Wilbur Blog

Music and Harmonia

2009-12-21T12:22:00.001-06:00

“For all that we might smile benignly at in the mathematical clumsiness and rhetorical hyperbole of the classical philosopher of music or in the intellectual abstractions and tetchy fussiness of the medieval theorist, is there not something in the notion of being ‘cradles’ in God’s created harmonia that is worth recovering?”

Jeremy Begbie, Resounding Truth: Christian Wisdom in the World of Music

Thanks and Liturgy

2009-12-16T10:33:00.000-06:00

“Religious service is essentially a work of praise, of giving glory to God. Though it is communal work, and in a sense it helps to create community, it is derived from the primordial action of the individual human being, and action more basic to us—when we are authentically ourselves—than even eating or drinking or sleeping; namely, giving thanks. For prior to everything else we do, and whether or not we think of ourselves as ‘religious,’ we exist, and liturgy begins by acknowledging that fact with gratitude.”
Stratford Caldecott, Beauty for Truth's Sake

100 Spiritually Significant Films

2009-11-12T06:40:00.002-06:00

While one could argue about some of the particulars, this list of Spiritually Significant Films offers a guide for viewing and discussing a wide array of movies.

Reverence in Worship

2009-11-09T07:46:00.001-06:00

Ecclesiastes 5:1-2
Guard your steps when you go to the house of God. To draw near to listen is better than to offer the sacrifice of fools, for they do not know that they are doing evil. Be not rash with your mouth, nor let your heart be hasty to utter a word before God, for God is in heaven and you are on earth. Therefore let your words be few.

Facts and Truth

2009-11-07T10:29:00.001-06:00

Because we come from a common origin, there’s a desire for that which is true. Myth is more powerful as a weapon for cultural renewal than math and science. When you want facts, look in an encyclopedia. When you want truth, look in songs, art, literature, and sculpture. In our rationalistic way, we think facts are truth, but facts and truth are not the same. Our desire to make them the same is why we sometimes never move on from knowledge into wisdom.

The Story of Our Lives

2009-11-04T07:11:00.001-06:00

“God has a plan—that is, a story—for each of His children. Strictly speaking, we do not shape the facts of our lives into stories; we try to discern the pattern of the story that God is telling with our lives.”
—Peter Leithart

Power of Faerie

2009-11-03T06:24:00.000-06:00

"Those who say that children must not be frightened may mean …that we must try to keep out of his mind the knowledge that he is born into a world of death, violence, wounds, adventure, heroism and cowardice, good and evil. [This] would indeed be to give children a false impression and feed them on escapism in the bad sense… Since it is so likely that they will meet cruel enemies, let them at least have heard of brave knights and heroic courage. Otherwise you are making their destiny not brighter but darker…As far as that goes, I side impenitently with the human race against the modern reformer. Let there be wicked kings and beheadings, battles and dungeons, giants and dragons, and let villains be soundly killed at the end of the book. Nothing will persuade me that this causes an ordinary child any kind or degree of fear beyond what it wants, and needs, to feel. For, of course, it wants to be a little frightened.
"…I think it possible that by confining your child to blameless stories of child life in which nothing at all alarming ever happens, you would fail to banish the terrors, and would succeed in banishing all that can ennoble them or make them endurable. For in the fairy tales, side by side with the terrible figures, we find the immemorial comforters and protectors, the radiant ones; and the terrible figures are not merely terrible, but sublime. It would be nice if no little boy in bed, hearing, or thinking he hears, a sound, were ever at all frightened. But if he is going to be frightened, I think it better that he should think of giants and dragons than merely of burglars. And I think St George, or any bright champion in armor, is a better comfort than the idea of the police."
—C.S. Lewis, On Three Ways of Writing for Children

Beauty

2009-11-02T07:39:00.001-06:00

“We no longer dare to believe in beauty and we make of it a mere appearance in order the more easily to dispose of it. Our situation today shows that beauty demands for itself at least as much courage and decision as do truth and goodness, and she will not allow herself to be separated and banned from her two sisters without taking them along with herself in an act of mysterious vengeance.”
When beauty is lost, “the whole of worldly being falls under the dominion of ‘knowledge.’ And the springs and forces of love immanent in the world are overpowered and finally suffocated by science, technology and cybernetics. The result is a world without women, without children, without reverence for love…a world in which power and the profit-margin are the sole criteria, where the disinterested, the useless, the purposeless is despised, persecuted and in the end exterminated—a world in which art itself is forced to wear the mask and features of technique.”
—Hans Urs van Balthasar

