QUOTATION ANTHOLOGY by Rosie Perera 051657

INDS 501: The Christian Imagination Loren Wilkinson

Regent College Winter Term 2005

The Christian Imagination class is about as interdisciplinary as they come. I thought it fitting, therefore, to begin with a quote I came across which encourages the integration of the various disciplines in our lives, including and ultimately for the benefit of our art: Each of us are multi-faceted people with a variety of interests from politics to the arts, from financial investments to recreational pleasures....In our lives, we almost have to segregate these varied interests, but in primitive societies they intermingle as one. Art, music, religion, food gathering, birth, marriage and death, are all intertwined. Each represents an essential part of life, and none can exist without support from the others. Why we have evolved into a civilization that segregates these aspects of life into essential and nonessential aspects could be a lifelong study for teams of anthropologists. But I feel that each of us who are seriously interested in making photographs [or any art] could benefit greatly by trying to integrate the many facets of our own lives. (Barnbaum, The Art of Photography, 152; italics mine) In my photography, I often go for months with no inspiration. It usually takes a trip to some exotic place to get me shooting again, but often my creative juices start running whenever I pay attention to and appreciate the beauty of Creation, thus integrating my faith in a Creator-God with my photographic art. Similarly, a common piece of advice to would-be writers is to write about what you love. I aspire to be a writer (in some ways I already am), and it is appealing to approach writing projects with that same sort of integrative intent, drawing on the myriad interests in my life. Barnbaum also writes: Creativity is a product of desire, thought, experience, and experimentation. It is also a product of inner conviction. Taken together, these imply intelligence and commitment. (141-2) This annotated anthology arises out of an assignment rather than a desire, but I hope Ive put enough thought and experimentation into it, and drawn enough upon my experience and inner convictions, that it will reveal my intelligence and commitment... In writings on theology and the arts, several themes tend to emerge, so I have grouped the remaining quotes under these headings: Creation/Creativity, Incarnation, Redemption, Sacrament/Holiness/Transcendence, Worship, and Revelation/Discovery/Proclamation/Truth-telling.
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Creation/Creativity/Image of God It is hard to talk about creative art without evoking the Creator of the universe. Our artistic endeavors are frequently spoken of as either a reflection of our being created in the image of God, or a response to his creation. The characteristic common to God and man is...the desire and the ability to make things. (22) It is the artist who, more than other [people], is able to create something out of nothing. (28) [T]he mind of the maker and the Mind of the Maker are formed on the same pattern, and all their works are made in their own image. (Sayers, The Mind of the Maker, 213)1 I agree with Sayers that the human impulse to create is derived from our being made in the image of God, but I would disagree that it is the only characteristic common to God and man. There is also, for example, our relationality. Nonetheless, observing our creativity is indeed a way that we can come to know better the Mind of the Maker. I believe that the delight which I experience in making something beautiful must approximate the satisfaction God felt in his creation when he looked upon it and said that it was good. Regarding the second of Sayers quotes above, I would say that either humans are not truly capable of creating something out of nothing (as God did), or else if we are, then it is not the exclusive domain of artists to do so. As a computer programmer, I felt like I was creating something out of thin air (out of the ideas in my mind) every time I wrote a piece of software even more so than do people who work in the graphic and plastic arts, because the building blocks of computer programs are not anything physical. They are mathematical and logical constructs, and commands akin to Let there be.... Perhaps one could argue that I was acting as an artist when I was doing that work.2

Throughout this paper, multiple page numbers in parenthesis in a given paragraph all refer to the source listed at the end of the paragraph. 2 This would be an interesting avenue to explore further. I have written about the craftsmanship of computer programming in my MCS comprehensive paper. 2

