Christianity
**Faith & Culture**

Joseph Pearce, Editor of Faith & Culture magazine, has weekly interviews with well-known Catholic authors, speakers, and academics on a variety of topics related to Catholicism.

Latest Episodes:

The End of the World Again Mar 25, 2020

Show notes

We used to keep death close, even stare it in the face: the skull on the desk beside the book, the graveyard right next to the church, crypts under the floors where we knelt. We kept death close to remind us that we must die. There was a fear of death, but it was a very healthy fear. It made us live better lives. By watching the dead we watched ourselves. By contemplating the mystery of the next life, we took an active interest in the mystery of this life.

“For some strange reason,” says G.K. Chesterton, “man must always plant his fruit trees in a graveyard. Man can only find life among the dead.”

But Chesterton saw us losing our fruitful fear of the morbid. Now we have hidden away our cemeteries, and, what's more, as Chesterton predicted, we have returned to the pagan habit of cremation. We have scattered our ashes, and the wind has blown away the memory of the dead. We have stopped thinking about the brevity of this life, and in the process have also stopped thinking about the breadth of eternity. And a strange loss of balance has occurred, even a loss of sanity, which is what happens when there is a loss of mental and spiritual balance. We used to fear death. Now we fear life instead. We used to fear abnormal things, like sexual perversion and slaughtering babies in the womb. Now we fear normal things, like the weather.

We no longer throw the meaningful shovelful of dirt on the coffin because now the dirt has become more sacred than the dead. We mutilate our bodies in the most unnatural ways, yet we wring our hands about using too much air or too much water or too much bread. We do not worry that we are destroying our individual homes with adultery and divorce and contraception and abortion, but we are obsessively worried that we are destroying our shared home the earth by turning on lights, growing corn, eating meat, driving cars. We have grown afraid of the primal and primary tools of civilization – fire and farming and the wheel – because they might interfere with the earth and sky. We are afraid of the normal, human things because we have forgotten the dead. We don't read them, we don't remember them, and we have forgotten who we are. We have forgotten that we are civilized. Civilization has always interfered with the forest. As soon as the plow breaks the soil, man declares his lordship over nature. But now we cower before the climate.

Chesterton says, we can predict the stars, but we cannot predict the clouds. Amazing how he continues to be right about that one. In spite of our sophisticated meteorological equipment, we still can't predict the clouds. We still cannot infallibly forecast sunshine or rain tomorrow. That won't stop us from checking the weather report. It is harmless when planning for a picnic. But it is a grave matter when we have chosen to follow into the wilderness the most consistently wrong prophet in all of history: the weatherman.

Here is Chesterton talking about the weather: “On the bright blue day my spirits go slightly down; there seems something pitiless about perfect weather. On the clear cool day, my spirits are normal. In the fog, my spirits go up; it feels like the end of the world, or better still, a detective story.”

Paradoxical and profound as expected. Good weather brings him down, bad weather lifts him up. And he sees the end of the world in the weather. He also sees a mystery. The fog is full of riddles. But the finality at a certain point is certain.

Now we have the weatherman telling us it's the end of the world. He is not the first prophet to make this prediction. As Chesterton reminds us, “It is very natural but rather misleading, for supposing that this epoch must be the end of the world because it will be the end of us.”

And yet, one of these times it really will be the end of the world.

For the Christian, the final revelation is a good thing, the apocalypse, the unveiling, the solution to the mystery, the explanation not only of all things, but of that most mysterious thing: ourselves. Chesterton cannot help but anticipate what, in truth, we have all been waiting for: “No men will ever know each other till the end of the world.”

But here's a thought. What if the climate change alarmists are absolutely right? And what if we do not heed their warnings? What if we proceed on this path to destruction? What if there is nothing they can do to stop us? What if we are all going to burn up, if not quickly, then slowly and surely?

Will those who will have lost their hope about saving the earth have any concern to save their souls? Will they consider Jonah and Nahum and Nineveh? Will anyone ever repent?

Instead of the thundering hoofbeats of the Four Horsemen of the Apocalypse, perhaps the Judge will come riding in at a plodding pace, maybe even on a donkey, but without fanfare, without trumpets. Perhaps he will quietly dismount and silently switch off the lights. The heat will be eternal, but the stars will all go out. Just a thought.