Legends and Truth

2009-11-02T07:12:00.001-06:00

“All too often the legends old men tell are closer to the truth than the facts young professors tell. The wildest fairy tales of the ancients are far more realistic than the scientific phantasms imagined by moderns.” —Hilaire Belloc

The Glory of the Psalms

2009-08-10T11:26:00.000-05:00

Of how many heroic characters have these old temple songs been the inspiration! Jewish saints and patriots chanted them in the synagogue and on the battlefield; apostles and evangelists sung them among perils of the wilderness, as they traversed the rugged paths of Syria and Galatia, and Macedonia; martyrs in Rome softly hummed them when the lions near at hand were crouching for their prey; in German forests, in Highland Glen, Lutherans and Covenanters breathed their lives out through their cadences; in every land penitent souls have found in them words to tell the story of their sorrow, and victorious souls the voices of their triumph; mothers watching their babes by night have cheered the vigil by singing them, mourners walking in lonely ways have been lighted by the great hopes that shine through them; and pilgrims going down into the valley of the shadow of death have found in their firm assurances a strong staff to lean upon.
—H.T. Hanna

Quote on Prayer and the Psalms

2009-08-07T08:16:00.001-05:00

“If we want to read and to pray the prayers of the Bible and especially the Psalms, therefore, we must not ask first what they have to do with us, but what they have to do with Jesus Christ. We must ask how we can understand the Psalms and God’s Word, and then we shall be able to pray them. It does not depend, therefore, on whether the Psalms express adequately that which we feel at a given moment in our heart. If we are to pray aright, perhaps it is quite necessary that we pray contrary to our own heart. Not what we want to pray is important, but what God wants us to pray. If we were dependent entirely on ourselves, we would probably pray only the fourth petition of the Lord’s Prayer. But God wants it otherwise. The richness of the Word of God ought to determine our prayer, not the poverty of our heart.” —Dietrich Bonhoeffer (1906-1945)

The Bible as Art?

2009-07-29T07:43:00.003-05:00

This story, concept, execution, comments, mentality, etc is so wrong in so many ways. However, it does serve to reveal a great loss in our culture for respect for the Word of God as well as appropriate Biblical categories of thinking, worldview, and belief--not to mention loving the lost.

Distilled Sunshine

2009-07-23T06:41:00.000-05:00

It was nearly dark, for the full November twilight had fallen around Green Gables, and the only light in the kitchen came from the dancing red flames in the stove.

Anne was curled up Turk-fashion on the hearthrug, gazing into that joyous glow where the sunshine of a hundred summers was being distilled from the maple cordwood.

--L.M. Montgomery, Anne of Green Gables

Mr. Badger's House

2009-07-23T06:38:00.001-05:00

The floor was well-worn red brick, and on the wide hearth burnt a fire of logs, between two attractive chimney-corners tucked away in the wall, well out of any suspicion of draught. A couple of high-backed settles, facing each other on either side of the fire, gave further sitting accommodations for the sociably disposed. In the middle of the room stood a long table of plain boards placed on trestles, with benches down each side. At one end of it, where an arm-chair stood pushed back, were spread the remains of the Badger's plain but ample supper. Rows of spotless plates winked from the shelves of the dresser at the far end of the room, and from the rafters overhead hung hams, bundles of dried herbs, nets of onions, and baskets of eggs. It seemed a place where heroes could fitly feast after victory, where weary harvesters could line up in scores along the table and keep their Harvest Home with mirth and song, or where two or three friends of simple tastes could sit about as they pleased and eat and smoke and talk in comfort and contentment.
--Kenneth Grahame, The Wind in the Willows

Humor

2009-06-09T07:09:00.003-05:00

"But she had, as I have told you, the glimmerings of a sense of humor—which is simply another name for a sense of the fitness of things."

—L.M. Montgomery, Anne of Green Gables

Haydn Anniversary

2009-05-31T06:50:00.002-05:00

Today marks the 200 anniversary of the death of Joseph Haydn. Damian Thompson writes a sympathetic and compelling argument for re-exploring the work of this oft overlooked composer.

Pentecost 2009

2009-05-31T06:24:00.002-05:00

One of my favorite hymns for Pentecost is "Come Down, O Love Divine" by Bianco of Siena (?-1434) (Discendi, Amor santo). What a stately and sincere exploration of the indwelling work of the Spirit.

Come down, O love divine, seek Thou this soul of mine,
And visit it with Thine own ardor glowing.
O Comforter, draw near, within my heart appear,
And kindle it, Thy holy flame bestowing.