I would also disagree with Sayers that all the works of artists are made in our own image. I carved a dolphin out of wood the other day. Is that in my image? I doubt it. Are live dolphins made in the image of God? I think not. In a twist on the theme of artist as imager of God, William of Sens, in The Zeal of Thy House, is an example of the artist as rival to God: William: We are the master-craftsmen, God and I We understand one another. None, as I can, Can creep under the ribs of God, and feel His heart beat through those Six Days of Creation; Enormous days of slowly turning lights Streaking the yet unseasoned firmament; Giant days, Titan days, yet all too short To hold the joy of making. God caught his breath To see the poles of the world stand up through chaos; And when He sent it forth, the great winds blew, Carrying the clouds. And then He made the trees For winds to rustle throughoak, poplar, cedar, Hawthorn and elm, each with its separate motion And with His delicate fingers painted the flowers, Numberlessnumberless! why make so many But that He loved the work, as I love mine, And saw that it was good, as I see mine? The supple, swift mechanics of the serpent, The beautiful, furred beasts, and curious fish With golden eyes and quaintly-laced thin bones, And whales like mountains loud with spurting springs, Dragons and monsters in strange shapes, to make His angels laugh with Him; when He saw those God sang for joy, and formed the birds to sing. And lastly, since all Heaven was not enough To share that triumph, He made His masterpiece, Man, that like God can call beauty from dust, Order from chaos, and create new worlds To praise their maker. Oh, but in making man God over-reached Himself and gave away His Godhead. He must now depend on man For what mans brain, creative and divine Can give Him. Man stands equal with Him now, Partner and rival. Say God needs a church, As here in Canterburyand say He calls together By miracle stone, wood and metal, builds A church of sorts; my church He cannot make
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Another, but not that. This church is mine And none but I, not even God, can build it. Me hath he made vice-gerent of Himself, And were I lost, something unique were lost Irreparably; my heart, my blood, my brain Are in the stone; Gods crown of matchless works Is not complete without my stone, my jewel, Creations nonpareil. (Sayers, The Zeal of Thy House, 69-70) Even though I disagree with the underlying premise, this speech is such amazing writing that I couldnt help including it. I think there are parts of it which do resonate as true those parts which speak of Gods feelings, and ours, upon the completion of a creative activity. Trevor Hart sums up well the premise underlying Sayerss assessment of Williams audacious boast. It comes from an ancient (and unhelpful, in Harts opinion) view of the Promethean nature of art: [S]ince only the gods can truly create at all, acts of human poeisis result at best in a series of clever fakes or imitations of the genuine article....The aspiration to participate in some sense in a creativity akin to Gods original creative act is, in other words, inherently rebellious. (Trevor Hart, Through the Arts: Hearing, Seeing and Touching the Truth, Chapter 1 in Begbie, Beholding the Glory, 6) Im with Hart here over against Sayers. He later refutes the ancient Greek ideas, and calls art a participation in Gods creativity. (16) More from him below. I include this next quote from The Zeal of Thy House, not because I like it, but simply because it is important in the corpus of Christian reflection on the arts, and it sums up so well Sayerss main idea expounded later in The Mind of the Maker that of the trinity of artistic creativity. Also it serves as a foil for my later reflections on Harts ideas. For every work of creation is threefold, an earthly trinity to match the heavenly. First: there is the Creative Idea; passionless, timeless, beholding the whole work complete at once, the end in the beginning; and this is the image of the Father. Second: there is the Creative Energy, begotten of that Idea, working in time from the beginning to the end, with sweat and passion, being incarnate in the bonds of matter; and this is the image of the Word.
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Third: there is the Creative Power, the meaning of the work and its response in the lively soul; and this is the image of the indwelling Spirit. And these three are one, each equally in itself the whole work, whereof none can exist without other; and this is the image of the Trinity. (Sayers, The Zeal of Thy House, 110-11) I find Sayerss terminology (Idea, Energy, Power) unhelpful in thinking about art, and her whole analogy somewhat tenuous. The aspect of it which most enriches my understanding is the notion of art as incarnational, which is the subject of the next section of this paper. I did like her discussion of scalene trinities, in which art either has too much idea and not enough fleshing out, or is overwhelmed by technical ingenuity with no idea behind it, or is too emotional with no coherent idea or incarnational discipline. But I think it goes beyond reasonable extrapolation from Trinitarian theology to see Father, Son, and Holy Spirit in those overemphases. In contrast, for Hart, art is an obligation, a response to, and a sharing in Gods creativity: The creative authority of the Word who becomes flesh...creates space for, facilitates, and deliberately seeks the responsible exercise of such freedom in every sphere of human life. Responsible creativity of an artistic sort is thus not only warranted, but may be viewed as an unconditional obligation laid upon us and called forth by Gods gracious speaking to humankind