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Integrative Studies Lecture - March 21, 2000 (8PM Recital Hall)

I was deeply honored on receiving Dr. Hijleh’s invitation to join him in this event.  I was also intimidated.  However, as I read the draft of what he has just shared with you, I found that his insights explored thinking I have already done as an artist.

I would like to focus my response, therefore, on the concept of creativity and on the incarnational role of artists.  I will explain creativity in the character of God and as an activity that imitates Christ’s compassion.  And I will illustrate these thoughts with visual art.  As Dr. Hijleh encouraged us to take his words and apply them to ourselves substituting “chemist” or “teacher” or “cashier” in place of “composer,” I will speak from a context of the visual arts.  The person of “artist” fits into both musical and visual activities.  I am using it to open up the comparison for your own particular place in Christ’s body.

We are created made in the image of God.  We are also imitators of Christ.  This includes in our character the aspect of creativity.  I believe artists share a special understanding of God’s character in this way, just as becoming a parent can throw a sudden light on God’s relationship to us as our “Abba, Father.”  This understanding is the act of creating as an action of compassion.  Begbie’s initial point from the five statements is that, “Creation out of nothing is an act of God’s love.”  God’s ex nihilio extension of himself was a creative act with inner resources no human artist can imagine.  It is from the fullness of himself that we are given existence.  Christ’s redemption through the cross and his resurrection are expression of this same everlasting love.

I interpret the role of creativity in the first action of Adam, Genesis 2:19, who gives name to the world around him.  Artists have always sought to identify the seen.  Walter Percy defines art’s transcendent role in society as “seeing and naming what had heretofore been unspeakable.” (Lost in the Cosmos)  The writer Madeleine L’Engle also emphasizes the significance of names and a human participation with God in the work of Naming.  I will briefly present her concept through the texts of Isaiah 40:26, “Lift up your eyes on high and see:  Who created these? He who brings out their host and numbers them, calling them all by name…” and Isaiah 43:1, “Do not fear, for I have redeemed you; I have called you by name, you are mine.”

Naming affirms the essence of another person’s existence and worth.  It is intrinsically expressed in the characters and plot of L’Engle’s book A Wrinkle in Time.  Meg, the adolescent protagonist, recognizes her need to name and therefore love the antagonistic school principal.  Part of her effort comes from her love for her brother.  His life is linked to a larger picture of relationships, including that of Mr. Jenkins.  And I think this shows our responsibility in Christ’s statement, “Whatever you have done to the least of these, my brothers, you have done unto me.” (Matthew 25:40)

I will quote from the book Walking on Water, also by L’Engle, to move into artistic examples of Christian activity and compassion.  “Some of those angry etchings of Hogarth, depicting the sordidness and squalor and immorality caused by the social inequities of his day are profoundly incarnational, for they are filled with anguished pity for the thief and the prostitute and the scum of the earth, and this compassion is Christ’s” (p. 122).  I have recently been examining the work of Georges Roualt, a French artist of the 20th century, and find the same concern for suffering.  I also see the visual presence of salvation in Roualt’s work.  The dark lines that describe his figures trap them in a very physical material.  They also recall the effect of stained glass—a darkness that only accentuates the brilliant light illuminating these same figures.

The color of this paint within the dark strokes represents the spiritual within physical matter.  It is an indwelling of Spirit that God promises in his “Immanuel” or, “God with us,” and one Christ gives his Church again on Pentecost.  I found a painting of Monet’s last spring at London’s huge show that struck me with this initial realization (The Water Lily Pond, 1918).  It is in the recognizable impressionist style, but with a vibrant color palette, including reds, oranges, purples and blues.  The intensity of the landscape becomes movement in layer upon layer of paint strokes.  And in this canvas, I could see the flame of Pentecost, see the breath of God’s Spirit sustaining his Creation.

The whole history of Western art is wedded to religious imagery.  It is something I have come more and more to appreciate in my study of it.  Admittedly, the iconoclastic spasms of Protestantism and Reformation have separated us in a larger cultural sense from visual aspects of worship.  Yet, the expression of Christian faith still challenges its visual counterpart as the church moves through centuries of time and culture.

The following acknowledgement is from Gardner’s Art Through the Ages (p. 770, 10th edition):  “The Jesuits has a strong, indirect influence on art and architecture through the teachings of… their Spanish founder.”  Their influence was in the act of seeing, recreating the real through an inner eye.  The Jesuits formed around Ignatius of Loyola, a former soldier and caballero.  They were one of several new religious orders inspired by revival in the Roman Catholic Church after the Reformation.  St. Ignatius contributed a rigorous self-discipline to traditional spirituality.  His “Spiritual Exercises” describe the application of the senses as a method of mental prayer.  This encouraged the use of imagination in spiritual experience—recreating the biblical stories or engaging the Trinity, Christ, or the Virgin Mary in conversation “so much so as to be visible to the eye.  [Thus] the content of faith was visualized and the sacred objects of the Church were to be venerated as defenses against false doctrine and the power of Hell.”  (Ibid.)

The Church directly affects movements of art, and “Christian” art extends to more than subject matter and theme.  My examples are chosen to demonstrate this.  I want to continue an abstract sense of Christian expression that Dr. Hijleh discusses.  His analysis of Christ’s style of communication indicates the relevance of non-logical creativity.  To give the Spirit flesh in art, to clothe the biblical story with contemporary significance, echoes the call of incarnation.  Madeleine L’Engle speaks of this in the role of an artist serving their work.  The Incarnation required Mary’s acceptance to be a birthgiver (Walking on Water, p. 18).  The work of the artist is to constantly examine their obedience to an incarnational calling.  I would caution against that which cheapens a vision of truth and of beauty.  I think Dr. Hijleh addresses this by his mention of excellence in the arts, in fact, by the claim also of Dallas Willard, “Jesus is the best _____ who ever lived.”

Our imitation of Christ in creating visual or musical art involves koinonia love and active compassion.  Dr. Hijleh points out that this work is for the edification of the church as much as for evangelization.  Christ calls his disciples to be fishers of men, but the call “Follow me” is also repeated throughout the gospels.  “…Whoever wishes to become great among you must be your servant…just as the Son of Man came not to be served but to serve…” (Matt. 20:26-8).

The most eloquent example of service is what we imitate in sacrament, the footwashing from John chapter 13.  Footwashing takes the very dirt and dust of our world and the physical support of our human body and sanctifies.  It indicates the renewing work of God’s coming creation.  In this image, I want to re-emphasize Dr. Hijleh’s statement that encourages us as a community toward mutual submission.  Submission recalls the model of service to counteract what Hijleh addresses as the “essential rift” within the Christian musical community.  May our separate pursuits of excellence not isolate the parts of Christ’s body, but bring these aspects together to serve each other, to wash each other’s feet, and to worship.