O let it freely burn, til earthly passions turn
To dust and ashes in its heat consuming;
And let Thy glorious light shine ever on my sight,
And clothe me round, the while my path illuming.

Let holy charity mine outward vesture be,
And lowliness become mine inner clothing;
True lowliness of heart, which takes the humbler part,
And o’er its own shortcomings weeps with loathing.

And so the yearning strong, with which the soul will long,
Shall far outpass the power of human telling;
For none can guess its grace, till he become the place
Wherein the Holy Spirit makes His dwelling.

Shame on Judy

2009-05-18T06:49:00.002-05:00

Children's author Judy Bloom is actively soliciting funds for pro-death organization, Planned Parenthood. In a prepared statement for Mother's Day she wrote:

"Say thanks this Mother's Day with a gift that honors her courage by making a donation to Planned Parenthood in her name. I guarantee you that she'll be pleased. I know I would be."

None so blind as those who cannot see. What tragic irony.

Doodles and Drivel

2009-05-14T15:02:00.005-05:00

Doddle for Google is a scholarship contest for students to sketch a Google home design with the theme of “What I Wish for the World.” Some of the drawings are quite interesting; some seem to be very advanced for their age. Unfortunately, almost all of them are political messages of gay rights, health care coverage, rebirth in peace and harmony, acceptance of public art (i.e. graffiti), and lots of world peace and tolerance. As one 8 year old put it, “One World One God—I wish religious harmony for the world. We all are equal under one God! Our world will be a better place, if we love and respect each other irrespective of our religion. With respectful coexistence of different religions, peace will prevail in the world.”

It reminds me of all of the graduation speeches at this time of year. “Who knows but in our midst might be someone who finds the cure for cancer (or AIDS or the global fever).” All of the high minded, good intentions and humanist ideals fall flat in the face of sinful man. It makes me fearful of the future generations and their conception of the world.

What do I wish for the world? Jesus.

Horton Foote Tribute

2009-05-12T11:17:00.003-05:00

Texan playwright Horton Foote died in March of this year. Yesterday, friends and family gathered to pay tribute to this quiet man and his remarkable talent.

“Horton Foote wrote tough, serious plays about people to whom nothing happened, except that they lived their lives. Horton never wrote a character in any of his plays. Horton only wrote people.”

Potential Artifact Hoax

2009-05-12T11:12:00.003-05:00

Martin Gayford writes a commentary that questions the age and origin of the famous statue and likeness of Egyptian Queen Nefertiti.

Current Reading

2009-05-12T11:06:00.002-05:00

Bach and Belief

2009-04-24T07:27:00.001-05:00

It looks like A.N. Wilson has come full circle in his walk of faith and has returned to the Gospel. Here is an interesting blog about how Bach played a role in that journey.

Christian Nation?

2009-04-08T21:21:00.001-05:00

At a press conference this week in Turkey, President Obama casually rebuffed the idea that the United States is a Judeo-Christian nation.

"One of the great strengths of the United States," the President said, "is ... we have a very large Christian population -- we do not consider ourselves a Christian nation or a Jewish nation or a Muslim nation. We consider ourselves a nation of citizens who are bound by ideals and a set of values."

Bach and Mozart

2009-03-29T06:32:00.000-05:00

Mozart of course was the ultimate composer for the Enlightenment. A good way to break up any dinner party is to claim Bach’s superiority to Mozart, but there it is: Spend any serious amount of time listening to Bach, and most of Mozart’s work, however wantonly gorgeous, will seem to be…missing something.

—James R. Gaines, Evening in the Palace of Reason: Bach Meets Frederick the Great in the Age of Enlightenment

Targeted Ministry

2009-03-26T14:46:00.005-05:00

C.S. Lewis writes the following in his essay, "Sometimes Fairy Stories May Say Best What's To Be Said":

"Some people seem to think that I began by asking myself how I could say something about Christianity to children; then fixed on the fairy tale as an instrument, then collected information about child psychology and decided what age group I’d write for; then drew up a list of basic Christian truths and hammered out ‘allegories’ to embody them. This is all pure moonshine. I couldn’t write in that way. It all began with images; a faun carrying an umbrella, a queen on a sledge, a magnificent lion."

It strikes me that some people's assumptions about Lewis's writing of Narnia are somewhat similar to the modern evangelical strategy of ministry.

Chesterton on Fairy Stories

2009-03-26T14:42:00.000-05:00

"If you happen to read fairy tales, you will observe that one idea runs from one end of them to the other--the idea that peace and happiness can only exist on some condition. This idea, which is the core of ethics, is the core of the nursery-tales."