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Matthew 6:9 with St. Gregory of Nyssa Mar 24, 2020

Show notes

“Pray then like this: ‘Our Father in heaven…’”

The similarities between the giving of the Law on Mount Sinai in Exodus and Jesus’ Sermon on the Mount in Matthew 5–7 are striking. Comparison of the two, however, also reveals important contrasts, and St. Gregory of Nyssa begins his preaching on the Lord’s Prayer, which Jesus teaches during the Sermon on the Mount, by pointing these out. Whereas the people of Israel at Sinai underwent bodily ritual purification in preparation for God’s appearance on the mountain, we are to purify our thoughts and desires by faith and repentance. Whereas Moses alone drew near to God on the mountain, Jesus leads us all “not to a mountain but to Heaven itself, which He has rendered accessible to men by virtue.” Even more amazing, Jesus tells us to call God “Father.”

For Gregory, this invitation should make our jaws drop. God, after all, “is absolute goodness, holiness and joy, power, glory and purity, eternity that is always absolutely the same.” For us to call him “Father” indicates that Jesus has brought us “to kinship with the Divine Nature.” Christ is the only Son of God, yet, as Gregory quotes, “to all who did receive him…he gave the right to become children of God” (Jn. 1:12).

With this right, however, comes tremendous responsibility. Just a few verses before teaching the Lord’s Prayer, Jesus tells us to “be perfect, as your heavenly Father is perfect” (Matt. 5:48). To call God our Father is to commit ourselves to live as his true children, seeking his holiness. Gregory makes it clear that he is not demanding some sort of self-achieved perfectionism apart from God’s grace, but at the same time, he writes, “He who has commanded us to say Father, has not permitted us to pronounce a lie.” We must not let our prayer become empty words. Rather, when we pray to “our Father,” we should remember and give humble thanks for the dignity of being called to be the children of God.[1]

[1] Summary by John Sehorn with the use of Gregory of Nyssa, Sermon 2 on the Lord’s Prayer in The Lord’s Prayer, The Beatitudes, trans. Hilda C. Graef, Ancient Christian Writers 18 (New York: Paulist Press, 1954), 35–44.

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Revisiting The Two Towers Mar 20, 2020

Show notes

I’ve just enjoyed the second of the three movie nights at a friend’s house watching the full extended editions of Peter Jackson’s The Lord of the Rings. As I stated in last week’s essay describing my experience of watching The Fellowship of the Ring for the first time in many years, it’s intriguing to see how my judgment of Jackson’s films has changed or mellowed with time. This is especially true of The Two Towers, which is the film I enjoyed least of the three and the one which deviates most drastically from Tolkien’s book. I still suspect that this will be the one I consider the least good of the three, though I’m avoiding calling it the worst because such a word-choice would imply that it was bad, which it most definitely is not. In fact, it struck me as very good and much better than I’d remembered it being.

I was particularly struck that the things in the film that I considered bad when I originally watched it are not as bad as I’d thought. Take, for instance, the Ents who are largely employed by Jackson as comic relief. This violated my literary sensibility because Tolkien treated them with the utmost seriousness, bestowing a great deal of gravitas on them as the oldest rational creatures in Middle-earth; oldest, that is, except for the enigmatic Tom Bombadil, whom Jackson had omitted completely from The Fellowship of the Ring. Treebeard is possibly my favourite character in the whole book, and Quickbeam, who is used by Tolkien as light relief, is positively Chestertonian or Hopkinsonian in the sheer joy that he displays in the presence of the goodness, truth and beauty of Creation.

