PODCAST - Press sideways triangle below to
listen
Wednesday 30th Week OT / Sts. Simon & Jude
The Institute
October 28, 2015
ABSTRACT OR REALISTIC ART? ++++++++++++++++++
- ¬ You have no doubt been to an art museum and found yourself gazing at a painting for a long time
- ¬ Do the art pieces you single out for deeper looks tend to be realistic or abstract?
- ¬ For example, might you linger longer w/ Rembrandt’s realistic self-portrait or w/ Picasso’s abstract Guernica?
- ¬ W/ realism you are presented with one clear look
- ¬ W/ abstract art U R given a presentation that can B taken different ways & from different angles
- ¬ ABSTRACT OR REALISTIC CHURCH? +++++++++++
- ¬ In Luke’s Gospel, he is very realistic, very clear
- ¬ Jesus prays & then names his Apostles, including Simon and Jude, the saints we celebrate today
- ¬ They immediately respond to Jesus’ call to be with him in prayer and to work alongside him
- ¬ The picture is one clear look, very realistic
- ¬ The 1st reading from Ephesians, on the other hand, is rather abstract, but no less “work of art”
- ¬ It describes foundation of a building being made up of Apostles & prophets w/ J as cornerstone
- ¬ “Building” includes Jews & Gentile in its structure
- ¬ Paul gets even more abstract by including all of us in the structure, “In him you also are being built together into a dwelling place of God in the Spirit”
- ¬ So I’m asking, “Hmm, where am I in this wall or that flooring or that ceiling?”
OUT OF THE MEUSEUM +++++++++++++++++++++++
- ¬ Whichever artistic genre we’re drawn to, realistic or abstract, the inner beauty of either, of who we are as Church, who we are as the body of Christ…
- ¬ Becomes enfleshed at this table of the Eucharist
- ¬ For here we are “no longer aliens or strangers”
- ¬ Because we are one with Jesus as Simon and Jude were
- ¬ Here we are one with Jesus as his own flesh and blood
CONCLUSION ++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++
- ¬ Today it’s time to take artwork – realistic or abstract – off museum wall…
- ¬ And see it come alive at this table!
+++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++