~G. K. Chesterton~
All Things Considered
1908

Current Reading

2009-03-25T23:14:00.005-05:00

In Defense of Lent

2009-03-22T17:20:00.002-05:00

Here's a link to my article about a protestant view of Lent. It was published in the most recent King's Meadow newsletter. To sign up for the free email newsletter, click here.

Happy Shamrock Day?

2009-03-17T10:35:00.003-05:00

Apparently the name "St. Patrick's Day" has become too divisive and controversial. Since the origin of St. Patrick's Day is the celebration of the Christian Faith proclaimed to the Irish by St. Patrick (who died on March 17, 461), it seems ironic that some (i.e. Disney and card stores) would seek to declare that religion gets in the way of celebrating this day. For more info, click here for a newspaper article.

Role of Music

2009-03-15T06:42:00.000-05:00

Music should be enjoyed prudently and in moderation, like wine, because it has the capacity to excite men to evil as well as good, to intoxicate, and to exclude other worthwhile occupations.
—Gioseffo Zarlino, The Art of Counterpoint: Part Three of Le Istitutioni harmoniche, 1558

"New" Tolkien Book

2009-02-19T09:45:00.000-06:00

From the New York Times:

"There will be much celebrating around the Party Tree in Hobbiton: Houghton Mifflin Harcourt said in an e-mail message that it planned to release a previously unpublished book by J. R. R. Tolkien that predates his novel “The Hobbit” and his fantasy epic “The Lord of the Rings.” The book, “The Legend of Sigurd and Gudrun,” was written during the 1920s and ’30s, while Tolkien held the Rawlinson and Bosworth professorship of Anglo-Saxon at Oxford University. It is his English-language narrative of the Norse hero Sigurd the Volsung, whose medieval adventures were — of course — populated by magic horses, dwarfs, dragons and gods with mischievous motives. Houghton Mifflin Harcourt said that it would publish the book, with commentary from Tolkien’s son Christopher Tolkien, on May 5."

Stravinsky Conducts the End of Firebird

2009-02-19T06:22:00.002-06:00

Watch how much control he has over the orchestra--even with his facial expressions. What a gifted man!

Igor Stravinsky quotes:
"I was born out of due time in the sense that by temperament and talent I should have been more suited for the life of a small Bach, living in anonymity and composing regularly for an established service and for God."

"I haven't understood a bar of music in my life, but I have felt it."

Musical Counterpoint

2009-02-18T10:24:00.000-06:00

It is hard to write a beautiful song. It is harder to write several individually beautiful songs that, when sung simultaneously, sound as a more beautiful polyphonic whole. The internal structures that create each of the voices separately must contribute to the emergent structure of the polyphony, which in turn must reinforce and comment on the structures of the individual voices. The way that is accomplished in detail is...'counterpoint'. —John Ruhn

Current Reading

2009-02-12T06:32:00.002-06:00

The Power of Bach

2009-02-11T07:03:00.002-06:00

Here's an interesting article sent to me by Evan Pyle. It's both encouraging and discouraging! This is even more evidence that music does shape who we are, how we think, and how we act.

Thoughts on Andersen’s Snow Queen

2009-02-06T20:22:00.001-06:00

Considering Han Christian Andersen’s sexual identity confusion and his unrequited love affairs (including the singer Jenny Lind who thought of him only as a brother), several uneasy points arise from studying The Snow Queen:

There are many strong female characters but only four male characters: Kai who needs to be rescued, the prince who was raised from being a pauper by the princess, the crow who died, and the stag who acts as a beast of burden.

For all of the evil intent and Lilith-like qualities of the Snow Queen, she is never defeated, confronted, or banished. Gerda just steals Kai away after “innocence and love” break the spell. The Snow Queen’s power remains intact. Evil is not defeated by good.

The initial evil of the devil (or hobgoblin) with the splintered mirror in the first section is never confronted except in the innocence and love of Gerda. The exaltation of childhood and innocence is more in line with a belief in innate goodness rather than a Biblical understanding of being innocent as a dove.

There is no happy ending in the fairy tale sense. Gerda and Kai are older, wiser, childlike and platonic. The wedding that should end all comedies is absent.

The story is moralistic but without a moral (like in most fairy tales).

Elfin Coincidence

2009-02-03T06:06:00.000-06:00

"In short, there is in life an element of elfin coincidence which people reckoning on the prosaic may perpetually miss."
—G.K. Chesterton, “The Blue Cross”

Dangers of Originality in Art

2009-02-02T06:56:00.000-06:00

Craftsmanship, and not originality, was the emphasis in the arts prior to Romanticism and the Enlightenment. Certainly an artist was praised for imaginative ideas, but the value of those ideas rested in how the artist treated and developed those ideas and crafted them into something profound. The quality of the idea was dependent on its suitability for development.

