Franciscan at Home

There are several reasons why this is an extraordinary image to use catechetically and why it is so perfectly suited to illustrate Part Three of the Catechism of the Catholic Church.

One reason is that it links those who are going through the RCIA process today to someone who had been through the RCIA in the fourth century! The young man for whom this tomb was made is named Junius Bassus and the inscription across the top of the sarcophagus states clearly that Junius was a ‘neophyte gone to God’, ‘neofitus iit ad deum’.

It may be that he was dying and was baptized on his deathbed; or it may be that he had been a catechumen in the normal way and had been baptized at some point within the previous year. Whatever his particular circumstances, we can see from these earliest times in the Church, that those newly baptised were called those with new (neo) nature (physis), now united with the life of Jesus Christ. ‘New birth, ‘newly planted’ into Christ or ‘newly alive’ are the usual translations for the great event, the great ontological change that takes place at baptism.

For the Year of Faith, ‘Learning through Art’ is focusing on the artworks used in the Catechism of the Catholic Church and how to catechise, beginning from the art work, when we use or teach from a particular section of the Catechism. The first image discussed in The Sower was the logo on the front cover which we saw can help us to catechise on the purpose and structure of the Catechism and appreciate how the Catechism was written to support us in our journey to Heaven. In the last issue, we looked at the artwork used for Part Four of the Catechism on Christian Prayer. In this present issue we look at the image that illustrates Part One, The Profession of Faith.

This painting, called ‘Real Presence’, is a rich example of proclamation of the faith from a Catholic perspective. You can see immediately that it is Eucharistic; the consecrated host takes up the centre around which, and to which, everything is connected. For the New Evangelization, reaching out especially to the baptised but lapsed Catholic, the Eucharistic liturgy is the source of Christian life as well as the summit. Eucharistic art, then, can wonderfully serve the New Evangelization.

What a remarkable painting! And how unexpected to find it given to us as the painting to introduce the part of the Compendium on the moral life! One might have thought, naturally, that this painting could most easily be used to illustrate the doctrines of Our Lady, especially Mary as Immaculate. But in the Compendium of the Catechism of the Catholic Church the painting is being proposed, instead, as one that can be used to help people to learn about Catholic moral teaching, our life in Christ.

The usual title of the painting is, as we know, the Immaculate Conception but here the Church surprises us by placing a very different title over the painting: ‘Man’s vocation: life in the Spirit’. We need to look closely at the painting, therefore, to understand how the picture illustrates this point: to ‘picture’, to see, our vocation, to see what you and I are being called to, we are being asked to contemplate Mary immaculate. We might say, in fact, that if we do not contemplate she who has the fullness of life in the Spirit we cannot know well to what we are being called. In Mary we see what life in the Spirit is, and so in her we see our vocation.

A catechetical implication, then, is that when we teach any element of Catholic life or moral teaching, we would do well to help people to contemplate Mary immaculate in order to see more clearly what the Church’s moral teaching means and entails. If we do not do this, one might even say that we are actually making it harder for people to ‘see’ the Church’s moral teaching.

Part Three of the Compendium is entitled ‘Life in Christ’, and Section One introduces us to man’s authentic vocation, which is Life in the Holy Spirit. The painting chosen to illustrate this Section is El Greco’s St John contemplates the Immaculate Conception, presently to be found in the Museum of Santa Cruz (Holy Cross), Toledo, Spain. El Greco (1541-1614) made this painting during his period of prolific activity between 1607 and his death in 1614. It is a particularly appropriate choice, for as the Compendium puts it: ‘Mary, the Panhagia, (all holy), is the masterpiece of the Holy Spirit. (Panhagion). Her existence from her Immaculate Conception to her glorious Assumption into heaven, is completely sustained by the love of God. The Spirit of the Love of the Father and the Son makes Mary a new creature, the new Eve.’
Although the doctrine of the Immaculate Conception was not officially promulgated until 1854 (in the Ineffabilis Deus of Pius IX), it has long been part of the Tradition of the Church. The feast of the Immaculate Conception was instituted by Pope Sextus IV in 1477, and in its decree on Original Sin in 1546, the Council of Trent specifically exempted the Virgin from any stain of Original Sin.

An early painting of the Immaculate Conception, made in 1492 by Carlo Crivelli, hangs in the National Gallery, London, and seventeenth century Spain produced a profusion of ‘Immaculadas’ by artists such as Pacheco, Velasquez, Murillo and Zurbaran. El Greco, a Cretan Greek who came to Spain via Titian’s Venice, thoroughly absorbed the Spanish spirituality of the Counter Reformation. His magnificent paintings of the Immaculate Conception effectively became templates or prototypes for those later Spanish artists.

Este cuadro de Caravaggio narra el relato histórica de lo que le sucedió a San Pablo antes de que fuera bautizado, mientras todavía le llamaban Saúl. Se narra esta historia tres veces en el Nuevo Testamento (Hechos 9:1-9; 22:5-16; 26:12-18) con variantes en el detalle y énfasis. Principalmente, ésta es una de las representaciones más poderosas de las características esenciales de la conversión cristiana.

Una forma en que se puede empezar a utilizar este cuadro, para adultos o niños, sería por medio de una lectura en voz alta, lentamente, siguiendo el drama del encuentro de Saúl con Cristo, señalando paso a paso cómo se describe la conversión en el cuadro.

Se propone la versión más completa de la historia en la tabla que sigue, tomado de Hechos 26. El texto de las Sagradas Escrituras se encuentra en la columna de lado izquierdo, y un comentario sobre el cuadro en la columna del lado derecho.

This painting by Caravaggio tells the historical story of what happened to St Paul, before he was baptized, while he was still called Saul. The story is related three times in the New Testament each time with slightly different detail and emphasis: in Acts 9:1-19; 22:5-16; 26:12-18. Most of all, this is one of the most powerful depictions of the essential characteristics of Christian conversion.

One way to begin using this painting, for adults or children, would be to have the story read slowly, out-loud, following the drama of Saul’s encounter with Christ, while pointing out step by step how the conversion is portrayed in the picture.

Two thousand years ago, St Paul, the Apostle to the Gentiles, was born in Tarsus, in present day Turkey. To mark the bi-millennium of his birth, Pope Benedict XVI instituted a Holy Year, which began on the Vigil of Saints Peter and Paul in 2008, and will end this year on their Feast Day, the twenty ninth of June. Accordingly, our Learning through Art feature in this issue is devoted to St Paul through a study of a painting of his conversion. This was, without question, the most famous conversion in the long history of the Church, and is described three times in the Acts of the Apostles (Acts 9:1-19, 22:5-16. 26:12-18).

A number of artists have interpreted this event, but probably the most striking and dramatic portrayal is that of Michelangelo Merisi da Caravaggio, made in 1601 for the Church of Santa Maria del Popolo in Caravaggio, who had become an overnight celebrity in Rome, thanks to the success of The Calling of St Matthew in 1600.

There are two betrothal stories told in this painting, one human and one divine. Like the Scriptures, this painting can be read on these two levels; it has a literal human sense and a spiritual Christo-centric sense. Joseph looks as though he may be considering already the words of the sacrament of marriage ceremony: ‘to love and to cherish from this day forth’, while the spiritual story is of the spousal betrothal between God and his people.