From the blog of Holy Resurrection Monastery, Valyermo, CA, a traditional Byzantine monastic community under the omophorion of Bishop John Michael (Botean), Eparch of the Romanian Catholic Eparchy of St. George in Canton, OH.
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Here are some very general thoughts.
No decision of the Second Vatican Council has been as dramatic, as contentious and as influential in the practice of the Faith, or lack of, as the changes brought about in the liturgical celebration of the Roman Catholic Mass and through this, the general liturgical life of the Church. Many believe that getting this right is the most significant work for the Church and will have the greatest and most important results in resolving some of the greatest crises the Church is facing. There is much evidence to suggest that Benedict XVI is one of the most enthusiastic advocates of this position. When the liturgical life of the Church is authentic, everything else in the Faith will also become authentic. As an Eastern Christian, it is perhaps not surprising that I wholeheartedly agree with Pope Benedict in this matter.
Unfortunately many Catholics even so-called liturgical experts, lack a clear formulated theology of liturgy to under-gird the externals of liturgical celebrations. This is very unfortunate. As long as there are no agreed and secure theological foundations for the liturgy, the politicized, liturgical wars will continue reflecting the present Culture Wars in Western Societies. Whether the Mass is in Latin or the Vernacular seems to be the main dividing line for most Roman Catholics but, of course, it is not as simple as this, although this is certainly one of the issues. A correct English translation from the Latin and the use of sacral as opposed to a more horizontal language is another political fight that is currently taking place, not to mention the controversial arguments regarding so called gender-inclusive language.
Benedict XVI speaks of authentic liturgical reform according to the hermeneutic of continuity, of course, he believes the whole of the Second Vatican Council needs to be interpreted in this way. But, at least, with respect to liturgy, how far back in history do we need to go to make repairs where this break in continuity has taken place. For many Catholics, this break took place at Vatican II especially in the area of liturgy. This is why the ordinary form of the mass and the extraordinary form of the mass is such an important ideological battle ground for so many Catholics. For others the break happened at Trent. However, for Pope Benedict the break takes place long before then. Benedict XVI believes the Western Church never fully understood and therefore never fully received the Seventh Ecumenical Council and it is for this reason that a sound liturgical theology has not developed in the West. Basically, Joseph Ratzinger believes the West’s liturgical theology is semi-iconoclastic and sometimes, perhaps in the present close to fully-blown iconoclasm.
We speak of the Eastern Orthodox Churches and the Roman Catholic Church having the first Seven Ecumenical Councils in common but perhaps a lot more work needs to be done in this area to agree on a common and definitive understanding of the Orthodox victory over iconoclasm. I am very surprised that the Catholic-Orthodox International and American Theological Dialogues have never explicitly discussed this issue. Pope Benedict certainly believes a new iconoclasm is infecting the Western Church.
To be continued.
This is another take on Pope Benedict’s commitment to reground the western church in patristic thought. And Abbot Nicholas is certainly correct to connect the crisis in the Roman liturgy to the thousand year drift from apostolic Christianity. In my opinion, semi-iconoclasm is just one manifestation of this general phenomenon.
This drift and not some fine point of theology or papal arrogance lies at the heart of the divisions between east and west. The 7th ecumenical council is accepted in the west but not really understood and so its implications are ignored. This is just one of many examples of a general phenomenon.
We will find that good will and dialog at the level of theological commissions and a handful of sympathetic hierarchs is not enough to restore unity. It will happen when ordinary eastern Christians once again sense in the western church an authentic development of apostolic Christianity. In the area of liturgy the post V2 period has seen more regress than progress towards unity.
I can’t say I like where this is going. If the West has “misunderstood” the 7th ecumenical council for 1,200 then by any Orthodox definition it wasn’t an ecumenical council as this would mean it was neither approved of nor received by the whole Church. I will have to wait for the rest of the good abbot’s thoughts, but this strikes me again as the all too typical Orthodox practice of imputing heresy to all that is not Byzantine, but this time with the added touch of trying to misrepresent the Pope in the bargain. It would help if Ratzinger’s actual words cited (in context) before ascribing to him a perception that his Church is “semi-iconoclastic.”
Perhaps I should start talking about Orthodoxy as “semi-philetist.” I am sure it would contribute wonderfully to brotherly dialogue.
Michaël, I don’t see this as a problem. It just means that the theology around icons has never been developed to its full extent. If you state the Orthodox view on icons to an average Catholic, he will agree with you 100%, but if you asked a Catholic first how one should see icons, he’d struggle since it’s not something that’s talked about so he’ll have to figure out on his own. I visited an Orthodox Church a few years back and was given a tour on the building. I was awestruck at how much thought was put into the icons, their arrangement, their design, and their placement wrt the architecture. I wondered why Catholics never adopted anything like this….until I saw some older (1000 year old) Catholic Churches that were virtually identical to the Orthodox…except that statues replaced the icons.
The Orthodox have a similar issue with underdevelopment, mostly in relation to “the two books of God”, namely revelation and the universe. The Catholic would have no problem explaining how the author of one book is also the author of the other and how that has clear implications and the Orthodox would agree….But what I’ve found with Orthodox treatments is that they tend to slip too easily into mystery or to downplay rational application of revelation or reconciliation between the two as a trivial detail that more spiritual people do not indulge in.
From my perspective, both Catholics and Orthodox need each other since both are strong where the other is weak.
What you say makes sense, and I have to admit that the contexts in which Aquinas cites Nicaea II makes me think he hadn’t fully internalized its drift. It’s the “semi-iconoclast” jibe that got me–all the more galling in that it comes from an Eastern Catholic who should know better.
That said, I don’t know of any aspect of the OF that doesn’t conform in every last detail to Nicaea II. It strikes me that the good abbot has been spending too much of his time hanging out with Latin-rite traddies, and seems to have imbibed a bit too heavily of their rather controversial interpretive narrative with regards to Vatican II. I will however suspend judgment until our host posts the rest of the article.
“It strikes me that the good abbot has been spending too much of his time hanging out with Latin-rite traddies, and seems to have imbibed a bit too heavily of their rather controversial interpretive narrative with regards to Vatican II.”
If anything, it is certain kinds of “Latin-rite traddies” who would be offended by this essay, as it implies that there was something seriously wrong with Roman Catholic theology in the millennium prior to Vatican II.
As for the interpretative narrative of Latin Traditionalists being “controversial”, well, the opposite narrative — Vatican II as the New Springtime, and the reform of the Roman liturgy as the perfect example of liturgical renewal — is equally controversial, if not more so. The current Pope has certainly spoken against this narrative.
It should have gone without saying, of course, that “the Spirit of Vatican II” crowd have their own wacky narrative. I will grant that traddies (at least most of those not fallen into outright sedevacantism) are still orthodox. The fact of the matter is that there is far more to Vatican II than its rather modest reform programme for the liturgy. The mandate did prove to be a Trojan Horse for liberals in Europe and North America to go well beyond what the council or even Bugnini’s commission had contemplated, but the abuses are being corrected, and I am tired of seeing this always being blamed on the council itself.
I think that the problem does not lie in the non-grasping of Nicaea II. After all, it was Rome’s support for Orthodox teaching that defeated the iconoclast in the end. It’s just that the role of icons/statues etc. have never been questioned in the Roman Rite. They were accepted but the West never dealt with their theology seeing that there was no need for it. It does not mean that Rome has an underdeveloped theology in this regard. In the same vein that Western theology is not the end-all and be-all of theology, so too is Byzantine theology.