An artist striving to be original by necessity ignores or rebels against the history and development of their art. This denial flies in the face of the Biblical ideas of learning from the past, passing along wisdom, and respecting the clouds of witnesses who have gone before.

An artist motivated to be original, by definition, is more interested in personal glory than the glory of God. The impulse to be different for the sake of being different has little or no place in a Biblical concept of the arts.

Scripture does not deny the opportunity to be creative, but the emphasis and purpose is far different than our concept of originality. Craftsmanship, as an artistic trait, is much more in line with the Biblical notion of the arts—and a far more difficult endeavor requiring the exercising of wisdom and ability. The idea of taking various materials, gathering them, remolding and blending them, and ultimately enlarging them is the bringing of order inherent in craftsmanship—an opportunity to act as a sub-creator.

One need only to evaluate the twentieth century art that used originality as its basis to see how far originality takes true art away from a Biblical standard and winds up destroying itself in the process.

Hymns: Texts and Tunes

2009-02-02T06:25:00.002-06:00

One of my issues with the idea of setting old texts to new tunes is the suitability of the new melody with the lyrics. I've sung too many upbeat songs about the blood of Christ or repentance. Reverent theological issues should be sung reverently and appropriately. This does not mean in a stodgy or forced manner but with an appropriate weight and significance.

It is perhaps for this reason that many have trouble with rich theological texts sung to bebop style tunes that seem to undercut the permanence of the eternal truths expressed. Texts and tunes should appropriately reflect one another: joyful expressions of thanksgiving with joyous music; mournful repentance of sin with solemn and dark melodies; pardon received with thankful hopeful tunes; eternal truths with rooted and firm, timeless melodies.

Alice Parker addresses the suitability of this pairing in The Anatomy of Melody:

"Hymns suffer particularly from this failure to pair [text and tune] effectively. There seems to be a feeling that if the words are talking about something holy, that is enough. For the discriminating singer, that is certainly not true: a careless text can reduce even a wonderful melody to ruins. Choosing by syllable count (the meter of the hymns) is basic but much more important is the nature of the tune (its mood, function, voice, tone) and the comfort level of the combination…

"Hymnals are full of bad marriages, and our sensitivities get dulled by constant exposure to bad models…Try consulting the metrical index in the back of any hymnal and look up the text for the first example in any meter. Then try that text with each of the succeeding metrically matched melodies in turn. They should all fit, but you’ll find that few of them do…there’s a very real sense of belonging or not belonging. It’s amazing how few are really good combinations.

"When hymns are selected by text, the suitability of the tune is usually ignored…Both text and tune must have their own integrity and then graciously accommodate each other."

Current Reading

2009-01-31T07:37:00.004-06:00

Cultural Vigilance

2009-01-31T07:30:00.000-06:00

The wide world is all about you; you can fence yourselves in, but you cannot forever fence it out.” —J.R.R. Tolkien

Approaching Film With Understanding

2009-01-30T19:39:00.001-06:00

The 4th Annual King's Meadow Film and Worldview Conference is February 20-21, 2009 in Franklin, TN. For more info, click here.

The medium of film is a complex, multi-layered, many dimensional art form that encompasses numerous levels of communication. Too often Christian film reviews focus solely on the plot, trying to show how the storyline agrees or disagrees with Scripture. To be sure, the worldview of the narrative matters, but how that worldview is expressed specifically through the medium of film also matters—and it matters greatly. A good filmmaker can tell the audience more through non-verbal expression than the actual dialogue can. For instance, to understand what the director is saying through his craft, we need to understand some basic elements of his tools—lighting, framing, camera angles, color, sound, symbolism, etc. Hence, the story is but one layer of the total expression. How a filmmaker tells his story embodies just as many worldview assumptions and applications as the words and ideas in the script.

For example, a gifted filmmaker can take a script that is antagonistic to Biblical morals but present it in a beautiful and winsome way that convinces the audience of the merit of the film despite the fact that it is in direct contradiction to what they say they believe.

Likewise, a director can make technical choices (such as quick edits and shaky cameras in certain circumstances) that use the medium of film in such a way that affects the audience’s ability to process visual versus written information.

Or, consider that a movie with a life-affirming message rooted in Biblical values might actually contradict its intended message through sloppy or artless production values or through techniques rooted in non-biblical worldviews. Such a lack of artistry can (will?) actually fight against the objective of the film in the first place.

