This piece is exacting and, to use the correct term, of the Good. A few additional thoughts:
The Bible is, among other things, a way for small minds to think big thoughts and I mean that as a positive. If beauty is our last animating force for a moral society, then perhaps there needs to be, mapped out in a simple way for enfeebled minds to grasp, a Ten Commandments, so to speak, of aesthetics. People instinctively know beauty when they see or experience it, but can they delineate its value or describe its meaning? Quickly, concisely, in simple terms? If they can, your doorway to ethics might open.
And how to enable beauty to exist in a world driven by efficiency and impulsivity? Enough of us need to care to make it happen. The question is, are there enough Irish monks in this technologically enabled Dark Ages left among us?
"The solemn rhythm of liturgy impressed duty upon the heart long before the logic of theology could reach the mind. In the absence of universals, aesthetics becomes the silent teacher, shaping conduct through pattern and presence."
This reveals a problem, particularly in modern Catholic/Roman liturgy and architecture - the lack of beauty means that the faith is not being passed down, but is rather obscured.
"Aesthetics binds because it appeals directly to perception." "When truth grows faint, beauty becomes the last commandment."
Very good
"Beauty disciplines desire. It shows that life has a form higher than appetite . . . . by exposure to what is noble"
This is very well put. Our desires are arguably very out of control today because of a lack of beauty, and therefore a lack of exposure to the noble, and hope of aspiring to it. Reminds me of Goethe's quote, although I think we need it more than even he imagined - “A man should hear a little music, read a little poetry, and see a fine picture every day of his life, in order that worldly cares may not obliterate the sense of the beautiful which God has implanted in the human soul.” - Johann Wolfgang von Goethe
Donatism was the “heresy” that those who had bowed the knee to Rome and renounced their faith rather than be martyred, should not, once political winds had changed and Christianity became legal, be allowed to stand in places of authority, and that sacraments administered by them were null and void. In other words, the idea that quislings had lost the Mandate of Heaven, and therefore any legitimate claim to apostolic succession, the sole imprimatur from which the Catholic Church derives its claim of legitimacy.
Unfortunately, the Donatists were in the minority, and eventually defeated, and those who had taken the mark of the beast were allowed to shape church doctrine, from which all Christian doctrine post-Donatism is derived. These whistleblowers obviously had to be estoppeled, lest they turn too many hearts away from the traditores (origin of the word “traitors”) and back to the Truth.
Donatism is essentially 4th century sedevacantism.
This piece is exacting and, to use the correct term, of the Good. A few additional thoughts:
The Bible is, among other things, a way for small minds to think big thoughts and I mean that as a positive. If beauty is our last animating force for a moral society, then perhaps there needs to be, mapped out in a simple way for enfeebled minds to grasp, a Ten Commandments, so to speak, of aesthetics. People instinctively know beauty when they see or experience it, but can they delineate its value or describe its meaning? Quickly, concisely, in simple terms? If they can, your doorway to ethics might open.
And how to enable beauty to exist in a world driven by efficiency and impulsivity? Enough of us need to care to make it happen. The question is, are there enough Irish monks in this technologically enabled Dark Ages left among us?
will share this with people! thank you
"The solemn rhythm of liturgy impressed duty upon the heart long before the logic of theology could reach the mind. In the absence of universals, aesthetics becomes the silent teacher, shaping conduct through pattern and presence."
This reveals a problem, particularly in modern Catholic/Roman liturgy and architecture - the lack of beauty means that the faith is not being passed down, but is rather obscured.
"Aesthetics binds because it appeals directly to perception." "When truth grows faint, beauty becomes the last commandment."
Very good
"Beauty disciplines desire. It shows that life has a form higher than appetite . . . . by exposure to what is noble"
This is very well put. Our desires are arguably very out of control today because of a lack of beauty, and therefore a lack of exposure to the noble, and hope of aspiring to it. Reminds me of Goethe's quote, although I think we need it more than even he imagined - “A man should hear a little music, read a little poetry, and see a fine picture every day of his life, in order that worldly cares may not obliterate the sense of the beautiful which God has implanted in the human soul.” - Johann Wolfgang von Goethe
Donatism was the “heresy” that those who had bowed the knee to Rome and renounced their faith rather than be martyred, should not, once political winds had changed and Christianity became legal, be allowed to stand in places of authority, and that sacraments administered by them were null and void. In other words, the idea that quislings had lost the Mandate of Heaven, and therefore any legitimate claim to apostolic succession, the sole imprimatur from which the Catholic Church derives its claim of legitimacy.
Unfortunately, the Donatists were in the minority, and eventually defeated, and those who had taken the mark of the beast were allowed to shape church doctrine, from which all Christian doctrine post-Donatism is derived. These whistleblowers obviously had to be estoppeled, lest they turn too many hearts away from the traditores (origin of the word “traitors”) and back to the Truth.
Donatism is essentially 4th century sedevacantism.