in the life, death and resurrection of his Son. Indeed we may go further, and suggest that it is not only a proper response to, but also an active sharing in...Gods own creative activity within the cosmos. (Hart, Through the Arts, 18) To my mind, his is a much more graspable and exciting way of thinking about art than Sayerss. This view fires me up and energizes my actual creation of art, whereas Sayerss concepts, to use her own critique, are heady (father-ridden) and virtuosic (son-ridden), but weak in the spirit/ghost department. Incarnation Picking up on the one person of Sayerss trinity of creativity which I find most useful, here is the first of two writers talking about how the arts model the Incarnation: It may be that language itself, and the very possibility of communication through words, bears witness to the primal act of communication in the incarnation of the eternal Word: every effort to incarnate our own thoughts in the web of language is
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underwritten by Gods expression of his Word in Christ. In that sense all literary art, even self-consciously atheist literary art, is in some way, consciously or unconsciously, modeling and bearing witness to the mystery of incarnation. (Malcolm Guite, Through Literature: Christ and the Redemption of Language, Chapter 2 in Begbie, Beholding the Glory, 32) The parallel Guite draws between the spoken or written word of humans and the creative word of God is interesting, but I actually find the literary arts to be the least incarnational of all the arts, because there is little physicality involved (all the more so now that most writers no longer even push pen across page to create their oeuvres, but use a computer). In reverse of Hegels valuation of arts from the baser architecture and sculpture up through the increasingly higher forms of painting and music and poetry, I see the progression going from less incarnational (literature) to more incarnational (painting and sculpture). Not that incarnationality is a measure of how great an art form is, by any means. Poetry can often be more sublime than sculpture. But when it comes to human creativity modeling the incarnational expression of God, I think the more material the art form, the stronger the connection with the prototype. However, it is not insignificant that Gods verbal utterance (his Word) is given to us as a metaphor for his creative activity. This hallows the less physical forms of human art. Thus I believe all the arts, from literature to sculpture and architecture, find their parallels in the different stages of the Incarnation. Lynn Aldrich writes: Sculptors learn to respect the inherent attributes and conditions of what they have to work with, seeing these not so much as limitations but as the perimeters of a space wherein the best work can be made. It is revelatory to note here that the incarnation did not do violence to the structures and goodness of physical matter. Matter is respected; Jesus is still utterly human. The Son of God assumes our humanity but does not violate it or obliterate it. (Aldrich, Through Sculpture: Whats the Matter with Matter?, Chapter 6 in Begbie, Beholding the Glory, 105) This is a good observation, but what Aldrich writes could apply equally to the other art forms. All artists must respect the limitations of their materials. This is easier to see with the more physical arts of painting and sculpture, but it is true across the board. Musicians deal with the limited ranges of the
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various instruments (including the human voice) and they have to ensure the playability of the most technically challenging passages in their compositions. A composer can certainly write a piece that could never be played, but it would remain unincarnate. Photographers contend with the properties of light and the chemistry of film. Even in the digital age, the new generation of photographers must struggle against bugs in software, the memory limitations of their computers, and the color combination characteristics of the ink used for printing. The playwright has to take into account the limitations of space on a stage, and the capabilities of human actors. And even poets, though they can take great liberties with language, are restricted to a certain extent by the common understandings of words in the minds of their potential readers. This limitation aspect of participating in creative endeavors is one of the windows that art provides into the mind of the Maker. Redemption It is not what immediately jumps to mind when one thinks about art, but several writers offer the suggestion that art has redemptive qualities. The concern of literature to use language well, to cleanse and purify it, to redeem its words from the captivity and abuse to which the powers of this world continuously subject them, is bound up with the redemptive purposes of God who chose that his Word should be born as one who had to learn to use words. (Guite, Through Literature, in Begbie, Beholding the Glory, 34) Language is desecrated in so many ways in our world, from pornography to verbal abuse to deceptive advertising. I find the idea of writing well, as a way to redeem all that corruption, appealing. Anne Lamott talks of writing as being capable of freeing someone from bondage: Toni Morrison said, The function of freedom is to free someone else, and if you are no longer wracked or in bondage to a person or a way of life, tell your story. Risk freeing someone else. (Lamott, Bird by Bird, 193) I think Lamott herself has exemplified this in her other writing. I also think of Frederick Buechners Telling Secrets and the other books in his trilogy of memoirs. I know that I have a lot to offer in this

