Modern Art is Liberal Politics and Philosophy in Disguise

(Copied over from my other blog)

Modern man is asked by the zeitgeist of the times to live life open-minded and accepting of multiple possible world views and perspectives. In today's pluralistic culture of the West, to believe that there is one correct view on life and morals is considered closed-minded. Relativism in the West opens our minds to multiple simultaneous and contradicting truths. Multiple perspectives on life and truth are valued even if contradicting. This type of mindset can be confusing, but confusion is the home of the modern mind. Instead of confusion one can call it possibility, potential, freedom. In this state though, our perspective on life is much like this painting by Picasso, The Poet. Its hard to know what we are looking at, but one is supposed to be ok with that and find the beauty in ambiguity. This is the mind of modern man, he doesn't know what we are or where we are going but isn't that kind of pretty in itself, just the weird wonder of it? Concrete meaning and definite truths are blurred and blended. What is truth? What is man? What is God? What is reality?

Cubism paints reality from multiple perspectives at once, after all one perspective can't be right. All perspectives at once are true even if this leads to no perspective. This type of painting can be a metaphor for the mental state of how reality appears to the modern man who is open to all-truths since no truth is absolutely true to everyone. Being open to all-truths, even contradictory truths is like having no truth.

Representational art traditionally has one viewpoint. Traditionally societies have had a majority viewpoint. Art tended to have meaning and represented real things and ideas. As in cubism, the modern liberal mind tends to shun a single narrative of truth unless that narrative is that there is no one truth. Ambiguity, open-mindedness, pluralism, "tolerance", is the ideal. I think that is why modern art is so ambiguous and hard to understand. Modern Western society thinks life should be hard to understand, at least a life with meaning. It tends to say that each person makes his or her own personal meaning and no one narrative encompasses all as true.

Then we have abstract expressionism. This type of art seems to promote the idea that meaning is not important in life, only self-expression and freedom to do whatever you feel. The need to communicate ideas and connect to others in a rational way is not important. What seems to be encouraged is the expression of the self at the expense of a shared experience with others with actual understood meaning. Can you think of any people in your life that live this way?











Am I reading to much into art and what its style promotes or can you see that values of a society materialized in the artworks it creates?

The Arts Role in Conversion of Heart

Victor Hugo's Les Miserables, Tolkien's Lord of the Rings and Shakespeare's A Man for All Seasons played a role in this man becoming a Catholic Christian. http://chnetwork.org/2015/01/cole-matson-presbyterian-became-catholic-journey-home-program/?utm_content=buffer8a433&utm_medium=social&utm_source=facebook.com&utm_campaign=buffer

Beautiful Churches

Here's a sketch I made after mass today.

It's a drawing of St. Mary's in Mexia, TX. 

Something cool about being Catholic is being able to travel the country and attend any Mass and know the reading for the day and the liturgy ahead of time. Each church has its charm and beauty, but the overall liturgy is the same. 

Here are some photos of parishes I visited for Mass.

St. Edward's in Little Rock, Arkansas. 

This sculpture of Purgatory was at St. Edward's in Little Rock. 

St. Andrew's in Roanoke, Virginia.

St. Catherine of Sienna in Wake Forest, North Carolina.

I still love my little Parish of Saint Mary's though. 

Oh, look at some of the saint statues at St. Catherine of Sienna's. 

St. Peter of Verona. 

Not a statue but a beautiful mosaic of Our Lady of Guadalupe.  

St. Louis de Montfort. 

St. Dominic who received the rosary. 

Birthday Party Talks

Today we attended a 7-year-olds birthday party my daughter Zoë was invited to. The food, decorations and cake were fantastic. Before the evening could come to a close my wife brought up that she had been attending mass with me quite a bit. Blam! That was it. I had been trying to avoid the topic of my entering the Catholic communion because I know the family we were visiting has divided views about Catholicism, but my wife opened up the box. I think we talked for the next three hours about Christianity, the Bible, Catholicism/Protestantism. At one point one person in the discussion, not the host family, began to share an unorthodox interpretation of the identity of Christ, that he was not God while on earth. I told the group that if each man must interpret the Bible as he sees fit then his view is valid. I for one no longer have the option to choose my own interpretation, and I am thankful for the Catholic Bishops who preserve the original interpretation of Scripture and the traditions handed down to us from the twelve apostles so that we are not at the mercy of voting for interpretations or falling sway to simply believe the best debater in the room. 

Progress

I prayed with my wife seeking for clarity in the decisions we face. We feel we are in a transition and need guidance. I prayed for wisdom without uncertainty. 

Referee

Not everyone agrees with the referee's decision. In fact sometimes you may completely hate his call, but if you truly love the game, you have to love that a referee exists. Without a referee, the game would soon divulge into a shouting match of disagreement, and the game would stop as confusion took the field. Yes, you may hate the referees call, but if you love the game, you should be thankful one exists. I believe the Pope is one such referee. Without his calls, Christianity just becomes an argument of opinions.

( I read this analogy in a book. I don't recall the title at this moment.)

The Long Process

I don't know how this journey will end up as far as my family goes. I'm still the only Catholic in my family. This morning I went to Mass by myself again, and my wife went to her AG church.

This weekend I was sick with the flu and stayed in bed all of Saturday. Heidi helped nurse me back to health by checking on me, taking my temperature, making me soup, and bringing me orange juice, water and medicine.

The whole Catholic culture seems to talk more about self-sacrifice than prosperity so I think I just need to work on being a faithful husband and father. I was thinking today about how no lay person has ever been a Doctor of the Church. Does that mean that lay people have no insight to share with the Church. Perhaps we need more people to exemplify what radical holiness looks like in family life. I believe there have probably been many people who have done this. Perhaps there stories just go untold and they don't have the time to write down all there thoughts. 

Becoming Catholic has been a strange ride. It's hard to describe the many subtle shifts that it has affected in my life and outlook. The only downside is my friendships with my Protestant friends and family. I'm not as close to Catholics yet nor have prayer partners to pray with.  Perhaps my "witness" is down because my friendships are strained and they may judge Catholicism by it pulling me away from them. Perhaps they don't think of it at all.

I'm still working on a mural that is huge 110' long and 11' high and have been asked to do a painting of a great-grandmother with a baby in her lap looking at each other. It may take editing and such since the woman who wants it done does not have a photo of both together.  This may be tough but I will meet with her on Tuesday at 11am.

Glory be to the Father, to the Son and to the Holy Spirit.

I watched some to the Mass on the Feast of the Virgen de Guadalupe in Rome on my computer during my school conference period. The music of the Gloria was my favorite. I've been learning about the Aztec culture, Mexican history and even watched "For Greater Glory" the story of the Cristeros while I was sick in bed. I want to read my Grandma's Guadalupe Spanish Bible.