In Tolkien’s work, the Ents embody Tolkien’s understanding of Tradition, linguistically and ecclesiologically, which is to say that they evoke his philologist’s understanding of the rootedness of language and his Catholic understanding of the rootedness of the Church in those doctrines, tried and tested by time and enshrined dogmatically, which form the living body of the Church’s teaching tradition. It takes a long time to say anything in Old Entish because each word is not merely a label, signifying some up-to-date fashionable sense, but is a genealogical etymological tree of living meaning, stretching back to the roots of meaning itself. The ecclesiological dimension is connected to the longevity of the Ents, who live for countless generations of men, transcending and outliving the transient ages of history, much as the Church has done and is doing. An Entmoot, like a Council of the Church, is a rare occurrence in history because Ents, like the Church, have no need to be “hasty” in coming to decisions, even in times of crisis, because most crises resolve themselves through the mutually destructive collapse of the secular forces that cause them. And yet when the Ents, or the Church, do come to a definite decision or resolution the consequences are binding and have seismic ramifications.

All of the foregoing is lost in Jackson’s film adaptation, a fact that irritated me immensely when I first saw the film. How could something with such gravitas be treated with such levitas? How could Jackson be flippant about such things? How could he make a joke of the Ents and all that they signify? It was almost sacrilegious! But that was then, and this is now.

Now I see things differently.

I see them differently because I am no longer trying to see them through Tolkien’s eyes. The film is not Tolkien’s work. It is Peter Jackson’s. It is not a re-presentation of Tolkien’s work but an adaptation of it in a different storytelling medium. The thing that is essential to a bona fide adaptation, i.e. an adaptation done in good faith, is that it stays true to the spirit of the work it is adapting. Jackson does this, for the most part, even if he feels constrained to exercise artistic license in excising some characters and adapting others to the demands of storytelling in a different medium. When I see Peter Jackson’s Ents through Peter Jackson’s eyes I see them as playing their part in the film with the degree of levitas that the story, as a film, demands. In ceasing to compare chalk and cheese, i.e. literature with film, I can enjoy the cheese as cheese and not be disappointed that it’s not the chalk I was expecting or demanding.

This criterion of judgment is equally applicable to other manifestations of Jackson’s artistic license which had irritated me when I had first seen The Two Towers. I found myself enjoying the interpolation of Arwen into the story, reminding us of Aragorn’s betrothal to her and of their self-sacrificial love and loyalty towards each other, and serving to heighten the romantic tension between Aragorn and the wonderfully portrayed Éowyn.

Gandalf’s exorcising of the demonic spirit of Saruman from the possessed Théoden works very well, even though I had disliked this scene intensely upon my initial viewing, because it adds a much-needed supernatural dimension to the story, as do the occasional scenes when characters, such as Aragorn, appear to be praying.

All these things are well and much better than I remembered but all’s not well in the absolute sense. I still feel that Jackson is too enamoured of computer-generated special effects, using them well in the case of the characterization of Gollum but using them excessively in the excessively long battle scenes. The scene in which Legolas uses his shield as a surfboard in the midst of battle is as ridiculous as ever, and the characterization of Faramir as Boromir’s clone and not as his more virtuous brother impoverishes his crucial role in the drama as a much-needed counterpoint. These are, however, mere quibbles. The Two Towers is nonetheless a masterpiece.

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Antidote to Chaos Mar 19, 2020

Show notes

The work never stopped. I thought things would ease up after the first six months, but the pace at work only increased. Managers changed direction on what seemed like a monthly basis, which required total rework of processes and tools. I began to see that whatever I was working on today, would be gone by the next quarter. I was working seven days a week from morning ‘till night. My international assignment outside Dublin, Ireland had become not a dream job but a nightmare sweat shop.

Chaos reigned in my life. For the first time in my career as a project manager in a large information technology company, I felt that work was consuming me. I found myself drowning in an endless stream of meetings, spreadsheets and process documents. I felt trapped in an inescapable prison of impossible deadlines. I no longer had the direct support of my wife and children, as they remained in the United States continuing their homelife and schoolwork. Even though I was surrounded by coworkers, I felt isolated. There was no end in sight.

It was in the midst of this overwhelming workload that my prayer life began to change. In a type of quiet desperation, I began to see God not as a distant deity who controlled the universe, but as the one person whom I could turn to at any time of the day or night with my pain. Prayer became not just an expression of my devotion to the distant, albeit knowable God, but more of an intimate encounter with my Lord. My morning Rosary changed from the simple recitation that I had known for almost 30 years to a sacred rendezvous with my Blessed Mother, which gave me the strength to face the day.