area, but Im not sure Im brave enough yet to write from my own life for wide distribution, but its something I aspire towards, and writers like Lamott and Buechner are good mentors for me. Nicholas Wolterstorff talks about the possibilities art has for bringing shalom: I suggest that we think of art as fundamentally a mode of stewardship, capable of contributing to our shalom; and that in working out this perspective, we take as our fundamental emphasis the social practices of art. More specifically, I suggest that we think of art as involving the interplay among three sorts of such practices: the social practice of composing works of art, the social practice of performing (or displaying) works of art, and the social practice of using (appropriating) works of art. (468) Art is ultimately for human flourishing for that mode of human flourishing which the biblical writers called shalom. Shalom requires justice... harmony and delight in our relation to God, to society, and to nature. But it also requires art....In its contribution to shalom lies the justification of art. In that contribution lies its unmistakable glory. (Wolterstorff, Evangelicalism and the Arts, 473) The sounds of the words lead me to make the connection between Wolterstorffs social practices of art and Albert Borgmanns notion of focal practices,3 and I think the connection is not accidental. It seems to me that participating in the creation of art is a focal practice, an activity which can center and illuminate our lives...a regular and skillful engagement of body and mind.4 But I dont mean to sidestep Wolterstorffs emphasis on the social nature of art. One of the artistic endeavors that brings me the most joy and sense of shalom is creating music together with others in a brass ensemble. The social nature of art can be redemptive in our individualistic age. Sacrament/Holiness/Transcendence Several writers talk about the arts as a sacrament, bringing us in touch with the holy, helping us to experience God, even (for some authors) enabling us to achieve more transcendence than we do by going to church. Writing...is a sacrament insofar as it provides graced occasions of encounter between humanity and God. (Hansen, Writing as Sacrament, 53)