When evaluating, thinking, and discussing film, we can begin with the narrative, but we also must consider how and in what manner the film presents that story. A skilled director leads the audience—often subconsciously—towards a certain reaction to a character. As the characters are thus presented, the story itself gains levels of meaning and symbolism well beyond the actual words spoken or the literal actions. In this way, the emotions a film generates will often color an objective evaluation of its content.

Film is a wonderful art and a specific art that tells a story in a unique way. The true test of film artistry lies in the craft of the filmmaker to transform a narrative into something different than what a play or book portrays. In other words, the beauty of a good film is a film that understands how to be a film in the way it tells its story.

Creed and Education

2009-01-30T17:14:00.000-06:00

Dogma is actually the only thing that cannot be separated from education. It IS education. A teacher who is not dogmatic is simply a teacher who is not teaching. There are no uneducated people; only most people are educated wrong. The true task of culture today is not a task of expansion, but of selection-and rejection. The educationist must find a creed and teach it.
--G.K. Chesterton

The Purpose of Life

2009-01-30T10:06:00.000-06:00

“...the chief purpose of life, for any one of us, is to increase according to our capacity our knowledge of God by all the means we have, and to be moved by it to praise and thanks. To do as we say in the Gloria in Excelsis: ...We praise you, we call you holy, we worship you, we proclaim your glory, we thank you for the greatness of your splendour.” —J.R.R. Tolkien

(Thanks to Kay for this quote)

Quote on Song and Silence

2009-01-23T17:41:00.000-06:00

We are living in a culture that doesn’t value melody; one that seems to have lost touch with this primal means of expression. We are surrounded by sounds so insistent, so varied in intent and clangor, that we’ve forgotten how to listen to a single line. In fact, we don’t really listen to each other speak anymore because there are too many distractions luring us away from the unadorned human voice. We’ve lost the basic, easy connection between speech and song that makes speech musical and song communicative. We’re perilously close to losing silence: in the electronic world, silence means disconnection…

Through the media’s constant barrage, we are subjected to endless chatter, listening to tune written in an unceasing quest for momentary fame and ingesting surface information that rarely delves below the surface. We are being deprived, through overload, or our principal senses.

—Alice Parker, The Anatomy of Melody

O'Connor Quote

2009-01-08T20:36:00.001-06:00

"I have found that anything that comes out of the South is going to be called grotesque by the Northern reader, unless it is grotesque, in which case it is going to be called realistic."

Flannery O'Connor, "Some Aspects of the Grotesque in Southern Fiction"

Happy New Year

2009-01-01T08:24:00.003-06:00

Today is the day in which the circumcision of Christ is usually remembered. Following is a hymn to that effect. It is also a good day to read Sir Gawain and the Green Knight since this Feast Day plays a role in the story.

O happy day, when first was poured
The blood of our redeeming Lord!
O happy day, when first began
His sufferings for sinful man!

Just entered on this world of woe,
His blood already learned to flow;
His future death was thus expressed,
And thus His early love confessed.

From heaven descending to fulfill
The mandates of His Father’s will,
E’en now behold the victim lie,
The Lamb of God, prepared to die!

Lord, circumcise our hearts, we pray,
Our fleshly natures purge away;
Thy Name, Thy likeness may they bear:
Yea, stamp Thy holy image there!

O Lord, the virgin born, to Thee
Eternal praise and glory be,
Whom with the Father we adore,
And Holy Ghost forevermore.

Sebastien Besnault, 1736

Review on Reformation21

2008-12-23T10:57:00.002-06:00

My review of The Incarnation in the Gospels is now available on the Reformation21 website.

Street Name Change in Moscow

2008-12-20T20:57:00.002-06:00

A street in Moscow renamed for Aleksandr Solzhenitsyn has some residents up in arms--they prefer the former name: Big Communist Street. The Guardian has a story with the details.

Christmas Toy Jeers

2008-12-19T09:02:00.001-06:00

Little Tykes has a line of toys for toddlers (6 months and older) that play songs—so far so good. These trains, mobiles, and toy guitars, drums, and keyboards are part of the “Pop Tunes Big Rocker” line of toys. As the advertising line says, “Plays songs to get kids moving with music that parents can appreciate.” These songs include versions of: “Love Shack” by The B-52's, “Hot Hot Hot” by Buster Poindexter, and “Wild Thing” by The Troggs. These are hardly songs or messages appropriate to toddlers.