I’m sorry, but I think this is ridiculous. IMHO, if anyone has failed to grasp the full implications of the 7th ecumenical council, it is the Orthodox.
Chesterton once said that, if you’re unwilling to accept statues and realistic religious art in general, then you’re refusing to accept the FULL implications and ramifications of the Incarnation. Icons are wonderful; don’t get me wrong…but, in a sense, they don’t go far enough. They are flat; they are stylized and abstract. That’s wonderful, and it serves its legitimate and necessary purpose (“windows into Heaven” and all that). But Jesus, His Mother, and the Saints were not flat, one-dimensional, iconic abstractions. Western religious art — from Giotto and Cimabue to Raphael, Donatello, Caravaggio, and Bernini; from the Book of Kells to those sappy 19th-century representations of the Madonna and the Sacred Heart…all testify to the robust, red-blooded, three-dimensional reality of the Incarnation. The Incarnation was and is a scandal, and ONLY Catholicism has the courage to fully embrace that scandal, IMHO.
Years ago, a then-Orthodox quoted John Taverner to me, to the effect that only Eastern icons are truly spiritual. Western religious art, according to Taverner, “convey no theology”; they consist merely of “an Italian woman and a fat baby,” or words to that effect.
If you ask me, Taverner did not have Clue One what the Incarnation means. The very realism and “fleshiness” of those Italian mammas and babies testifies far more eloquently to the Scandal of the Incarnation than any number of oh-so-spiritual icons. And, if the Incarnation’s not theology, then what on earth is it?
I hear Taverner is some sort of New Agey syncretist now. Which, in a way, makes perfect sense. As one cyber-friend puts it — this fellow’s married to a Greek Orthodox — Eastern Orthodoxy sometimes verges on the brink of being too Eastern. Its relative discomfort with the full implications of the Incarnation exemplify this “almost too Eastern” tendency. As James Likoudis has argued, this has ecclesiological implications. (Cue Perry’s Likoudis-bashing interjection. ;-))
And as for the contention that the Western Catholic Mass has been “iconoclastic” for centuries…I’m sorry, but that’s insane. If these folks claim that this is what Pope Benedict believes, then I suggest they ask the Pontiff himself to verify their contention. Somehow I doubt that they will receive the response they expect.
“I’m sorry, but I think this is ridiculous. IMHO, if anyone has failed to grasp the full implications of the 7th ecumenical council, it is the Orthodox.
“Chesterton once said that, if you’re unwilling to accept statues and realistic religious art in general, then you’re refusing to accept the FULL implications and ramifications of the Incarnation. Icons are wonderful; don’t get me wrong…but, in a sense, they don’t go far enough.”
If this is your view, Diane, then you’d have to include the Greek Catholics (and certain groups among the Malabar and Malankar Catholics) with the Orthodox as “not grasping the full implications of the 7th ecumenical Council.” Furthermore, granting that your position is the correct one, then we must fault the numerous Popes (not just post-Vatican II ones, but pre-Vatican II ones as well) who, far from imposing elements of the Latin tradition on the Greek Catholics, often intervened to PREVENT such importations into the Greek Catholic world, often against the wishes of the Greek Catholics themselves. Among the most prominent such importations were the use of statues and “realistic” icons, whose use has significantly declined among Greek Catholics since the 1960’s, due in no small part to the call of the Popes and of Vatican II for the Eastern Churches to return to their authentic heritage.
If Rome’s many statements on the beauty and integrity of the Eastern Rites mean anything at all, then we must admit that Rome does not see anything seriously lacking in the liturgical traditions of the East (non-use of statues and all). Just because the Orthodox (and, sadly, some Eastern Catholics as well) like to criticize the Latin tradition as much as they can, even with little justification, doesn’t mean that we have any right to go down to their level.
Furthermore, I’d like to see what the context of Chesterton’s statement is. My guess is that he is addressing Protestant objections to the use of statues in the Roman Catholic Church. Catholic apologetics in the last 500 years has tended to focus on answering Protestant and / or Liberal objections, and of necessity (more for practical than for theoretical reasons) it must use arguments and proofs that can scarcely take into account the thinking and practices of the Christian East. This is especially true of historic Catholic apologetics on topics such as clerical celibacy, communion under only one species, kneeling for prayer and liturgy, and the use of images.
Just to give one example from our own times of what I’m talking about: in his wonderful “Dominus Est”, Bishop Athanasius Schneider — quoting Cardinal Ratzinger — writes: “And so, before the humility of Christ and His love, communicated to us in the Eucharistic Species, adoration is not possible without bending the knee. Cardinal Ratzinger again observed: ‘kneeling is the right, indeed the intrinsically necessary gesture’ before the living God.” Bishop Schneider is, of course, arguing for the practice of kneeling in order to receive Holy Communion. Was he (and Cardinal Ratzinger) therefore denigrating the historic Eastern practice of receiving communion standing? Was he therefore condemning the Eastern practice of not kneeling at all on most Sundays? Obviously not — the book goes on later to praise the Eastern liturgical tradition, and it is obvious from the whole thrust of the book that Bishop Schneider’s intent is to answer Liberal / Modernist attacks against communion kneeling and on the tongue, attacks that have little to do with the reasoning of the East.
In short: the context is important, and what notable Catholics have said in defense of Roman Catholic practice versus the attacks of Protestants and Liberals do not always apply to the East.
Carlos, I went out of my way to say that I love icons. I have SEVEN in my home, on various shelves and walls.
We Latins embrace BOTH East and West — icons and statues. ISTM that *disdain* for Western religious art (as evinced by John Taverner) is the problem. It is precisely the claim that *only* Eastern icons “convey theology” which strikes me as not fully appreciative of the implications of the Incarnation. I thought I had made that clear. If I didn’t, I apologize.
Frankly, I get tired of the “well, Eastern Catholics do it, too, so you are condemning Eastern Catholics” argument. First of all, I’m not condemning anyone. I am *defending* the Western tradition against yet another gratuitous, silly smear, all the sadder because it comes from Eastern Catholics.
So, it’s OK for Easterners to tell us we’re semi-iconoclastic, but it’s not OK for us to defend ourselves against this ridiculous charge? What are we–doormats? We’re supposed to let ourselves be smeared, slandered, and misrepresented? Wow, my Eastern brethren, that sounds really fair and charitable.
Just for the record: IMHO there is no need for the West to define an elaborate theology of representational religious art. It’s about the Incarnation, period, and if you can’t see how packed with theology the Incarnation is…well, then, I give up.
At the time when I was being regaled with all that stuff about how icons are so much more spiritual and theological than Italian Madonnas, a fellow forum-member emailed me privately with the message, “Wow, I never realized that aesthetic snobbery was the sign of the True Church.” AMEN.
Jesus said “you must become like little children.” He never said you have to master the theological arcana and minutiae of Eastern iconography in order to be His disciple. Little kids can relate instinctively to those realistic Western Madonnas. And countless Catholics of all ages find solace and meaning in them. If that’s good enough for Jesus–and it is–then it’s good enough for me.
BTW, Michael’s right about the Latin ultra-traddies. They are the sourest, most negative people I have ever encountered, and I’d rather be dead in a ditch than be one of them.