Soon, I began to steal a little more time before starting my day to contemplate Christ on the cross. I would kneel before a small, two-inch crucifix in my apartment and try to simply gaze upon our Lord for just five minutes. Have you ever tried to just stop everything and look at a crucifix for five minutes? I was astounded at how little patience I had, as I turned my head towards the clock to see if the time had passed. However, it was during these moments that I saw Christ’s suffering more intensely. What must it have been like to feel the crown of thorns on his head? What of the excruciating pain, as his shoulders got pulled from their sockets while hanging on the cross? These were unthinkable pains. Yet he endured them.

These brief moments in front of the cross helped me to understand more clearly the words of St. Teresa of Calcutta, who started her life as a nun in Ireland: “The beginning of prayer is silence. If we really want to pray we must first learn to listen, for in the silence of the heart God speaks.”

Sunday Mass had been a duty. Joyful, yes. Spiritually refreshing, of course. But now, it became something else. It was an emotional sanctuary. It felt much more like an intimate meeting with a treasured friend. Even my preparation for Mass was no longer simply putting on a suit. It was a time filled with anticipation before what was sure to be a truly special event. I arrived early to join some parishioners who said a Rosary before Mass. I would stay afterwards to gaze at the statues and study the stained glass windows. I was spending more time with our Lord.

One day after Mass, on the bulletin board in the back of the parish, I noticed a simple white sheet of paper on which was typed an invitation to Sunday night Eucharistic Adoration. At first, I thought how odd it was to have Adoration on Sunday, but I decided to try it anyway. I could not have imagined the impact this devotion would have on the rest of my stay in Ireland.

From then on, I found myself drawn back to this oasis of grace each week. The dread of Monday morning was transformed by Christ into a peace I had never known. In fact, a fundamental change occurred in my attitude toward work. I found that my worries about day to day activities ceased. I was no longer shaken by the often-raised voices of my co-workers. The frantic pace felt somehow manageable.

Years later, as I reflect back on my international assignment, I see that those turbulent times were actually a gift. In that seemingly unbearable pressure, I found that turning to God in prayer is the antidote to our chaotic life. Although work may seemingly never stop, it does. What does not stop, is God’s love.

Our Lady Queen of Peace pray for us!

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The Light of Christ Mar 18, 2020

Show notes

The Light of Christ: An Introduction to Catholicism
By Father Thomas White OP
Catholic University Press, 2017
329 pp., $19.95
ISBN: 978-0-8132-2971-3

Father Thomas White OP, has written a book on the Catholic Church that is destined to be a classic. It is erudite yet written in an engaging style making it accessible to the educated layperson—which is the intended audience. And as Father White states in the introduction, the book is meant to be a companion to the faith, not an argument to convince. But, after reading it, even non-Catholics may be convinced that the Catholic Church is indeed the light of Christ.

Father White has already established himself as a known Catholic writer and thinker, with several books, many articles and an internet presence, including video presentations. He became interested in the Catholic Church while in college at Brown University and converted at age 22. He joined the Dominican order in 2003 and completed his master and doctoral work at Oxford. Father White is also one of the youngest members of the Pontifical Academy of the Immaculate Conception. He currently resides at the Dominican House of Studies in Washington, DC.

The Light of Christ is a comprehensive overview of Catholic theology, with chapters on revelation and reason, the Trinity, Creation, and the Incarnation. The book concludes with chapters on the institution of the Church— the Mass, sacraments, priesthood, Holy Mary, social doctrine and Last Things. All topics are treated thoroughly and clearly without academic jargon or excessive footnotes. Father White’s skill as a writer and theologian come together nicely throughout the book. He always provides new and different insights on the topics he covers. This is his particular talent. That is what makes this book so good.

In the beginning chapters, he describes ancient Greek and Roman religions. These peoples accepted various gods because they were “multicultural” societies. As such, the ancient goal was not the pursuit of truth but rather social unity. Father White states that if there was one “truth” for ancient Rome, it was glory. This sounds much like the secular world today with its focus on tolerance and diversity, yet with an overarching goal of material wealth. It was the Jews and Christians (and heroic ancients like Socrates) who challenged this.