Quote about Freedeom and the Arts

2008-12-09T06:43:00.003-06:00

Jeremy Begbie in Resounding Truth: Christian Wisdom in the World of Music

"For the Christian, to be free is not fundamentally to enjoy some supposedly blank space before us, or to increase options, but to be at peace with God and one another and thus at home in a God-given world."

Current Reading

2008-12-08T07:34:00.002-06:00

Bama 12-0

2008-12-03T06:24:00.006-06:00

Anxiously anticipating Saturday's game with Florida. Roll Tide!

Advent Carol

2008-11-30T06:16:00.003-06:00

This morning at Parish we will sing the following Advent carol by John Morrison written in 1781. I set the text to the English Folk Tune Kingsfold. It's a wonderful reminder of the prophecy of Isaiah and the hope that we have in the incarnation of Christ and is thus a perfect text to sing on this First Sunday of Advent.

To us a Child of hope is born,
To us a Son is giv’n,
Him shall the tribes of earth obey,
Him all the hosts of Heav’n.

His Name shall be the Prince of Peace,
Forevermore adored,
The Wonderful, the Counselor,
The great and mighty Lord.

His pow’r, increasing, still shall spread,
His reign no end shall know,
Justice shall guard His throne above,
And peace abound below.

To us a Child of hope is born,
To us a Son is giv’n,
The Wonderful, the Counselor,
The mighty Lord of Heav’n.

Psalm of Thanksgiving

2008-11-27T10:46:00.002-06:00

This is our Psalm of the Month at Parish for November. We are singing it to a new melody by Henry Owen. Happy Thanksgiving for His steadfast love endures forever!

Psalm 111

O give the Lord whole-hearted praise,
To Him thanksgiving I will bring;
With all His people I will raise
My voice and of His glory sing.
His saints delight to search and trace
His mighty works and wondrous ways;
Majestic glory, boundless grace,
And righteousness His work displays.

The wondrous works that God has wrought
His people ever keep in mind;
His works with grace and mercy fraught,
Revealing that the Lord is kind.
God’s promise shall forever stand,
He cares for those who trust His Word;
Upon His saints His mighty hand
The wealth of nations has conferred.

His works are true and just indeed,
His precepts are forever sure;
In truth and righteousness decreed,
They shall forevermore endure.
From Him His saints’ redemption came;
His cov’nant sure no change can know;
Let all revere His holy Name
In Heav’n above and earth below

In reverence and godly fear
Man finds the gate to wisdom’s ways;
The wise His holy Name revere;
Through endless ages sound His praise.

Europeana Crashes

2008-11-24T08:41:00.003-06:00

Europeana, the European attempt to create a comprehensive compendium of knowledge, crashed in its first day--because it received 10 million hits an hour. The Guardian has an article about the intent and scope of this endeavor. It's somewhat ironic that this desire for an indestructible Alexandrian-type Library failed its first day.

More Luther Quotes

2008-11-23T06:54:00.002-06:00

My heart, which is so full to overflowing, has often been solaced and refreshed by music when sick and weary.

For where God built a church, there the Devil would also build a chapel.

I am afraid that the schools will prove the very gates of hell, unless they diligently labor in explaining the Holy Scriptures and engraving them in the heart of the youth.

Music is the art of the prophets and the gift of God.

Peace if possible, truth at all costs.

To gather with God's people in united adoration of the Father is as necessary to the Christian life as prayer.

If I knew that tomorrow was the end of the world, I would plant an apple tree today! (Possibly not Luther, but too good not to include)

Martin Luther on Music

2008-11-23T06:53:00.002-06:00

I, Doctor Martin Luther, wish all lovers of the unshackled art of music grace and peace from God the Father and from our Lord Jesus Christ! I truly desire that all Christians would love and regard as worthy the lovely gift of music, which is a precious, worthy, and costly treasure given to mankind by God. The riches of music are so excellent and so precious that words fail me whenever I attempt to discuss and describe them.... In summa, next to the Word of God, the noble art of music is the greatest treasure in the world. It controls our thoughts, minds, hearts, and spirits... Our dear fathers and prophets did not desire without reason that music be always used in the churches. Hence, we have so many songs and psalms. This precious gift has been given to man alone that he might thereby remind himself that God has created man for the express purpose of praising and extolling God. However, when man's natural musical ability is whetted and polished to the extent that it becomes an art, then do we note with great surprise the great and perfect wisdom of God in music, which is, after all, His product and His gift; we marvel when we hear music in which one voice sings a simple melody, while three, four, or five other voices play and trip lustily around the voice that sings its simple melody and adorn this simple melody wonderfully with artistic musical effects, thus reminding us of a heavenly dance, where all meet in a spirit of friendliness, caress and embrace. A person who gives this some thought and yet does not regard music as a marvelous creation of God, must be a clodhopper indeed and does not deserve to be called a human being; he should be permitted to hear nothing but the braying of asses and the grunting of hogs.