Diane
The actual quote from Joseph Ratzinger’s Spirit of the Liturgy is as follows:
From http://www.adoremus.org/0302artliturgy.html
A New Iconoclasm
Contemporary culture turned away from the faith and trod another path, so that faith took flight in historicism, the copying of the past, or else attempted compromise or lost itself in resignation and cultural abstinence.
The last of these led to a new iconoclasm, which has frequently been regarded as virtually mandated by the Second Vatican Council. The destruction of images, the first signs of which reach back to the 1920s, eliminated a lot of kitsch and unworthy art, but ultimately it left behind a void, the wretchedness of which we are now experiencing in a truly acute way.
Where do we go from here? Today we are experiencing not just a crisis of sacred art, but a crisis of art in general of unprecedented proportions.
The crisis of art for its part is a symptom of the crisis of man’s very existence. The immense growth in man’s mastery of the material world has left him blind to the questions of life’s meaning that transcend the material world. We might almost call it a blindness of the spirit. The questions of how we ought to live, how we can overcome death, whether existence has a purpose and what it is — to all these questions there is no longer a common answer.
Positivism, formulated in the name of scientific seriousness, narrows the horizon to what is verifiable, to what can be proved by experiment; it renders the world opaque.
True, it still contains mathematics, but the logos that is the presupposition of the mathematics and its applicability is no longer evident. Thus our world of images no longer surpasses the bounds of sense and appearance, and the flood of images that surrounds us really means the end of the image.
If something cannot be photographed, it cannot be seen. In this situation, the art of the icon, sacred art, depending as it does on a wider kind of seeing, becomes impossible.
What is more, art itself, which in impressionism and expressionism explored the extreme possibilities of the sense of sight, becomes literally object-less. Art turns into experimenting with self-created worlds, empty “creativity”, which no longer perceives the Creator Spiritus, the Creator Spirit. It attempts to take his place, and yet, in so doing, it manages to produce only what is arbitrary and vacuous, bringing home to man the absurdity of his role as creator.
Again we must ask: Where do we go from here? Let us try to sum up what we have said so far and to identify the fundamental principles of an art ordered to divine worship.
1. The complete absence of images is incompatible with faith in the Incarnation of God. God has acted in history and entered into our sensible world, so that it may become transparent to Him. Images of beauty, in which the mystery of the invisible God becomes visible, are an essential part of Christian worship. There will always be ups and downs in the history of iconography, upsurge and decline, and therefore periods when images are somewhat sparse. But they can never be totally lacking. Iconoclasm is not a Christian option.
2. Sacred art finds its subjects in the images of salvation history, beginning with creation and continuing all the way from the first day to the eighth day, the day of the resurrection and Second Coming, in which the line of human history will come full circle. The images of biblical history have pride of place in sacred art, but the latter also includes the history of the saints, which is an unfolding of the history of Jesus Christ, the fruit borne throughout history by the dead grain wheat. “You are not struggling against icons”, said Saint John Damascene to the iconoclastic emperor Leo III, “but against the saints”. In the same period, and with the same view in mind, Pope Saint Gregory III instituted in Rome the feast of All Saints (cf. Evdokimov, p. 164).
3. The images of the history of God in relation to man do not merely illustrate the succession of past events but display the inner unity of God’s action. In this way they have a reference to the sacraments, above all, to Baptism and the Eucharist, and, in pointing to the sacraments, they are contained within them.
Images thus point to a presence; they are essentially connected with what happens in the Liturgy. Now history becomes sacrament in Christ, who is the source of the Sacraments. Therefore, the icon of Christ is the center of sacred iconography. The center of the icon of Christ is the Paschal Mystery: Christ is presented as the Crucified, the risen Lord, the One who will come again and who here and now, though hidden, reigns over all.
Every image of Christ must contain these three essential aspects of the mystery of Christ and, in this sense, must be an image of Easter. At the same time, it goes without saying that different emphases are possible. The image may give more prominence to the Cross, the Passion, and in the Passion to the anguish of our own life today, or again it may bring the Resurrection or the Second Coming to the fore. But whatever happens, one aspect can never be completely isolated from another, and in the different emphases the Paschal Mystery as a whole must be plainly evident. An image of the Crucifixion no longer transparent to Easter would be just as deficient as an Easter image forgetful of the wounds and the suffering of the present moment. And, centered as it is on the Paschal Mystery, the image of Christ is always an icon of the Eucharist, that is it points to the sacramental presence of the Easter Mystery.
4. The image of Christ and the images of the saints are not photographs. Their whole point is to lead us beyond what can be apprehended at the merely material level, to awaken new senses in us, and to teach us a new kind of seeing, which perceives the Invisible in the visible.
The sacredness of the image consists precisely in the fact that it comes from an interior vision and thus leads us to such an interior vision. It must be a fruit of contemplation, of an encounter in faith with the new reality of the risen Christ, and so it leads us in turn into an interior gazing, an encounter in prayer with the Lord. The image is at the service of the Liturgy. The prayer and contemplation in which the images are formed must, therefore, be a praying and seeing undertaken in communion with the seeing faith of the Church. The ecclesial dimension is essential to sacred art and thus has an essential connection with the history of the faith, with Scripture and Tradition.
5. The Church in the West does not need to disown the specific path she has followed since about the thirteenth century. But she must achieve a real reception of the Seventh Ecumenical Council, Nicaea II, which affirmed the fundamental importance and theological status of the image in the Church. The Western Church does not need to subject herself to all the individual norms concerning images that were developed at the councils and synods of the East, coming to some kind of conclusion in 1551 at the Council of Moscow, the Council of the Hundred Canons. Nevertheless, she should regard the fundamental lines of this theology of the image in the Church as normative for her. There must, of course, be no rigid norms. Freshly received intuitions and the ever-new experiences of piety must find a place in the Church. But still there is a difference between sacred art (which is related to the liturgy and belongs to the ecclesial sphere) and religious art in general. There cannot be completely free expression in sacred art. Forms of art that deny the logos of things and imprison man within what appears to the senses are incompatible with the Church’s understanding of the image. No sacred art can come from an isolated subjectivity. No, it presupposes that there is a subject who has been inwardly formed by the Church and opened up to the “we”. Only thus does art make the Church’s common faith visible and speak again to the believing heart. The freedom of art, which is also necessary in the more narrowly circumscribed realm of sacred art, is not a matter of do-as-you-please. It unfolds according to the measure indicated by the first four points in these concluding reflections, which are an attempt to sum up what is constant in the iconographic tradition of faith. Without faith there is no art commensurate with the liturgy. Sacred art stands beneath the imperative stated in the second epistle to the Corinthians. Gazing at the Lord, we are “changed into His likeness from one degree of glory to another; for this comes from the Lord who is the Spirit” (3:18).
But what does all this mean practically? Art cannot be “produced”, as one contracts out and produces technical equipment. It is always a gift. Inspiration is not something one can choose for oneself. It has to be received, otherwise it is not there. One cannot bring about a renewal of art in faith by money or through commissions. Before all things it requires the gift of a new kind of seeing. And so it would be worth our while to regain a faith that sees. Wherever that exists, art finds its proper expressions.
