Sympathies

Fr. Jonathan Hagger, the Mad Priest of Newcastle lost one of his dogs yesterday.  Glenna died after a sudden seizure.

Counterlight's Peculiars extends its sympathies on so sudden and terrible a loss of a dear old friend.

It is remarkable how close we become to beings with whom we share no language or culture, and are physically so different from us.  When they leave us, we grieve for them like we would grieve for our children.  They have always been our most faithful companions, still glad to see us no matter how bad a mess we make of things.

May Glenna rest in peace.

Onward Christian Soldiers

Presented here without comment.

First, from a comment posted on Thinking Anglicans on Tuesday:

We who think that homosexual practice is immoral certainly don't think that it puts one outside the race or entails a loss of respect or acceptance (of the person) any more than lying, adultery, lust, greed or any other moral failing. I have serious moral failings, some of which I struggle not to justify, and yet I claim full membership in the race. Why would I think differently about any LGBT person?

Second, a Tweet sent to Joe Jervis of Joe.My.God on Wednesday:
 

In 1972, The Better Man Didn't Win

... he lost in a landslide.   But McGovern had the last laugh when Nixon's paranoia and ambition caused his presidency to implode.


Rest in Peace George McGovern

I wonder how many people remember that this soft-spoken man who became everyone's stereotype of the "bleeding heart liberal" was an ace fighter pilot in World War II and a decorated hero of the Battle of Guadalcanal (together with another famous "bleeding heart liberal," the late Bishop Paul Moore).  If anyone had a right to condemn a pointless war, a colonial war we inherited from the French that made a lot of people a lot of money (the real winners were the military contractors like Kellogg Brown and Root, or "Kellogg Burn and Loot" as it was known to American troops), it was George McGovern.

If time and chance had conspired differently, and McGovern won in 1972,  the USA would have been out of Vietnam much sooner with fewer dead on all sides.  The outcome of that war would still have been the same.

George McGovern was the last heir to that populist progressivism that once included everyone from Eugene V. Debs to William Jennings Bryan.   That progressivism saw all Americans as stake-holders in their country regardless of wealth or position.  And now the imperial oligarchy McGovern resisted all his life seems poised to take over permanently and bring to an end the world's oldest constitutional democracy.  Perhaps in the end, the real prophets of the future will be Dick Cheney and Vladimir Putin.

May George McGovern have the Peace that Passes All Understanding as the American Empire he resisted so stubbornly buries him with grudging ceremony.






EXTRA:

During my years in Congress and for the four decades since, I've been labeled a 'bleeding-heart liberal.' It was not meant as a compliment, but I gladly accept it. My heart does sometimes bleed for those who are hurting in my own country and abroad. A bleeding-heart liberal, by definition, is someone who shows enormous sympathy towards others, especially the least fortunate. Well, we ought to be stirred, even to tears, by society's ills. And sympathy is the first step toward action. Empathy is born out of the old biblical injunction 'Love the neighbor as thyself.'

—George S. McGovern, What It Means to Be a Democrat (2011).

The Artists' Church in Rome

 The Church of Santi Martina e Luca in the Roman Forum

Today is St. Luke's Day.  Luke was one of the four Gospel writers, the traditional author of the Book of Acts, a physician (and the patron saint of medicine), and according to pious legend, he was an artist, and remains the patron saint of artists.

One of Rome's magnificent and not quite so well known baroque churches served as the chapel of the Academy of Saint Luke, the painters' guild, in Rome.  It sits in the Roman Forum between the old Senate House built by the Emperor Diocletian, and the Forum of Julius Caesar.  A church has stood on this site for many centuries, dedicated to the martyr saint, Martina.  The Academy of Saint Luke used the Church of Santa Martina as a chapel for generations.

In 1634, the new head of the Academy and the leading Baroque painter in Rome, Pietro da Cortona decided to excavate a burial crypt for himself and his family in the floor of the old church.  During the excavation ancient human remains were found and proclaimed to be those of Saint Martina.  The discovery changed everything.  It was decided to build a new church.

