"How can sacred art, in the Gothic tradition, emphasize the act of bringing God’s scattered people together?"
Saint Brigid and the Love of the Trinity
Augustine and the Holy Spirit
Letting Go Of "Things"
How God Teaches Us Patience
How Artistic Gifts Have the Power To Unite Us
The Artists and the Church - John Paul II
Pope Saint John Paul II perhaps understood the sensibility of artists better than most pontiffs. He was, after all, a poet, playwright, and actor himself. His Letter to Artists, written in 1999, deserves special attention among those struggling to find a way to reconcile being an artist with being Christian.
The Artist Teaches Through His Art
Are You Using All of Your Gifts?
“God-given gifts are by definition supernatural gifts. Even if they seem common or mundane, we can trust in their ability to work supernatural wonders.”
Have you ever wondered what God is trying to tell you? Have you ever felt frustrated because you don’t believe God is speaking to you at all? It may be that you just don’t recognize His voice.
God speaks to us through the gifts He has given us. Each one of us is given a unique set of gifts, and there are no small gifts. “To each individual some manifestation of the Spirit is given for some benefit.” These gifts are not given to us to hoard and use for our own pleasure, they are given to us to help one another, to benefit the common good. As these are God-given gifts they are by definition supernatural gifts. Even if they seem common or mundane, we can trust in their ability to work supernatural wonders.
Art, Artists, and a Theology of Beauty, Part II
A beautiful spirit may shine even through a form that has been weakened. Drawing on both old and new testaments the early church fathers developed the doctrine of "kenosis" from a Greek word meaning emptiness. In the context of a theology of beauty kenosis refers to a humiliation of form, an emptying of one's self, so that the divine beauty shines more brightly. In the Old Testament this theme is taken up in the suffering servant.