The author also emphasizes that secularism and materialism are not new. Rather, they are a return to ancient skepticism. Like the secularism of today, ancient skepticism is concerned with the world. Both are mundane. The other side of skepticism is credulity—unexamined faith. This was present in the past and is also present today in Islam and some Protestant fundamentalist sects. Father White argues that the Catholic faith has always avoided these extremes. Faith and reason are always in harmony; one does not subvert the other.

Father White also criticizes the “dictation theory,” the belief that sacred writings are directly composed by God. Again this is found in Islam, Mormonism and certain Protestant fundamentalist sects. The author argues that the dictation theory does not allow for any intellectual scrutiny or inquiry. Catholics have always challenged such rigid scriptural interpretations. And again we see the balance between reason and faith. This approach to scripture is why the Catholic faith is the most intellectual of all the world’s religions.

Father White also explains why Catholics cannot accept the Bible as the sole basis of faith, as do Protestants. The Bible alone cannot stand up to the living (and mercurial) intellect of man. Understanding the Bible requires the Church, a unified authoritative Church that can maintain the living stream of Christian tradition in every age. That church is the Catholic Church.

Father White does not delve deeply into the debate over evolution in his section on Creation. He accepts many scientific premises and theories. That is not his focus. He shifts ground and makes the point that too much is written about how the world came into being, but little is said about its very existence. For Catholics, this is far more important. He states that “[t]he created character of all that exists is more fundamental than anything we can quantify or study in math or science.” The world we are given must be our spiritual focus.

The multiplicity of earthly life is itself remarkable. It begs for explanation and meaning. To the author, the meaning of Creation is already obvious in that this multiplicity is hierarchical, with humans at the apex. This is crucial to understanding our existence. Humans are different from all other life forms because they possess reason and will. And these are different not in degree, but in kind from any other earthly thing. What truly sustains our existence, our being, is the quest for human freedom which is essentially spiritual. This is what the Catholic Church—more than any other political or religious creed—has represented throughout all of its history.

Humans, unlike other living things, are also motivated by what is good. This goes beyond animal instinct—even our own. Humans again reveal their spiritual nature by pursuing goods that transcend the senses. It is this spiritual aspect to the human being that is key to understanding Creation and is something that eludes scientific explanation. That is why the book of Genesis should be treated as a metaphysical event. It should not be compared to or scrutinized by scientific theory.

To Father White, human beings are the bridge between the physical and spiritual realms. And humans are unique on earth in that they can commune with both realms. Humans are also a dynamic species, creative, restless, and always striving for perfection (God). This is through the pursuit of both knowledge and love. Here he sees a different type of evolution than a purely biological one. There is an “evolution” towards spiritual perfection (God). This is the great lesson of human history. It is a ceaseless effort to elevate the human condition despite original sin and constant setbacks.

This process has only accelerated with the birth of Christ—who is the essence of freedom—and has been maintained by the Catholic Church. Father White’s orthodoxy comes through clearest in his discussions of the Church. There is only one Church and that is the Roman Catholic Church. Thus, there can be no new religions (Islam, Mormonism) or reformation of the Church (protestantism). The deposit of faith was given at one time in history to the apostles. And it has been safeguarded by one church ever since.

Father White stresses the importance of the Mass and the sacraments to human salvation. The sacraments are both spiritual and material. Moreover they are patterned on normal stages of human life and on natural phenomena. Sanctification is another key element of Catholic life. It is the slow spiritual growth toward sainthood. And this also requires the sacraments and certain habits—namely the Christian virtues of faith, hope and charity. This takes time and naturally requires grace.

The author clearly shows how Catholic social teaching is also informed by natural reason. Key issues like war, capital punishment, abortion, and sexual behavior are all intrinsically moral issues. As such, widespread secular opposition to these positions can be expected.

Father White examines the perennial opposition to the Catholic Church throughout history. This is because the Church challenges authority—that of the state and now the individual. He openly admits that the Church has used violence to promote its authority, as in the Inquisition. But he reminds the reader that for most of history (including now) it is the Church and its members that have been persecuted.