Pietro da Cortona, the leading painter in Rome in the mid 17th century, also had an illustrious career as an architect, and designed the church that we see today.  He designed the church to serve as a martyrium for Saint Martina, and to be the artists' church in Rome.

Construction began in 1640 and was completed in 1664.  Of the many churches in Rome built by Cortona, this was supposedly his favorite.  Cortona lies buried in the church.  Cortona was a Florentine and he designed this church with the Baptistery and the great cathedral dome designed by Brunelleschi in mind.

It is remarkable that Cortona, famous for his sprawling painted spectacles on the ceilings of Roman churches and palaces, included so little painting in this church for painters.

The Church of Santi Martina e Luca; the Senate is to the immediate left of the church, the remains of the Forum of Julius Caesar are in the foreground; the columns on the right are what remain of the Temple of Venus Genetrix, once the centerpiece of Caesar's Forum.

The facade of the church; like all Roman churches from this time, the facade includes a blessing window above the door for the Pope to bless the crowds when he visits the church in his capacity as Bishop of Rome.

The remarkable interior; a relatively austere ground level gives way to a spectacular dome and vaults filled with magnificent relief carving.   There is very little painting in the church.

The vaults and dome of the church

Over the high altar is a painting of Saint Luke as an artist at work by Antiveduto Grammatica.  Below is a striking sculpture of the martyred Martina by Niccolo Menghini.

Menghini's sculpture of the martyred Martina recalls an even more dramatic sculpture of the martyred Saint Cecilia by Stefano Maderno from 1600 in the Church of Santa Cecilia in Trastevere in Rome.

In the crypt of the church below the dome is the shrine of Saint Martina.

St. Luke by Guercino; I love this painting because Guercino shows Luke not as a humble pious painter, but as a proud Maestro Grandissimo, feeling entitled to our applause and the angel's admiration as his due reward for his hard and brilliant work.





To paraphrase Martin Luther,
 Hail Holy Rome!  Made glorious by all the artists who ever worked in thee!

Who Says Men Don't Like To Play Dress Up?

I am not and never have been Roman Catholic, so all of this is a little exotic to me.  On the other hand, Protestants and Evangelicals are hardly immune to ecclesiastical vanity (think of the gold stamped leather bound Bibles with gilt edged pages, the expensive suits that make Christ's Apostles look like bankers, and rival pastors comparing megachurches like schoolyard brats comparing penis sizes).

So here is a portfolio of everyone's favorite ecclesiastical fashion plate, the Cindy Crawford of sacerdotal man-lace, Cardinal Raymond Burke.

I enjoy the contrast between the prince-bishop splendor and the laxative-failed-to-work demeanor.





On the other hand, smiling Cardinal Burke would spook a Jack-O-Lantern.
Just in time for Halloween:

The Capa Magna always makes me think of Cleopatra unrolled from a carpet in front of Caesar.

And here is His Emminence in a fedora dodging the paparazzi.

The face of the contemporary Catholic hierarchy, over-dressed, elderly, and sour; irritated when the peasants don't show due deference to their spiritual lords.



Splendid as His Emminence may be in his spiritual vestments,  here is someone who will always out dress him, Nuestra Senora de la Esperanza Macarena de Sevilla starting out on her annual stroll to the Cathedral of Seville.

The Excitement Returns to St. Paul's

Protesters from Occupy chained themselves to the pulpit during Evensong in the cathedral today.
As usual Simon Sarmiento has all the scoop and then some over on Thinking Anglicans.

Also as usual, there is the public handwringing over "civility" combined with the contemptuous "let 'em freeze in the nave overnight" sentiments.

As far as I'm concerned, the cathedral clergy have only themselves to blame.  If they weren't such eager lackeys of the City banks and brokerage houses, then no one would be accusing them of selling out their temple to the Moneychangers -- or renting it out.


Jesus engages in respectful dialogue with the Jerusalem Financial Industry Council in this painting by Valentin de Boulogne from the 17th century.

EXTRA:

Here are the miscreants during Evensong.  They later released themselves when the cops threatened to enter the cathedral to arrest them.

Our own little Anglican Pussy Riot.

Marcha de Sevilla