“But Jesus, His Mother, and the Saints were not flat, one-dimensional, iconic abstractions. Western religious art — from Giotto and Cimabue to Raphael, Donatello, Caravaggio, and Bernini; from the Book of Kells to those sappy 19th-century representations of the Madonna and the Sacred Heart…all testify to the robust, red-blooded, three-dimensional reality of the Incarnation.”
Diane:
You might be interested in what Joseph Ratzinger has to say about Renaissance and Baroque art. He was quite critical of the ‘sacred art’ of the Renaissance, whilst praising Baroque.
The following passages immediately precede the passage on the new iconoclasm:
“The Renaissance
The Renaissance did something quite new. It “emancipated” man. Now we see the development of the “aesthetic” in the modern sense, the vision of a beauty that no longer points beyond itself but is content in the end with itself, the beauty of the appearing thing.
Man experiences himself in his autonomy, in all his grandeur. Art speaks of this grandeur of man almost as if it were surprised by it; it needs no other beauty to seek. There is often scarcely a difference between the depictions of pagan myths and those of Christian history. The tragic burden of antiquity has been forgotten; only its divine beauty is seen. A nostalgia for the gods emerges, for myth, for a world without fear of sin and without the pain of the Cross, which had perhaps been too overpowering in the images of the late Middle Ages.
True, Christian subjects are still being depicted, but such “religious art” is no longer sacred art in the proper sense. It does not enter into the humility of the sacraments and their time-transcending dynamism. It wants to enjoy today and to bring redemption through beauty itself.
Perhaps the iconoclasm of the Reformation should be understood against this background, though doubtless its roots were extensive.
The Baroque
Baroque art, which follows the Renaissance, has many different aspects and modes of expression. In its best form it is based on the reform of the Church set in motion by the Council of Trent.
In line with the tradition of the West, the Council again emphasized the didactic and pedagogical character of art, but, as a fresh start toward interior renewal, it led once more to a new kind of seeing that comes from and returns within.
The altarpiece is like a window through which the world of God comes out to us. The curtain of temporality is raised, and we are allowed a glimpse into the inner life of the world of God. This art is intended to insert us into the liturgy of heaven.
Again and again, we experience a Baroque church as a unique kind of fortissimo of joy, an Alleluia in visual form. “The joy of the Lord is your strength” (Nehemiah 10). These words from the Old Testament express the basic emotion that animates this iconography.
The Enlightenment pushed faith into a kind of intellectual and even social ghetto.
Your citations certainly put the kibosh to Abbot Nicholas’ apparent interpretation of Ratzinger, unless he is relying on other passages, in which case the poor cardinal (now Pope) must have been contradicting himself. To argue against a “new iconoclasm” that has emerged SINCE Vatican II is hardly a claim that the Church’s ethos is “semi-iconoclastic” and has been so through Trent and back to some non-reception of Nicaea II.
As for Ratzinger’s critique of Renaissance religious art, I am sure the Pontiff would gladly exempt the works of Fra Angelico, and acknowledge that his beloved Baroque (he is Bavarian after all) would have been impossible without the revolution in Renaissance art.
Fra Angelico’s Annunciation (currently in the Prado)
Even if one sets Fra Angelico aside, you still can’t criticize Renaissance religious art with a broad brush as simply overly humanistic. This might be true for Michelangelo’s David, It can have genuine and powerful iconic properties in the full sense of the word:
Michelangelo’s Creation of Adam in the Sistene Chapel
His Last Judgment
His Pietà in St Peter’s
His Moses in St Peter’s in Vincoli
Da Vinci’s Last Supper in Santa Maria delle Grazie
These images have been so potent as to almost define the Western visualization of these sacred events.
Carlos, if popes are infallible (even before they become pope) on the subject of the visual arts, then God help us.
I respect Cardinal Ratzinger’s opinions, but I reserve the right to disagree with them. If anything is a matter of personal taste, it is what kind of art one likes!
Oh BTW–are you familiar with Early Netherlandish art? It is packed with iconography. When I brought this up to the Icons-Are-More-Spiritual-Crowd–and recommended that they read Panofsky–they brushed it off as irrelevant. You can’t confuse some people with the facts.
It appears the good abbot has misread Ratzinger, at least thats the way it appears, from what i can read on google books preview.
The spirit of the liturgy, You might have the scroll up to page 129 to get the context, but some pages are missing on the preview.
Apparently Carlos posted that while i was still perusing, the book on google, so didn’t notice his post. Thanks.
As Michael has pointed out already, being a Bavarian, Pope B16 is naturally inclined toward the Baroque art. An Italian pope might have a different opinion about the Renaissance, that’s nothing to be surprised about.
Two issues are very different in byzantine and catholic art:
1. I wonder why the byzantine abbott did not mention the iconoclastic influence of Protestant theology especially in Western Europe. The fact that protestantism (generally speaking) does not believe in the Real Presence naturally leads to iconoclasm – and eventually to a completely different understanding of the Incarnation. The theology of the sacraments, the Church, liturgical art, social doctrine and so forth are just mere phenomena of a different understanding of the Incarnation.
And it would be a very imbalanced historical approach if one did not admit that Protestantism did have a major impact on actual Catholic practice in Western Europe.
2. Why any art anyhow? It’s art’s purpose to help men understand and at the same time express his or her feelings and beliefs. Since there are hardly any more analphabets in mostly Catholic countries, the catechetical dimension of sacred art has lost most of its meaning.
And art has always changed. Gothic buildings were “baroquized”, some have gothic, renaissance and baroque elements in it – each one was the modern way of expressing the Catholic faith.
In the 20th century, many neo-gothic buildings were remodeled towards a new “Nüchternheit” (=soberness, as we call it here in Germany). Everything that does not directly lead to a better understanding of the paschal mystery was thrown out. A more or less Cistercian arquitecture was en vogue (and still is).
A perfect example can be seen in the new Cistercian monastery in the Czech Republic:
http://www.novydvur.cz/en/day.html
Liturgical art had always had some catechetical meaning. But nowadays it has turned around: from explaining what the Church’s belief definitely are to helping clarify what it is not.
Michael, Tap, and Contrarian: Thank you. And Michael, thanks so much for reminding us of Fra’ Angelico. Anyone who cannot see the Beauty-Is-Truth “theology” in a Fra’ Angelico Annunciation should have his/her head examined.
Man, Eastern triumphalism and anti-Westernism get soooo old. This stuff really does remind me of the anti-Westernism of my hippie pals in college, who vehemently rejected their Judaeo-Christian upbringing in order to embrace the Allegedly Superior Easternness of Buddhism, Hinduism, Transcendental Meditation, and Macrobiotic Mushrooms.
This sort of antipathy toward one’s own Western heritage may be understandable for immature college kids. But adults should know better.
Sorry for bluntness, and meaning no slur on the good Abbot.
Diane
P.S. I guess I really don’t understand this whole impulse, this eagerness to find the precise moment when the Evil West supposedly went completely off the rails. It’s bad historiography, for one thing. Trained historians, much more familiar with the historical data than anyone on this board, would never draw such sweeping inferences or make such sweeping statements about periods covering many centuries. Never. And they, unlike us, actually know what they’re talking about.
I have to admit that I’m a bit surprised at the Catholic response to this thread.
I don’t see Abbot Nicholas, a Catholic, as representing an “Eastern triumphalism” here, any more than an Orthodox (like Olivier Clement or John Zizioulas) who believes that his own Church needs to come to a better understanding of universal primacy represents a “Western triumphalism.”
