ART. WHAT IS ART?

What spiritual direction is to faith I need the equivalent in some aspects of modern art and architecture. I went to the see the new addition to the Akron Art Museum (a post for another day) and spent some time in the modern art section. I went to my most troubling pieces and tried to spend some quality time with them. There was one piece in particular I was going to try to “figure out”. I read the artist’s and curator’s explanation. Best of all I was able to be there while some people who did love the piece were able to coo over it. “Look at that line,” one said. Another, “look how flawless that surface is.” They bent and stooped over it, taking it in at different angles and obviously admiring it greatly. (I was hoping that there would be a picture of it on their web site so that I could share it with you but alas, there is not.)

It just didn’t work for me. I could appreciate the great skill that went into the piece and feel that it should be preserved for others to see as a technique of art that could be incorporated into something else, but I have a hard time classifying it as art. That does not mean that it is not art. Here are just some possibilities:

1 My definition of art is too narrow.
2 It is so far ahead of me that I just don’t get it. For example, it took me a long time to appreciate icon.
3 It speaks to something that I just happen to have no interest in but need to appreciate because to someone else it is extremely relevant.
4 The key to understanding it has not been revealed to me.
5 There is nothing to get, I am just reading too much into it.
6 It isn’t art.

So I am trying to stay open. If I am going to have a good opinion on this however whether it be positive or negative (or somewhere in between) I am going to have to meet with a qualified “spiritual art director”.

That is the kind of approach that is needed when one questions the faith life. I find it interesting when someone vehemently disagrees with Church teaching and when asked why they disagree with a particular teaching the response is, “It’s not fair,” or “I don’t like it,” or “God wouldn’t say that.” When pressed for further details such as how do they know or if they know why it is that the Church teaches as she does, the conversation is blown away with the swipe of the arm as if going after an annoying fly thereby brushing off any chance that a meaningful exchange of ideas could even occur.

No teaching of the Church stands on its own. It is like a carefully constructed ball of yarn and to yank at one thread is most likely to effect many other teachings. Each teaching is not a referendum item that can be voted in or out without effecting the greater understanding of the whole.

For example many people want the Church to change her teaching on same-sex marriage. Ultimately that teaching would not stand on its own, it would effect the teaching on the meaning and purpose of marriage, sexuality, the purpose and meaning of man and life, and ultimately the way Scripture may be interpreted and how Tradition and the lived experience of the faithful for the last 2,000 years are seen. In truth, it would change the entire fabric of the faith.

That is the artwork of the Catholic take on faith. A visceral response to a limited understanding of its teaching does not make it false or untrue or unbeautiful. I find even those who make the time to understand the depth of a teaching and still disagree with it at least respect the logic, breadth, beauty and history of it while holding a contrary or modified position.

Does some teaching of faith from the Church strike you as wrong? Sit with it for a spell. Learn not just that it is being taught but why. Speak to someone knowledgeable about it. Be open to the possibility that it may be something more than what the newspapers report it to be. There is the possibility that it may be art and that it may touch you. And if it turns out that it doesn’t, you will not have lost out on anything but will at least understand better your brothers and sisters point of view.