner, and the list of subject matter is quite thorough. Continue reading →
Posted in Architecture and Design, Building a Church, Sacred Art & Artists, The Bookshelf
|
Tagged church buidlings, Communion of Saints, Partnership for Sacred Architecture, Resources, Sacramental Worldview, Sacred Art, Signs and Symbols, tradition
|
Readers will appreciate the beautiful reflection on the superabundant theological richness of the Triduum liturgy provided by Shawn Tribe, the editor in chief of the New Liturgical Movement blog. http://www.newliturgicalmovement.org/2012/04/liturgical-meditation-on-and-for.html
From David Clayton’s blog, The Way of Beauty, here is an article that provides a wonderful exposition of the liturgical theological symbolism contained within the Mond Crucifixion altarpiece by Raphael. ~ particularly appropriate as we enter into Holy Week and … Continue reading →
Readers might appreciate this concise but worthy column by Robert Reilly over at The Catholic Thing gathering up some of the rich insights of Pope Benedict regarding sacred music: The Sound of Faith Here’s an excerpt: Where does inspiration come from to create … Continue reading →
Juhani Pallasmaa has written extensively on the disordered emphasis we place on the sense of sight and timeless visual presentation in modern and contemporary architecture. What is lost, he argues, when we privelege the visual over the other senses is a properly holistic understanding of the deep and rich embodied experience that is natural to us all as humans in the world. In short we lose the ‘incarnational’ sensibility of architecture.
Continue reading →
“The sacred liturgy and doctrine are intertwined and the experiential dimension of the liturgy is a profound moment for catechesis and conversion.” Continue reading →