One may quibble with the Abbot’s interpretation of Ratzinger’s words (I think that he’s just riffing off of Ratzinger in an Byzantine mode), but it was Ratzinger, former “doctrinal watchdog” and now Supreme Pontiff of the Catholic Church, who started the discussion about a “re-reception” of Nicaea II’s theology of the image in the Latin Church.
One can disagree with him, but personally I am loathe to dismiss the arguments of one of Catholicism’s greatest modern theological minds.
No one is taking issue with the Pope. The Pope did NOT describe the Western Church as “semi-iconoclastic.” The semi-name-your-heresy insult is one heretofore only heard from the lips of Orthodox polemicists who want to appear moderate and are afraid their co-religionists might not back them up if they go for the whole h-word.
A call to “re-receive” Nicaea II is entirely legitimate: one should always hearken back to the wellsprings of the faith. The pointed accusation that the West NEVER received Nicaea II is NOT, however, and demonstrates pathetic historical ignorance not to mention insensitivity, if nothing else.
Eggzackly! :D
“Semi-name-your-heresy” — LOL!
Fair enough, Michael. I trust that Abbot Nicholas will flesh things out a bit in subsequent posts. I don’t have any strong views on the subject (and no one should assume that just because I’ve posted something means that I do), but I’m willing to give the Abbot a fair hearing.
The icons and sculptues are part of Catholic Churches, we don have problems with them, certainly there are some that feel the strong interpelations from protestants, mainly in the countries where protestantism is the largest portion of population faith. But if you go to Catholic countries, sculptures and images are greatly respected. I invite you to be in Maxico City a Dicember 12th, or in Guadalajara in October 12th, ther you can see the Latin catholicism.
OK, one more comment, and then I must get back to my boring proofreading task.
Carlos:
Why is it OK for an Eastern Catholic to accuse the West of semi-iconoclasm (stretching back centuries, no less)…yet it’s NOT OK for me to counter with, “IMHO, if anyone has failed to grasp the full implications of the 7th ecumenical council, it is the Orthodox”?
So, Easterners can get away with just about anything in their relentless West-bashing, but Westerners cannot respond by pointing out possible deficiencies in the Eastern approach?
So, the West is always fair game, but the East is above reproach? So, Easterners can bash us with impunity, but if we dare to suggest that Eastern praxis may not be absolutely perfect in every respect, the Easterners pitch hissy fits?
So much for “turnabout is fair play.”
Do our Eastern brethren not see how off-putting this is??
This is a bit tiresome. Anyone who has been to Christ the Saviour Cathedral in Moscow will not see “proper” iconography. What they will see is naturalistic works of art that speak to the soul.
The traditionalist Benedictine Community in Oklahoma however does have proper iconography in one of their chapels because I recall seeing a photo (however I went back and tried to find it and I can’t now).
The main point in this is that both East and West affirm God’s grace works through matter, and art is an element which conveys this grace.
Father Joseph, thank you!!
The main point in this is that both East and West affirm God’s grace works through matter, and art is an element which conveys this grace.
YES! Thank you!
Our local GOA parish has a very Western iconostasis. I tried to find a picture at their website but couldn’t.
Irenaeus — the question is, though: Is Pope Benedict really saying what the good abbot says he’s saying?
As for taste in religious art: It is an entirely personal thing IMHO, so Pope Benedict’s greatness as a theologian is not particularly relevant here. Both East and West have images. So, where’s the problem?
The post-VCII “stripping of the altars” is one thing. But Baroque art vs. Renaissance art vs. icons …that’s something else entirely. Surely this is entirely a matter of personal taste!
BTW, all the new churches being built in our diocese have stained glass and statues and icons galore. If that’s “iconoclastic,” I’ll eat my missalette. ;)
I think the issue of reception of of Nicaea II in to the consciousness of the church isn’t a matter of particular variations graphical representation; but a matter of the liturgy itself and all its various components being “iconic”.
You are demonstrably reading more into Nicaea II then is actually there.
We have been there-done that with this sort of thing before at the Council in Trullo (Quintsex) which, I might point out, led to the first extended estrangement between East and West.
It’s not up to the East to lecture the West on how to correct its liturgy and discipline so as to conform to strictly Eastern notions of what is right and proper. The words “arrogance” and “presumption” come to mind.
It really boggles the mind how the same people can whine about Latinization of their liturgy and theology while trying to lecture the West on orthodox (lower case) iconography, leavened bread, epicleses, baptism by immersion, married clergy (and so on, and so on).
Seriously, it’s enough to turn you off the whole idea of reunion.
that should be “than” of course
Michael: Amen. I wish people would realize how off-putting this all is!
Some years ago, the wonderful Dr. Tighe sent me Dom Gregory Dix’s justly famous and intimidatingly massive book on the development of the liturgy (East and West). Had I but world enough and time, I would read the whole dang thing. (Maybe I’ll get to it when I retire.) As it is, I managed only to skim it, but several things stuck in my mind.
One was Dom Gregory’s discussion of the Great Entrance in the Eastern liturgy. IIRC, Dom Gregory seemed to think that the Great Entrance was so grand and elaborate and impressive that it rather overshadowed the far more important center of the liturgy, i.e., the Consecration. Dom Gregory definitely gave the impression that this was a bug, not a feature.
In short, the Great Entrance’s Superior Iconic Significance was apparently lost on the good Dom. :)
(I will have to look up the passage in question when I get a chance.)
IOW: Eastern liturgy may be just as susceptible to legitimate criticism as Western liturgy. IMHO, it is silly and self-serving to always assume the superiority of Eastern praxis. Such a view does not reflect reality. And it is frankly off-putting. (I was going to say “utterly obnoxious,” but I’ll tone it down.)
Father (Sub-Deacon) Joseph had it right. Thank you again, Father Joseph!
Diane
P.S. A point of clarification: When I cited Chesterton on the subject of “willingness to accept statues” and other Western realistic religious art, I did not mean that Easterners (either Catholic or Orthodox) should install Sacred Heart statues and Raphael Madonnas in their churches. Of course not. All I ask is that our Eastern brethren NOT disdainfully reject and repudiate Western art as unspiritual or “semi-iconoclastic” or whatever the silly charge-du-jour may be. We Latins do not reject Eastern icons; rather, we embrace them. I do not expect our Eastern brethren to return this courtesy — but could they at least refrain from dissing our art and liturgy, much less characterizing it as a heresy? (Man, talk about the “gospel of division and exclusion.” :p)
OK, I discovered several instances of subject-verb non-agreement in my initial comment in this thread. Mea culpa, mea culpa, mea maxima culpa! ;-)
All of this discussion leaves me amused and bemused.
First, I think there’s a logical error in assuming that Liturgy is somehow the “ground’ for “spiritual experience” when it’s obvious that it’s the reverse.
I once had the immense privilege of participating in a Roman Catholic “Novu Ordo” Liturgy led by an African bishop. The bishop was obviously a person of deep character. Every gesture that he did, every prayer he said, was flowing forth from a very deep place that expressed the fulness of faith, ( joy, serenity, peace). His character, his experience, made the Liturgy a very deep and profound one, ( so deep that I remember it nearly 40 years later). It was not the language, nor the prayers nor anything tangible but the obvious spiritual experience the bishop had which made that Liturgy real and alive. Had that Liturgy been led by anyone else, it might and probably would have been the same old, same old. In other words, someone with deep spiritual experience can make even tying shoelaces a revelation of the Ultimate.