3 4

I have written at length about these in my MCS comprehensive paper. Albert Borgmann, Technology and the Character of Contemporary Life (Chicago: University of Chicago, 1984), 4. 8

I think that with this broader definition of sacrament than the Church has traditionally given (whether it be of the two-fold or seven-fold variety), just about any human experience could be considered a sacrament: walking through Nature, giving birth, eating a meal, conversing with friends, even sleeping. But I think it helps us take our art seriously if we think of it as fostering communion with God. [M]ovies, like other art forms, help us not only to know about God, but to actually experience God as well. (17) Movies have, at times, a sacramental capacity to provide the viewer an experience of transcendence. (57) Garrison Keillor once remarked: If you cant go to church and, for at least a moment, be given transcendence; if you cant go to church and pass briefly from this life into the next; then I cant see why anyone should go. Just a brief moment of transcendence causes you to come out of church a changed person. Commenting on this observation, Ken Gire writes, I have experienced what Garrison Keillor described more in movie theaters than I have in churches. Why? I cant say for sure....movies dont always tell the truth, dont always enlighten, dont always inspire. What they do on a fairly consistent basis is give you an experience of transcendence. They let you lose yourself in somebody elses story. (100) [M]ovies are a window through which God speaks. (161) [T]he artist is a potential sacrament maker, one who can reveal the presence of God within creation itself. Here is the theological basis for our experience of the holy in film. (Johnston, Reel Spirituality, 161) I first heard of this idea of movie theaters as places of transcendence in John Updikes In the Beauty of the Lilies. I know I have experienced that sense of losing touch with my quotidian life when Im engaged in a film; and then walking out of the theater a changed person, dazed, forgetting momentarily where I am. I have even had the sense of being momentarily transported out of my body as I walk along rapt in the dream-world of the movie, unaware of the normal physical sensations of walking in a parking lot (sounds, the air temperature, the impact of my feet on the pavement). But Im not sure Id call this experience an encounter with God. True, there are times when God speaks to me through the powerful impact of a film. But often that post-cinematic lightheadedness simply comes from a letting go of reality which can occur at the hands of a well-crafted story. Eugene Peterson speaks of the artist as mediator of holiness through beauty:
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[L]ife, which is characterized by...holiness...is mediated to us in beauty. Beauty is our sensory access to holiness....And that is how we come to identify as apostles of the Gospel the men and women who use words and images and sounds and textures to wake us up to the beauty latent and implicit all around us. I want to reaffirm our vocation as witnesses to the beauty of holiness inherent in all reality. These men and women are here to call attention to the words and images, sounds and textures that pull us into detailed and adorational and believing participation in Gods life-giving revelation. (Peterson, The Beauty of Holiness, 23) I could just as well have put this quote in the section on the vocation of the artist. Like Harts description of art as an obligation, a response to, and a sharing in Gods creativity, this idea of the artist as mediating holiness to the world through beauty is a strong motivation for me to engage in artistic creation. Interestingly, Jean-Luc Marion makes nearly the opposite point: Ugliness may not be the best frame for holiness, but beauty can screen us from it (Marion, The Blind Man of Siloe, 68). Without the context, one is taken aback by that. He is arguing that a famous master painter can sometimes draw attention away from the subject, and that is why icons are painted in a plain style that doesnt attract but draws the viewers gaze past the image to the prototype. In spite of the apparent contradiction with Peterson, Marion does recognize art as being in the service of the transcendant. So his statement is somewhat misleading. I believe there is beauty in the simplicity of icons, albeit a different kind of beauty than in a Raphael painting. Gregory Wolfe provides a new angle on the idea of art for transcendences sake: In a politicized age, few people look to art for its ability to create contemplative space in the midst of our restless lives....Art, like religious faith in general and prayer in particular, has the power to help us transcend the fragmented society we inhabit.... [G]reat art sneaks past our shallow prejudices and brittle opinions to remind us of the complexity and mystery of human existence. The imagination calls us to leave our personalities behind and to temporarily inhabit anothers experience, thus allowing us to look at the world with new eyes. Art invites us to meet the Otherwhether that be our neighbor or the infinite otherness of Godand to achieve a new wholeness of spirit. (Wolfe, Art, Faith, and the Stewardship of Culture, 100) I especially like his mention of arts ability to create contemplative space in the midst of our restless lives. It is something I thirst for, and I see it as one of the greatest needs of our technological
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society. I think that both the creation and the experiencing of art (whether through performance or audience or observation), can be an avenue for contemplation. One must necessarily slow down in order to engage in creative work. The bodily and mental movements involved in the practice of most arts can be a form of prayer, or can facilitate contemplation. I have an iconographer friend who tells me that the entire process of painting (writing) an icon is, and must be, bathed in prayer. She has encouraged me to do that with my wood-carving. And then, who hasnt experienced or heard of someone else experiencing the apparent stopping of time while entranced in front of a breath-taking work of art? I think of Henri Nouwens hours in front of Rembrandts The Return of the Prodigal Son, which was the inspiration for Nouwens own book by that title. And I recall the story of my pastors son, when he was just a little boy (pre-verbal), upon seeing the Taj Mahal in the distance as their family first approached it by foot. He stopped in his tracks and looked up at it and let out a little gasp of awe. Even a young child has that human ability to recognize and experience the transcendent through great art. It doesnt really fit in entirely with the theme of this (or any other) section, but I was so struck by this quote from Flannery OConnor that I wanted to include it somewhere: [T]he gravest concern...for me...is always the conflict between an attraction for the Holy and the disbelief in it that we breathe in with the air of the times. Its hard to believe always but more so in the world we live in now. There are some of us who have to pay for our faith every step of the way and who have to work out dramatically what it would be like without it and if being without it would be ultimately possible or not. (OConnor, The Habit of Being, 349-350) Perhaps it takes the vision of the artist/writer to make such an observation, or maybe such an experience of inner conflict is a prerequisite for being a good artist. I know a lot of Christians who would say they never experience any tension between attraction for the Holy and disbelief in it (doubt for them is out of the question). I dont know any of them who are artists, though. Thomas Kincaid

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might have his following, but Im not so sure that is good art. If the attraction-disbelief dialectic is the soil from which artists spring, then I am surely being well fertilized as an artist! Worship/Wonder/Attentiveness In many ways, art is a form of worship. Worship is a response formulated in attentiveness to Gods creation, something which artists of all stripes are especially good at. Poets are driven...by the desire to really see what is before them, to attend to particulars in all their uniqueness and diversity. (Andrew Rumsey, Through Poetry: Particularity and the Call to Attention, Chapter 3 in Begbie, Beholding the Glory, 51) Surely, to be a good poet, one must be attentive to details in the surrounding world. Luci Shaw in her poetry workshops emphasizes the importance of writing about particular, concrete things, things we know well. Rumseys quote could apply to the photographer as well, and probably also to the (nonabstract) painter. I know that when I take camera in hand to do a specific shooting project, my powers of perception are heightened. I might see things I wouldnt have noticed before, if I am on a hunt for, say, subjects that can be shot with only a 210mm lens. I am also reminded of the movie Smoke, where through his photographs, Auggie shows details that are otherwise overlooked. The poets first response to the world is stillness and wonder, passive reflection before active exposition. Poetry takes in before it gives out, and considers itself addressed by creation, called to attention. Response to the incarnate Christ frequently starts the other way around our questions, our interrogative analysis....Far more than we need to address God we need him to address us, which is precisely what he does in Jesus....Before it is anything our idea, our principle, our doctrine the incarnation is Gods initiative, his word addressing us, to which our first response must be what the late Denise Levertov beautifully describes as Primary Wonder:

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Days pass when I forget the mystery. Problems insoluble and problems offering their own ignored solutions jostle for my attention, they crowd its antechamber along with a host of diversions, my courtiers, wearing their colored clothes; caps and bells. And then once more the quiet mystery is present to me, the throngs clamor recedes: the mystery that there is anything, anything at all, let alone the cosmos, joy, memory, everything, rather than void: and that, O Lord, Creator, Hallowed One, You still, hour by hour sustain it. Poetry and incarnation both begin with annunciation. Not for us to say how it will be, what form and time God will take for his creative work. Only for us to receive and say, Let it be to me according to your will. (Rumsey, Through Poetry, 52-53) I believe we as humans are made for worshipping God. Wonder is a natural response to the quiet mystery in his creation. The psalms are filled with this kind of response. I have had experiences when I have wanted to break into song at the awesome beauty of a glowing sky or a sweeping view from a mountain. Nearly all worship takes place through poetry, music, and visual art. In fact, its hard to imagine any sort of worship that does not. Music is probably the most universal (almost anyone can sing, even if badly) and also the most immediate, because it is possible to erupt into song, maybe even a spontaneously invented song, at the moment of experiencing the emotions that congeal in worship. No pen or paper or paints need be present. But if they are, all the better for the writer or poet who is accustomed to turning every experience into material to write about: Flannery OConnor said that anyone who survived childhood has enough material to write for the rest of his or her life. (4) So much of writing is about sitting down and doing it every day, and so much of it is about getting into the custom of taking in everything that comes along, seeing it all as grist for the mill. (Lamott, Bird by Bird, 151)
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As I mentioned earlier, Im sure I have enough material already to write about for the rest of my life. The problem is developing the discipline of writing every day. Lamotts advice has inspired me. Henry James once said that a writer is a person on whom nothing is ever lost. That sounds like a focused Christian identity to me: the men and women on whom nothing, at least nothing that has to do with lifeand virtually everything doesis ever lost. O worship the Lord in the beauty of holiness. (Peterson, The Beauty of Holiness, 26) We need poets and writers more than ever today, when most of us go about our lives in such a hurry that we dont notice anything. In Thornton Wilders play Our Town, Emily laments this sorry state: I didnt realize. So all that was going on and we never noticed....Do any human beings ever realize life while they live it?every, every minute? The stage manager replies, No. And then after a pause, he adds, The saints and poets, maybethey do some.5 Saint Thomas Aquinas says that art does not require rectitude of the appetite, that it is wholly concerned with the good of that which is made. He says that a work of art is good in itself, and this is a truth that the modern world has largely forgotten. We are not content to stay within our limitations and make something that is simply a good in and of itself. Now we want to make something that will have some utilitarian value. Yet what is good in itself glorifies God because it reflects God. The artists has his hands full and does his duty if he attends to his art. He can safely leave evangelizing to the evangelist. (Hansen, Writing as Sacrament, 57) A counterpoint to Wolterstorffs view that art should bring about shalom and justice, Aquinass idea exalts art for arts sake. He says that in spite of having no utilitarian value, art, by the very fact of its being good in itself (as God called his creation good), gives glory to God. I think there is room for both views. Some art is indeed utilitarian (a carved wooden bowl, for example), but it is still good and beautiful in spite of (or in addition to) its function. And art that seems to exist only for its own sake can have a variety of functions, such as bringing a little joy into a depressed persons life. One last depiction of artistic creation as an act of worship (or in this case prayer) is in The Zeal of Thy House, when Raphael says: Behold, he prayeth; not with the lips alone, But with the hand and with the cunning brain
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Thornton Wilder, Our Town (New York: HarperCollins, 1957), 100. 14