On the Last Things, Father White explains heaven, hell and purgatory with his usual clarity and insight. He notes how all these doctrines existed since the early days of the Church and all have reasonable explanations. Heaven, the ecstatic union with God, the fulfillment of the Beatific vision, is articulated more clearly in Catholicism than in other religions. And similarly, purgatory is also a reasonable understanding of this life and how it determines our place in the afterlife. Purgatory is already begun on earth and so is the descent into hell, which Father White emphasizes is real as is, of course, damnation.

The author’s Thomistic vision—the importance of natural reason and law—comes through throughout this splendid book. Yet there is also the more subtle influence of John Henry Newman and his articulation of the illative sense. This is that type of reason that brings together many human experiences and creates a unified belief—for Newman, a belief in God. Father White makes this case with his book as one clearly sees how the Catholic Church—its institutions, practices, and beliefs—has always articulated and defended the illative sense. That is why it remains the Light of Christ.

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Matthew 5:1–9 with St. Leo the Great Mar 17, 2020

Show notes

“Seeing the crowds, he went up on the mountain, and when he sat down, his disciples came to him. And he opened his mouth and taught them, saying: ‘Blessed are the poor in spirit, for theirs is the kingdom of heaven. Blessed are those who mourn, for they shall be comforted. Blessed are the meek, for they shall inherit the earth. Blessed are those who hunger and thirst for righteousness, for they shall be satisfied. Blessed are the merciful, for they shall receive mercy. Blessed are the pure in heart, for they shall see God. Blessed are the peacemakers, for they shall be called sons of God.”

Like many ancient and medieval Christian interpreters, Pope St. Leo the Great saw the beatitudes as laying out a program of spiritual growth. Poverty in spirit, therefore, means detachment from worldly things. This “magnanimous poverty” frees us to be generous to others and so, St. Leo asks, “What is richer than this poverty?” Since the poor in spirit have this heavenly perspective, they do not “mourn” over earthly setbacks, but over their own and others’ sin. But Leo’s focus on heaven is not a rejection of bodily things, as is clear from the way he interprets the fourth beatitude: the “earth” that the meek shall inherit “is the very flesh of the saints.” He explains further that in the resurrection, our bodies will enjoy “the harmony of perfect unity with the will of the soul.”

The next two beatitudes refer to “righteousness” and “mercy.” Here Leo draws on the fact that God himself is supreme righteousness (or “justice”) and mercy. These beatitudes thus call us to reflect God in ourselves: “Mercy wants you to be merciful; justice wants you to be just. In this way the Creator will appear in his own creature, and ‘the image of God’ [Gen. 1:27], expressed through the paths of imitation, may shine in the mirror of the human heart.” When our hearts have been made “pure” by imitating God, reflecting the divine goodness, we in turn will come to “see God.” This loving union with God, finally, spills out into love for and unity with others, making us “peacemakers” and true children of God.[1]

[1] Summary by John Sehorn with the use of Leo the Great, Sermon 95 in Sermons, trans. Jane Patricia Freeland, C.S.J.B., and Agnes Josephine Conway, S.S.J., Fathers of the Church 93 (Washington, DC: Catholic University of America Press, 1996), 394–400.

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Revisiting The Fellowship of the Ring Mar 13, 2020

Show notes

It is probably at least ten years since I last saw The Lord of the Rings movies. I own all three of the special extended DVD editions of the films but they sit on the shelf in their virgin state, unopened and untouched, gathering dust. The reason is that I share my home with my children which means that I can’t watch anything that I don’t want them to see, or at least that I don’t want them to see yet. My daughter is eleven, with a very visual imagination. An early 1970s episode of Doctor Who gave her nightmares. Clearly she is not ready to be affronted with orcs, the Uruk-hai, black riders and cave trolls.

Considering my protracted exile from Peter Jackson’s Middle-earth (as distinct from Tolkien’s of which I am a regular inhabitant), I was delighted when a friend suggested that we have a movie night at his house on three consecutive Tuesdays to watch all three of Jackson’s films. Last night we watched The Fellowship of the Ring in all its full extended glory. For almost four hours, including “pause” time for visits to the bathroom or to the refrigerator for ale replenishment, we basked in the splendor of the first part of Jackson’s magnum opus. Memories of my earlier viewings of the film flashed back to me but my long period of exile meant that it was all once more remarkably fresh.