Second, I’m confused about what is meant by semi- iconoclasm.
My wife teaches Ikenobo, the Japanese “art of flower arranging”. In actuality, this is iconic art- done with flowers and living plants.
It has its origins in Japanese Buddhist temples, as offerings to Buddha. It reflects the relationship between Man, Earth and Heaven, in various ways, from the deeply traditional to very modern.
I think that Ikebono is as iconic of spiritual reality as any other art.
Looking at a flower arrangement can awaken the connection between Earth, Man and Heaven perhaps even more deeply than a rather cliched icon. I have seen this in the reaction of rather “secularized” individuals who are rather shocked to discover the spiritual meaning of what they perceive as beautiful.
Yet, in this discussion, all I’ve read is references to “western art” and not the arts of India, Japan, China and Africa, (as well as Latin/South America- the Virgin of Guadalupe is THE icon of that part of the world and it truly is mysterious in its origin but clear in its meaning).
One needs to reflect that we are no longer living in an isolated area of the world. One needs to look at the entire world.
I’ve found it fascinating that, in India, Jesus is quite a popular “iconic” image, painted everywhere along with Krishna, etc;
There’s something there that escapes both the Pope, ( whining, to my mind, about the loss of “European” influence), and the Abbot. Both are still focused on European civilization when the reality is that we are now in a post-European civilization.
You are demonstrably reading more into Nicaea II then is actually there.
Abbot Nicholas:
Benedict XVI believes the Western Church never fully understood and therefore never fully received the Seventh Ecumenical Council and it is for this reason that a sound liturgical theology has not developed in the West.
Yes, we know that’s what Abbot Nicholas wrote. He is misrepresenting the Pope’s views. We established as much through perusal of the passages of the Pope’s actual writings offered by Carlos.
Now, perhaps you will take the time and read the actual doctrinal canons of Nicaea II and point out to us all the “sound liturgical theology” contained therein which us benighted Westerners have somehow been missing out on for the past 12 centuries.
Possibly you and the good abbot are alluding to some “Spirit of Nicaea II,” a close relative perhaps of the Vatican II counterpart we keep hearing about.
And to anyone else still reading this thread and who can’t figure out why we are so steamed by this:
Let’s not forget that Rome practically dictated the doctrinal and disciplinary canons of Nicaea II 1,200 years ago, having dragged the East back from the brink of the mother of all heresies by the scruff of its liturgical collar.
Iconoclasm is the common thread that runs through ALL the Christological heresies, the denial of the incarnation, the denial of the bodily resurrection, the denial of the real presence, and the denial of the dormition/ascension, to list just a few (ok, I’ll name more: Erastianism, Manichaeism and Gnosticism). To describe the Catholic West as “semi-iconoclastic” and as never having internalized Nicaea II is just absurd, grotesque, outrageously offensive and worse yet, plainly historically illiterate. Nicaea II is, if anything, the most explicitly Western in ethos of ALL the first seven councils.
There could be a very elementary element in this dialogue where some Orthodox simply wish to say “my art is better than yours.” All mankind is made in the image and likeness of God, and artistic expression of this image and likeness is part of the very core of all that is good about mankind. I would not be surprised if those Orthodox iconophile’s are blown away by the absolute NATURAL beauty of the Kingdom when it is fully revealed in a polycultural transfigured creation.
P.S. Thanks Diane!
I would not be surprised if those Orthodox iconophile’s are blown away by the absolute NATURAL beauty of the Kingdom when it is fully revealed in a polycultural transfigured creation.
Exactly.
There needs to be a much broader vision of what reality is. It’s not limited to one cultural expression.
There needs to be a much broader vision of what reality is. It’s not limited to one cultural expression.
-now even a contrarian would agree with that!
Father Joseph, Michael, and Evagrius, AMEN! Evagrius, I think you are perfectly right about Japanese flower-arranging. There is more than one way to be iconic. ;)
Diane:
It is quite obvious to me that you didn’t even try to CAREFULLY read my response to you at all. Having read your numerous emotional responses in previous threads, I have to say that I’m not surprised.
Nowhere did I say that Easterners are justified in calling us semi-iconoclasts. Indeed, I mention that there is a sad tendency among some Easterners to find all sorts of things to criticize in the West. What I simply and clearly said is that just because some of them call us semi-iconoclasts doesn’t mean that we have the right to denounce their iconography in return. What is this, theological tit-for-tat? It is juvenile. There is a difference between being a doormat and trying to answer back at any and all costs.
Yes, you did say that you love icons. You also said that icons don’t go far enough and that the Easterners haven’t grasped the significance of the 7th Ecumenical Council because they haven’t accepted realistic art and statues. It is this latter point that I’m criticizing, but nowhere did I imply that you don’t love icons.
Nowhere did I say that Cardinal Ratzinger was infallible in any of his statements regarding art. I merely pointed out what his opinion on Renaissance and Baroque art is. If that makes you feel so bad that you have to lash out like this, then that isn’t my problem.
Most of your other points respond to things that I didn’t even raise in my response, so I won’t waste time countering them.
This is going to be my last response to you.
Carlos
“There is a difference between being a doormat and trying to answer back at any and all costs.”
SHOULD BE:
“There is a difference between NOT being a doormat and trying to answer back at any and all costs.”
The East does have a highly explicit institutional memory of iconoclasm and has incorporated the stamping out of it deep into its prayer life, which is what we do, this incorporation into prayer life. The West may do it and have done it differently, relying more on pronoucements and the its magisterium. (which doesn’t make either of them wrong just because they are different.)
That the West has gone through a rough round of iconoclasm as evidenced by the last forty years (does everyone agree on that at least?) is no cause of joy anywhere. But you can’t fault Easterners who, upon seeing the western churches swept bare, the relics tossed out, the liturgy mangled, to look first to protect what we treasure from the PERCEIVED root causes of this current iconoclasm.
So where does one go to understand just how exactly Roman Catholics do regard and act with images, be they statues or other? While I do see parishes with stained glass and statues, and even icons up on walls about 15 ft off the ground here and there (none within the worship space accessible for veneration btw), the vast, vast majority I see in North America (by last count at 356), and most newer churches in Europe, have either have very little to a bit. Very few have reliquaries, and none built recently have a saints’ relic imbedded in the altar.
In the end, the fight is against this modern wave of iconclasm that has overwhelmed the West recently, a fight which we all share, no? Images vs. statues seems small potatoes. Said another way, to worry about “realism” vs “mystical” misses the point, unless something caused or encouraged the enemy at hand.
In which case (and I don’t know if this is where Card.Ratz was headed or not), then a key question is, “What if an unbalanced appreciation for ____________ helped to bring about this iconoclasm?” Can East and West calmly answer that question if it is their own preference/totem filled into that blank?
I think the point you are missing is that not being an iconodule is not the same as being an iconoclast (or even a “semi-iconoclast”). The West has never taken the practice of venerating icons to quite the extreme found in the Byzantine rite even at the heights of the iconoclast controversy when Rome was alone in fulminating against heretical emperors and patriarchs, and granting refuge to Eastern monks fleeing perceived imperial persecution (and if you don’t think the Byzantine rite is extreme in this matter, just compare it to the other non-Byzantine Eastern rites that were never troubled by iconoclasm).