Men worship the Eternal Architect. So, when the mouth is dumb, the work shall speak And save the workman. True as masons rule And line can make them, the shafted columns rise Singing like music; and by day and night The unsleeping arches with perpetual voice Proclaim in Heaven, to labour is to pray. (Sayers, The Zeal of Thy House, 34) I am grateful for Eugene Peterson who first expanded my definition of prayer to include more than simply expressing words of adoration, confession, thanksgiving, and supplication to God. For example, a walk in the woods, enjoying the fresh air and the birds can be prayer. The monastics, with their dictum ora et labora, understood work, too, as part of the life of prayer. The work of an artist can be just as profoundly an act of prayer as the manual labor in the fields of a monastery. I think especially of Father Dunstan Masseys fresco painting and sculpture at Westminster Abbey, which for him Im sure are acts of prayer and worship. Again, I recall my iconographer friends advice to pray while doing my wood-carving, which I think implies praying in and through doing my woodcarving. Revelation/Discovery/Proclamation/Truth-telling Many writers talk about arts capacity to reveal or proclaim truth, both to the artist through the process of creating the art, and to the audience (viewer/listener) or participant (actor/singer). Jeremy Begbies concept of theology through the arts is all about this. We learn about God through doing art. Others in Begbies circle affirm this position: Clearly...the meaning or significance of art cannot be confined to the level of simple physical manifestation and perception. Art draws us deeper and further, takes us beyond the surface in some sense to see or experience something which otherwise remains hidden from us. (Hart, Through the Arts, Chapter 1 in Begbie, Beholding the Glory, 9)

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Like most writers, I dont know what I know until I start to write about it. The very process of writing becomes the process of revelation. I write not because I see but in order to see. I dont have a vision of the world which must with missionary fervour be passed on. (Nigel Forde, The Playwrights Tale, Chapter 7 in Begbie, Sounding the Depths, 64; italics his) I have definitely experienced something similar while writing in my journal. I just start writing, and what comes from my pen turns out to reveal something I might have known all along but was unaware of. It feels like revelation from God when that happens. Likewise, in my newly learned craft of wood-carving, I have experienced in a small way something like what Andy Goldsworthy experiences when he gets to know the natural world by doing his ephemeral art in the outdoors. Ive learned from my teacher, John Patterson, to let the wood tell me what direction to carve in. When youre cutting diagonally across the grain, you can only go in one direction, or else the knife will get stuck and redirected between the grain lines. You can tell by looking, but if you forget, and try to cut the wrong way, the wood will let you know! I had the most extraordinary experience in the dance session of the Christian Imagination class. I became aware of my body in a new way, and found myself paying attention to it as I moved about the next day and beyond. I wrote in my journal, this morning as I walk on the treadmill I find myself wanting to be present to my body instead of being absent from it engrossed in a book, even if that book might be the chapter on dance in Beholding the Glory. I did not read that time, as I usually do when Im on the treadmill,6 but rather delighted in my physicality, and that time of exercise became a time of dance and worship. That experience of being intentionally present to my body has recurred frequently since. Therefore, when I did get around to reading the chapter on dance, it really resonated with me. Sara Savage writes about how dance contributes to selfknowledge and knowledge of others and ultimately of Christ: In the West there has been a tendency to exalt and isolate the intellect while demoting and marginalizing other aspects of our humanity....One major casualty has been our
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This goes to show that Im probably usually not going fast enough to get a very good aerobic workout! 16

understanding of our emotional life. Our emotions, and our physical bodies which register those emotions, have often been regarded as messy hindrances to the pursuit of truth. This kind of intellectualism has had a marked influence on the Christian Church, and, not least, its approach to the person of Christ. At times it has encouraged an attitude to Christ which gives excessive weight to what can be expressed in propositions, apprehended by the mind. This has limited the resources with which we hold together the divine and human natures of Christ. Two extremes typically result: Christ is all/only divine or Christ is all/only human....Movement is a language that connects us to our bodies, and to our emotions which resonate within our physical bodies. Our bodies and emotions necessarily contribute to our self-knowledge and knowledge of others....I am suggesting that movement and its concentrated, stylized form, dance can enrich our knowledge of the person of Christ....[D]ance has the potential to subvert some of the cultural (mis)understandings that have handicapped our understanding of our own humanity and rendered our approach to the incarnation over-intellectualised and barren. (Sara B. Savage, Through Dance: Fully Human, Fully Alive, Chapter 4 in Begbie, Beholding the Glory, 65-67) Another aspect of art which Im lumping into this section is that of proclamation or truthtelling to others (which goes beyond the artists own discovery while creating or performing the art). [G]ood writing is about telling the truth. We are a species that needs and wants to understand who we are. (3) Risk being unliked. Tell the truth as you understand it. If youre a writer, you have a moral obligation to do this. And it is a revolutionary act truth is always subversive. (Lamott, Bird by Bird, 226) This reminds me of Emily Dickinsons line, Tell all the Truth but tell it slant. Sometimes truth told plainly is not heard, but when told slant (e.g., through art), it can penetrate even the most obstinate soul. Jesus parables are a prime (and very artistic!) example of this. Summary In all my reading for this course, the quote that best sums up the philosophy of art that I have developed over this semester is Trevor Harts, when he says that artistic creativity is not only a proper response to, but also an active sharing in...Gods own creative activity within the cosmos. (Hart, Through the Arts, 18) We respond to Gods creativity in delight and worship. We share that creative impulse, being made in the image of the Creator. And our vocation is to participate in the world as sub-creators (so Tolkien, in On Fairy-Stories), engaged incarnationally in the arts. The fruits of this will include discovering and telling the truth (revelation), mediating holiness through
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beauty (sacrament), and bringing shalom to the earth and the human community (redemption). Glory to God in the highest!