After the back story is recounted, showing how the One Ring was forged and became Isildur’s Bane, we find ourselves in the Shire and feeling very much at home. Jackson really captures the true spirit of Tolkien’s idyllic depiction of the agrarian simple life, captivating us and thereby releasing us, albeit all too briefly, from our own captivity in a “real” world which resembles the reckless wantonness of Isengard. The beauty, and the power and the glory, of Tolkien’s Shire is rooted in the way that it feels like home even though we have never been there. Perhaps it rekindles childhood memories of uncluttered and untroubled innocence; perhaps it touches those primal and primeval parts of us that still long for the lost Eden; perhaps it prefigures that other home to which we’re all called, the desire for which animates every healthy soul. Whatever the reason, Tolkien’s Shire presents us with an icon of idyllic community, which is inspirational and aspirational, and which Peter Jackson revivifies magnificently. It is indeed so much alive that we feel that we are less alive when we leave it, either with Frodo, Sam, Merry and Pippin on their journey into the dark, or when we return to our workaday lives.

But leave it we must (alas!) as we follow the hobbits to Bree, skipping past Tom Bombadil, whom Jackson chooses to excise from the story, exercising poetic license and his producer’s prerogative. Although Tom Bombadil plays a crucial part in Tolkien’s book, which is discussed in my own book Frodo’s Journey in a chapter entitled “The Enigma of Tom Bombadil”, I don’t have a major problem with Jackson’s decision to leave him out of the movie. The multifarious characters and multi-layered plots with which good authors construct their fictional works is not as easy to accomplish in the medium of film. Compromises are demanded because they are necessary. For this reason, I can sympathize with Jackson’s decision to drop not only Bombadil (and therefore the equally delightful Goldberry) but also Glorfindel, whose small but significant part in Tolkien’s book is taken in the film by Arwen, thereby magnifying the role of Aragorn’s love interest and accentuating the female presence within the movies, both of which enhance the quality of the film, as a film.

Perhaps I am mellowing with age, or finding it easier to separate the literary purist from the movie critic in my engagement with Jackson’s film, but I found myself much more tolerant of those aspects of the film which had irritated my literary sensibilities when I had first watched it. I recall my discomfort with the way that Jackson had turned Aragorn into a confused and conflicted modern man, unwilling or unable to accept and embrace the duties and responsibilities of his calling. I remember accusing Jackson of conflating James Dean and Jesus Christ in his characterization of Aragorn. On this more recent viewing, I saw less of James Dean and more of Christ, especially in the close-up shots in which Viggo Mortensen looks uncannily like Max von Sydow in The Greatest Story Ever Told or Jim Caviezel in The Passion of the Christ or, indeed, like the naturalistic romanticized portraits of Christ in pious and particularly Protestant art. Similarly, Jackson is unabashed in his iconographic depiction of Galadriel as a Marian figure, her grotesque and monstrous transfiguration when tempted by the Ring notwithstanding. Our last view of her, as the Fellowship departs Lothlórien, is reminiscent of classic images of Our Lady of Fatima or Our Lady of Lourdes.

The film version of The Fellowship of the Ring culminates with the death of Boromir, differing from Tolkien’s book in which Boromir’s death comes at the beginning of The Two Towers. It’s a scene that has great sacramental significance in Tolkien’s original work, the final exchange of words between Boromir and Aragorn reflecting the formal aspects of the sacrament of penance, in which the repentant sinner must have contrition for the sins he has committed, confessing them and making satisfaction in terms of an act of penance. Boromir’s final words contain all three of these prerequisites for a good and holy confession: “I tried to take the Ring from Frodo [confession]. I am sorry [contrition]. I have paid [satisfaction].” Aragorn’s role is that of the priest, acting in persona Christi, who forgives the sin and bestows “peace” upon the penitent. Jackson deviates radically from Tolkien in this scene, replacing the sacramental “confession” with Boromir’s fraternal “confession” that he would have followed Aragorn, proclaiming him to be “my brother, my captain, my king”. Thus the allusive allegorical confession to God in Tolkien’s original story is replaced with an explicit literal confession in Jackson’s adaptation, expressive of Boromir’s final reconciliation with the man (and king) whom he had wronged. The effect lacks the nuanced subtlety and the depth of theological applicability of Tolkien’s original but it has great power nonetheless in terms of its cathartic effect upon the viewer. Had Jackson chosen merely to reiterate Tolkien’s words, it is very unlikely that the literary subtlety of the original text would have been grasped by the viewer, the allegorical significance being lost in the fast-paced medium of film, weakening the scene and depriving it of the catharsis that Jackson’s reworking of it provides. As I pondered the artistic license that Jackson had granted himself in this most important of scenes from Tolkien’s book, I realized that a film adaptation of a literary work should not be expected to follow the literal letter of the original but should seek faithfully to encapsulate and project its true and essential spirit because, and to co-opt the words of St. Paul, “the letter killeth but the spirit giveth life”.