The extent to which icons are venerated in the Catholic West is dictated largely by local preference. Byzantines really have to get away from this rather contemptible practice of ascribing heretical intent or import, or lack of orthodoxy for that matter, to distinctively non-Byzantine liturgical practices. Nicaea II never required anyone to venerate even a single icon. It merely commended the practice and condemned those who attacked it or tried to limit it on doctrinal grounds. The problem from Rome’s perspective was theological, not one of liturgical practice or preference.
It seems we have a problem of definition. To some Orthodox “iconoclasm” seems to mean “not having or venerating icons.” To Catholics, “iconoclasm” is the conflation of icons with idols and the denial that matter can be a divine vehicle for grace. Now I ask you, which definition do you think Nicaea II was using? Can you now understand why the accusation is so outrageous?
Yes, you did say that you love icons. You also said that icons don’t go far enough and that the Easterners haven’t grasped the significance of the 7th Ecumenical Council because they haven’t accepted realistic art and statues.
Did you see my clarification? Perhaps I’m not the only one who does not read carefully. ;)
Even in your quote above, you misread, misquote, and misrepresent me.
and that the Easterners haven’t grasped the significance of the 7th Ecumenical Council because they haven’t accepted realistic art and statues.
I didn’t say that. I said that the East has perhaps not completely grasped the full implications of the Incarnation. I stand by this. (Again, I got the idea from Chesterton, no intellectual slouch. Perhaps we can take it up with Chesterton? ;))
I never said that Eastern Christians need to fill their churches with statues and representational art. That would be absurd.
All I ask (see my clarification) is that Eastern Christians stop dissing our Western statues and art, claiming they’re un-theological and unspiritual, or indicting them as heretical (“semi-iconoclastic”).
Yes, I do think that, in a sense, icons don’t go far enough. They don’t go far enough because they are flat, stylized, and (to some extent) abstract. There is nothing wrong with “flat, stylized, and abstract.” But it does not fully express the robust, fleshly, red-blooded reality of the Incarnation.
That’s OK. Icons serve other purposes. But, as Chesterton observed, if you’re really going to concretize Nicaea II, you do it with a statue. Nothing says “I defy you to call this an idol!” like a Catholic statue. :) Three-dimensional representational religious art is the ultimate artistic expression of the Incarnation.
I do think that Orthodoxy tends to hyper-spiritualize things. It has that tendency. I do NOT think that Orthodoxy takes this tendency too far — e.g., into the Gnostic (much less the iconoclastic) heresy. I fully recognize that the Orthodox do accept II Nicaea and do believe in the Incarnation. Unlike some of our Eastern brethren, I am accusing no one here of heresy.
BUT I think it is manifestly obvious that icons are more stylized and less realistic than, say, the religious works of Caravaggio and Bernini. And stylization by its very nature stops short of fully expressing Incarnational reality.
I really can’t see how this can be gainsaid. Stylized art, by definition, veers in the direction of abstraction.
ALL images of Christ and the Saints, including icons, testify to belief in the Incarnation. But highly realistic, naturalistic religious art testifies to this more fully.
Diane
P.S. Again, I am not attacking the Orthodox but rather defending the Western tradition against the smears and slanders of anti-Western polemicists. Do you think that the anti-Westernists should be allowed to bash us as heretics with total impunity, and without any response from us? Is it Open Season on Latin Catholicism? Are we not even allowed to defend ourselves against baseless and ridiculous charges?
P.P.S. I notice that you are not engaging Michael, who is making even more strongly worded arguments than I am. If there’s one thing I’ve learned from years of Internet discourse, it’s that they always attack the girl. :)
“There is a difference between NOT being a doormat and trying to answer back at any and all costs.”
At any and all costs???
OK, I am frankly strunned.
So, we should say, “Oh yes, you are so right, our liturgy has been heretical for centuries, and we have been iconoclasts since Nicaea”??
You have an odd definition of “not being a doormat.”
And, once again, why not engage Michael on this subject? He is wording his arguments even more strongly than I am.
Diane
That should be “stunned,” obviously. I always spot the typo right after I hit the submit button!
P.S. Carlos–your claim that I am “emotionally” lashing out is rather sexist. Not to mention ad hominem. Where have I said anything remotely like this either to or about you? I have consistently stuck to the issues.
And your claim that your citation of the pope’s artistic preferences made me “feel bad” is sheer projection.
Can we please stick to the issues??
Thanks,
Diane
The level of Catholic defensiveness about this post is really bizarre, especially since this post is not about East v. West, but rather West vs. West. Igumen Nicholas has not misread Ratzinger. In The Spirit of the Liturgy, Ratzinger does in fact write stuff like, “But she [the Western Church] must achieve a real reception of the Seventh Ecumenical Council” and “Only when we have understood this interior orientation of the icon can we rightly understand why the Second Council of Nicaea and all the following councils concerned with icons regard it as a confession of faith in the Incarnation.” This language by Ratzinger is not obscure. The only reasonable conclusion that can be drawn from this is that Ratzinger believes that the West has not in fact fully received Nicaea II, and that the reason for this has something to do with what he perceives to be a lack of “interior orientation” regarding images.
Furthermore, Ratzinger asserts that in the West, the Seventh Ecumenical Council was “poorly understood,” citing the Libri Carolini, and the Councils of Frankfurt (794) and Paris (824), all of which “came out against” Nicaea II, as examples. While asserting that “up the the threshold of the thirteenth century, there is no essential difference between East and West with regard to images” (emphasis in the original), Ratzinger nevertheless seems to backtrack on this in the rest of the paragraph by contrasting the “almost exclusive[]” pedagogical function of icons in the West as evidenced by St. Augustine, St. Gregory (Dialogos), and western synods, with “the rooting of the icon in the Incarnation,” which Ratzinger clearly sees as the message of Nicaea II.
Since The Spirit of the Liturgy is about Liturgy, Ratzinger further suggests that the Gothic period strayed from the Spirit of Nicaea II because “[t]he historical and narrative aspect of art [came] to the fore.” This resulted in the “mysterial image” being replaced by the “devotional image,” a situation which, Ratzinger argues, caused the West to see salvation history “less as a sacrament than as a narrative unfolding in time.” Nevertheless, Ratzinger still asserts that these differences, real as they are, must not be overemphasized, and he points to Gothic stained glass as an example of the true spirit of Nicaea II, calling it “the iconostasis of the West.”
Igumen Nicholas, therefore, is not misreading Ratzinger. Ratzinger does seem to be arguing that Western theology of icons falls short of the sacramental and Incarnational theology of Nicaea II, and for that reason, the Seventh Ecumenical Council has not yet been really received. He seems to believe that the Western use of images is, for the most part, too individual (devotional rather than liturgical), too pedagogical, and too narrative, and for these reasons, religious imagery in the West is stuck in the realm of the external rather than the transcendent, and therefore falls short of Nicaea II. Because he uses Gothic and Renaissance religious art as examples of detours from the true spirit of Nicaea II, it is clear that Ratzinger sees the contemporary iconoclastic tendency in the West not as something that came out of nowhere, but rather as an outgrowth of certain strains of Western theology that has roots as far back as St. Augustine. In short, it seems as though Ratzinger is asserting that the West does not actually have a theology of images as such. Rather, what the West has are images without a theology. Ratzinger, in writing that “[t]he Western Church does not need to subject herself to all the individual norms concerning images that were developed at the councils and synods of the East…[n]evertheless, she should regard the fundamental lines of this theology of the image in the Church as normative for her,” is calling upon the West to truly receive and live the Seventh Ecumenical Council rather than simply citing the Council as an excuse for its current use of images.
