St. Paul warns us,
"Do not be eager for praise" [Gal. 5:26] and the Lord in rebuking the Pharisees says,
"How could you believe, you who accept praise from each other, and do not seek the glory which comes from God alone?" [Jn. 5:44] The holy David also says threateningly,
"God has scattered the bones of those who set out to please men". [Ps. 52/ 3:6] - Monastic Institutes
Oh come on, you want to win the Cannonball awards just as much as the next guy!
ReplyDeleteSigned, the next guy.
Got me again! You know too much.
ReplyDeleteI love this topic, Terry--having battled pride all of my life. I learned so much from Fr. Hardon SJ on this subject. He talks about how we are all slaves to the respect of others--how dangerous this appetite is-- and what an obstacle...He also talks about priests and Bishops who do not wish to offend and so fail in their mission to be good Shepherds, ie, they fail to tell us the Truth...
ReplyDeleteYou've been including a few quotes from Monastic Institutes in your posts as of late -- I finally went ahead and ordered the book this morning. Thanks!
ReplyDeleteWhat is the painting about?? Especially the guy in the boat?? And fish everywhere??
ReplyDeleteSign me clueless..
Sara
Sara, it's a detail from a painting by Hieronymus Bosch, "The Temptation of St. Anthony". I think the idea is that the devil attempted to keep St. Anthony from prayer by all kinds of distractions and torments.
ReplyDeleteAustringer--Thank you for your explaination..
ReplyDeleteThanks to you guys and all the inspiring conversations on this blog this summer I will be taking an Art Appreciation course..hopefully by the end of the course I'll be able to tell the difference between Michaelangelo and Mozart :)
The textbook is "Living with Art" by Mark Getlein.
AndI definitely know where to come if I need any help :)
Sara
Sara, to be perfectly frank, you're wasting your time and money taking an Art Appreciation course, as you're likely to be told that ugly is beautiful. Well, you won't be told that directly, but that will be the end result....You have eyes and a brain --- you can appreciate art on your own without hearing some "expert" tell you that paint vomited onto a canvas, or simple blocks of color, are just as much "art" as the drawings of Degas or Ingres. You're better off ordering "The Twilight of Painting" (you won't find it in the libraries...) and reading that.
ReplyDeleteAustringer: Or, how about, a chimp throws paint onto a canvas and it's a masterpiece:<)!
ReplyDeleteI die laughing at that one.
Just let a chimp try to compose something like Shakespeare at a typewriter and come up with something as grand...THEN, I'll believe in "evolution" (according to the atheists)...but it won't happen...
Nope.
The traditional concept of art:
form must reflect reality; it must be consonant with the classical sense of beauty(there must be a proper relationship with dignity and perspective); it must be in conformity with Truth...these are the criteria that I believe must always be present; even in the most "grotesque" images...truth must be the foundation.
Nazareth Priest -- yes, yes, and yes again! This is what I try and drill into my students: order (what Aquinas would term "harmony"); workmanship, intelligibility, and Beauty (which is served by the others combined)are needed for art. It's a measure, though, of the perniciousness of modern relativistic philosophy that to say this is to invite comparisons to Nazis and Communists. I mean, this ought to be self-evident, but alas no longer is.
ReplyDeleteAustringer-- :P
ReplyDeleteI'm taking my art class anyway--I think it'll be fun..especially if we get to visit some of the local art museums..
Thumbing throughthe book there are a couple of pieces by Goergia O'Keefee..I've always liked her painting, growingup in the Southwest..
Sara
Sara: You take that art class...and bug the hell outta of the instructor if he/she gets into "insanity"...Georgia O'Keefe...she was a realist, no?
ReplyDeleteNazareth Priest,
ReplyDeleteShe was a realist, usually doing recognizable images (flowers, etc) though quite stylized. I never thought her work was that great -- I think she was terribly over-rated. I'm sure that some of my high-school aged students could do as well, even at their age and skill level. But, at least her work was intelligible and it did not rely upon shock value, novelty, or crudeness.