The Strokes of the Master Mar 12, 2020

Show notes

In his 1436 treatise On Painting, humanist theorist and architect Leon Battista Alberti writes that the painter must “make all the parts true to his model but also add beauty.” He goes on to explain how the painter is to “add beauty” not through abstraction, but by integrating the most beautiful parts he has observed into a single composition. This is why Alberti and Renaissance artists in general studied anatomy from the bones out, and also why Alberti emphasized the study of geometry. As a student of anatomy, the artist learns the relationship between the parts of a figure and how the parts cooperate to produce movement, so that he can integrate the most beautiful parts into a convincingly realistic figure. As a student of geometry, the painter can situate figures in a convincing illusion of space. The result is a work of art that portrays ideal beauty through the particulars of nature.

This approach—perfecting nature through anatomy and geometry rather than abstraction—perfectly communicates the religion of the Incarnation and Resurrection. To paraphrase the Christmas Preface, we are borne up to the love of the invisible God through His visible incarnate Word, Jesus Christ. Grace perfects nature. The glorified body is not an abstraction. I see the hand of Providence in the development of philosophy and art in the Christian West. Giotto, Fra Angelico, Michelangelo, Rubens, Bernini, Velázquez—despite their differences, all participated in the fecund tradition of perfecting the natural by “adding beauty.” Yet few are working within this tradition today.

That is why I am dedicated to researching and reviving Renaissance and Baroque practices, and trying to communicate those techniques to young artists. You cannot go to art school or an atelier and study from a Renaissance master. You have to cobble together an education from a variety of sources—books, classes, mentors, direct engagement with works of art—it is not unlike crafting a painting through the integration of beautiful parts. I am grateful to have a background in mathematics. Studying and teaching the theory and beauty of number and proportion trained me to appreciate order in nature, and to construct order on a canvas. I learned some anatomy from books, but I also needed life drawing classes because capturing a living, three-dimensional body is much harder than copying a static, two-dimensional image. And you need to get under the skin too. In art school, I took a class in anatomy for artists in which we built up the ligaments, muscles, and tendons of a knee joint with clay. Only then could I really see the subtlety of the underlying forms through the veil of skin. I learned to see light and color by studying with Boston School master Paul Ingbretson. And I have copied master drawings from books and master paintings in person.

Standing before a Ribera or a Zurbarán and trying to copy it is invaluable. You start to recognize all the practical choices the artist made—the size of brush, the overlaying of pigments, the adjustment of the composition—and you can then incorporate those choices into your own original works. It is also invaluably humbling. The brush fumbles to retread the paths of the original. It overworks some, elides others, loses its place, but sometimes stumbles into the strokes of the master. Perhaps a seminarian feels something similar when learning the Mass.

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[1] Summary by John Sehorn with the use of Gregory of Nyssa, Sermon 2 on the Lord’s Prayer in The Lord’s Prayer, The Beatitudes, trans. Hilda C. Graef, Ancient Christian Writers 18 (New York: Paulist Press, 1954), 35–44.

[1] Summary by John Sehorn with the use of Leo the Great, Sermon 95 in Sermons, trans. Jane Patricia Freeland, C.S.J.B., and Agnes Josephine Conway, S.S.J., Fathers of the Church 93 (Washington, DC: Catholic University of America Press, 1996), 394–400.

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