Just because Ratzinger wrote something that can be seen as vaguely similar to what Abbot Nicholas claims, if you don’t look too closely, doesn’t mean we have to swallow Nicholas’ insults.
I have no problem with what Ratzinger actually wrote. It is quite fair to ask whether the post Vatican II tendency in parts of the West to downplay Christian art reflects an iconoclasm at odds with Nicaea II. It is also fair to invite readers to reflect on and fully receive the implications of Nicaea II. Reflecting on and receiving the faith once delivered is what we are called upon to do on a daily basis.
It is quite another thing, however, to claim that “Benedict XVI believes the Western Church NEVER FULLY UNDERSTOOD and therefore NEVER FULLY RECEIVED the Seventh Ecumenical Council and it is for this reason that A SOUND LITURGICAL THEOLOGY HAS NOT DEVELOPED IN THE WEST. Basically, Joseph Ratzinger believes the West’s liturgical theology is SEMI-ICONOCLASTIC and sometimes, perhaps in the present CLOSE TO FULLY-BLOWN ICONOCLASM.”
I invite you to find the capitalized bits anywhere in Ratzinger. If this is the standard Orthodox approach to hermeneutics, what hope is there for even dialogue, let alone reconciliation? The failure of Orthodox posters here to understand our indignation speaks volumes.
And, yes, this is an East-West issue, as Abbot Nicholas is an Eastern Catholic apparently rewarming traditional Orthodox polemic tripe and canard.
Is there any discussion of how Orthodox icons are “integrated” into the Liturgy?
I’m a little confused as to what the Cardinal is arguing. It seems to me that “Eastern” icons are just as didactic as “western” icons, ( all one has to do examine the icons of the various categories of saints; those who were “intellectual” have the same type of brow, those who were ascetic, a certain physical shape etc;).
I once visited a Greek Orthodox church in California whose Pantocrator resembled a glowering Klingon and whose iconostatis angels looked like muscle builders on steroids.
Other churches have icons redolent of nineteenth century sentimental art. Others have many icons but of the “modern” style which, while “theologically” correct lack that certain depth that informs all good art including icons.
I believe that it was Thomas Merton who observed that just because it’s religious doesn’t mean it isn’t bad art.
Have the Abbot, or the Pope, looked at the art of the new Christ the Savior Cathedral in Moscow?
The main dome portrays, ( I think), God the Father with the Son as an infant on his lap, ( with what I call Keane eyes) and the Spirit as a dove floating between them.
http://www.xxc.ru/english/foto/inside/s01/index.htm
The Keane eyes, ( see http://www.keane-eyes.com/ for examples) are particularly disturbing;
http://www.xxc.ru/english/foto/inside/s01/f011.htm
All in all, perhaps this discussion should focus on aesthetics.
There’s a reason why so much of the kitschy, sentimental art was removed from Roman Catholic churches and it might have to do with sound aesthetic judgement rather than iconoclasm.
I have not waded through all the previous comments, but have read enough to see where this is going.
First, the constant need of either side to get the upper hand is clearly manifest in this kind of article. The need to say that the other side is undeveloped in this way or has misunderstood in that way is silly and can often come across as childish. Both sides are guilty. Both need to grow up a bit on these fora.
To engage in East West dialogue requires certain assumptions.
First, we have two fundamentally different but parallel traditions which are coeval.
Second, there were often misunderstandings and disputes between these two coeval traditions in the era of the united church–misunderstandings and disputes which did not alter the communion between them for the most part for a thousand years.
Third, part of the communion between East and West was a mutual acknowledgment of the dignity of each which did not negate the dignity of either.
Fourth, what was emphasized in either tradition was often present at least in seminal form in the other.
Fifth, that differences in emphasis are not differences in kind.
These points render much of the pettiness in East West conversations virtually moot.
Wise words, Father, and I bow out. Perhaps our host could call Abbot Nicholas’ attention to this heated discussion. He might then choose his words and articulate his claims more carefully in the rest of his blog post.
Han, I would not see it as “defensiveness” on the part of Catholics. Indeed, I see this “defensiveness” charge as a rather tired and tiresome one. (“Oh, you’re just being defensive!” says the person who insults you to your face and then expresses chagrin that you resent being insulted to your face. Sorry, not buying it.)
I think Michael has articulated very clearly what our objections are. We do NOT object to what Pope Benedict has said. We object to the misinterpretation thereof, which has led to yet another silly charge of heresy lobbed against the West and yet another round of Eastern triumphalism.
As Michael wrote:
It is quite another thing, however, to claim that “Benedict XVI believes the Western Church NEVER FULLY UNDERSTOOD and therefore NEVER FULLY RECEIVED the Seventh Ecumenical Council and it is for this reason that A SOUND LITURGICAL THEOLOGY HAS NOT DEVELOPED IN THE WEST. Basically, Joseph Ratzinger believes the West’s liturgical theology is SEMI-ICONOCLASTIC and sometimes, perhaps in the present CLOSE TO FULLY-BLOWN ICONOCLASM.”
I invite you to find the capitalized bits anywhere in Ratzinger. If this is the standard Orthodox approach to hermeneutics, what hope is there for even dialogue, let alone reconciliation? The failure of Orthodox posters here to understand our indignation speaks volumes.
Exactly.
And now I too will bow out. This is getting really old, and Father J’s post is wise indeed.
Third, part of the communion between East and West was a mutual acknowledgment of the dignity of each which did not negate the dignity of either.
Fourth, what was emphasized in either tradition was often present at least in seminal form in the other.
Fifth, that differences in emphasis are not differences in kind.
Amen! Amen! Amen!
Father J, if I have displayed “the need to get the upper hand,” I apologize. Mea culpa! Again, I want to clarify that I am NOT attacking Orthodox belief and praxis. (My “If anyone…” comment was expressed conditionally for a reason — it was purely for the sake of argument. And, while I do argue that, in a certain sense, icons do not “go far enough” in expressing the Incarnation, I also concede that this is OK because they serve a different purpose.)
Like you, I see the Eastern and Western traditions as coeval. Neither is better than the other. They are complementary.
I wish only to defend my own cherished Western tradition against the smears and misrepresentations of the West-bashers. I have no wish to exalt the Western tradition over the Eastern. I just want to defend the validity of the Western tradition. That’s all.
In my initial post, I used intemperate language, and I wasn’t always clear. I was writing in haste and in anger. Again, mea culpa.
This whole discussion strikes me as so silly — arguing over artistic preferences, over a matter of personal taste? How silly can we get!
And now I really will bow out….
Diane
I didn’t realize this would be such a contentious topic. I’m going to go ahead and close this combox, and the conversation can continue, hopefully, with the second installment of Abbot Nicholas’s series.
[…] Abbot Nicholas, on Holy Resurrection Monastery’s Practical Ecumenism blog, continues his thoughts on Pope Benedict’s “Reform of the Reform” here and here. We discussed the first part of Abbot Nicholas’s thoughts here. […]