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BIBLIOGRAPHY
Ive included the page count of everything Ive read for this course, even if I didnt find quotes in it suitable for this anthology. In some cases I read only a portion of the work referenced. Total read: approximately 1500 pp. Barnbaum, Bruce. The Art of Photography: An Approach to Personal Expression. Dubuque, Iowa: Kendall/Hunt Publishing, 1994. [77 pp] Bascom, Tim. A Beautiful Affliction: The Art of Erica Grimm-Vance. Image 31 (Summer 2000): 26-35. [10 pp] Begbie, Jeremy, ed. Beholding the Glory: Incarnation Through the Arts. London: Darton, Longman & Todd, 2000. [117 pp] Begbie, Jeremy, ed. Sounding the Depths: Theology Through the Arts. London: SCM Press, 2002. [57 pp] Cairns, Scott. Shaping Whats Given: Sacred Tradition and the Individual Talent. Image 25 (Winter 1999-2000): 73-82. [10 pp] Capon, Robert Farrar. The Oblation of Things in An Offering of Uncles in The Romance of the Word: One Mans Love Affair with Theology. Grand Rapids, MI: Eerdmans, 1995. [11 pp] Dillard, Annie. Notes for Young Writers. Image 16 (Summer 1997): 65-68. [4 pp] Hansen, Ron. Writing as Sacrament. Image 5 (Spring 1994): 53-58. [6 pp] Johnston, Robert K. Reel Spirituality: Theology and Film in Dialogue. Grand Rapids, MI: Baker, 2000. [195 pp] Lamott, Anne. Bird by Bird: Some Instructions on Writing and Life. New York: Random House / Anchor Books, 1994. [237 pp] Marion, Jean-Luc. The Blind Man of Siloe. Image 29 (Winter 2000-2001): 59-69. [11 pp] OConnor, Flannery. The Habit of Being. New York: Farrar, Straus and Giroux, 1979. [dabbled, approximately 120 pp] Peterson, Eugene. The Beauty of Holiness. Image 29 (Winter 2000-2001): 21-26. [6 pp] Reed, Ron. Is the Theatre Really Dead? Image 42 (Spring/Summer 2004): 41-45. [5 pp] Sayers, Dorothy. The Mind of the Maker. New York: HarperCollins, 1987. [229 pp] Sayers, Dorothy. The Zeal of Thy House. London: Victor Gollancz, 1937. [111 pp] Steiner, George. Real Presences. Chicago: University of Chicago Press, 1989. [144 pp]
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Wilkinson, Loren. Art as Creation or Art as Work? Crux XIX, No. 1 (March 1983): 23-28. Republished in With Heart, Mind & Strength: The Best of Crux 1979-1989, pp. 289-299. Edited by Donald M. Lewis. Langley, BC: Credo Publishing, 1990. [11 pp] Wolfe, Gregory. Art, Faith, and the Stewardship of Culture. Image 24 (Winter 1999-2000): 96104. [9 pp] Wolterstorff, Nicholas. Art in Action. Grand Rapids, MI: Eerdmans, 1980. [63 pp] Wolterstorff, Nicholas. Evangelicalism and the Arts. Christian Scholars Review 27.4 (June 1988): 449-73. [25 pp]

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