New Horton Foote Play

2008-11-22T07:10:00.002-06:00

Horton Foote's newest play, Dividing the Estate, is reviewed in USA Today and The New York Times. The 92-year-old Texan playwright exhibits a quiet grace in all of his works that probes relationships, motivations, dreams, and ambitions. A remarkable feat for someone who has written scores of plays and award-winning screen plays. A new work from Foote is always an occasion for rejoicing and reflection.

The Oak Beams of New College, Oxford

2008-11-12T20:50:00.001-06:00

This is a wonderful story of stewardship, thinking multi-generationally, and laying up an inheritance for future generations.

Modern v. Trinitarian Beauty

2008-11-12T06:41:00.001-06:00

Beauty: In Modernity, beauty is at most an accident of power. It derives from survival by power or mutation, and it is an unnatural presence in Modernity’s cosmos, because it doesn’t reflect the conformity and power at the center of that world. But beauty is not efficient; it is superfluous, unnecessary, an overflow, a natural expression of the Trinity’s life. Beauty doesn’t operate by force or power or necessity but by holy seduction, like the Trinity.
—Doug Jones

Current Reading

2008-11-10T07:37:00.001-06:00

Tolkien Quote

2008-11-10T07:22:00.001-06:00

If more of us valued food and cheer and song above hoarded gold, it would be a merrier world.
—J.R.R. Tolkien

Election Day

2008-11-04T07:15:00.002-06:00

Daniel 2:20-22

Blessed be the name of God forever and ever,
to whom belong wisdom and might.
He changes times and seasons;
he removes kings and sets up kings;
he gives wisdom to the wise
and knowledge to those who have understanding;
he reveals deep and hidden things;
he knows what is in the darkness,
and the light dwells with him.

Psalm 2:10-12

Now therefore, O kings, be wise;
be warned, O rulers of the earth.
Serve the Lord with fear,
and rejoice with trembling.
Kiss the Son,
lest he be angry, and you perish in the way,
for his wrath is quickly kindled.
Blessed are all who take refuge in him.

Worship Notes: Corporate Confession

2008-11-02T06:58:00.002-06:00

Robert G. Rayburn Quote
"One of the serious weaknesses of our modern lives in the fact that we have failed to make clear the inflexible holiness of our God. It is true that he is the God of all grace, that he is infinite in his kindness and mercy towards us, but he is also a God of manifest righteousness who cannot look upon sin. Entirely too many ministers give the impression that all we must do is rest in the lovingkindness of God, knowing that he will always supply the healing and strength that are needed. The Christian life is not as simple as that. The believer must honestly and reverently deal with sin in his life continually day by day. Before we presume to worship God, we must remember the clear teaching of the Word of God, “If I regard iniquity in my heart, the Lord will not hear me” (Ps. 66:18). Until we have truly and sincerely confessed our sin before the Lord, our worship will not be acceptable in his sight."

CA Kindergarten Curriculum

2008-11-01T18:07:00.002-05:00

Fox has a story about the use of pledge cards given to 5 year olds to prevent harassment against people of alternative lifestyles. Apparently it's never too early to start defining the thought categories of future citizens.

Roll Tide, 8-0

2008-10-25T20:20:00.005-05:00

Current Reading

2008-10-25T15:48:00.003-05:00

Music of the Spheres?

2008-10-25T08:03:00.001-05:00

Scientists have recently recorded the sound of distant stars. You can hear these "songs" with this BBC article.

Thoughts on Religion...

2008-09-30T07:24:00.002-05:00

by children's book author, Philip Pullman. His anti-Lewis, anti-Christian trilogy is being made into films, with The Golden Compass (2007) as the first installment.

"My basic objection to religion is not that it isn't true; I like plenty of things that aren't true. It's that religion grants its adherents malign, intoxicating and morally corrosive sensations. Destroying intellectual freedom is always evil, but only religion makes doing evil feel quite so good."

Decorating on a Dime and Imagination

2008-09-30T07:20:00.001-05:00

A Kentucky man transformed the bare walls of his basement with sharpies and imagination. This is worth seeing.

Day of Reckoning

2008-09-15T06:58:00.003-05:00

Finally someone is willing to tell the art world that the Emperor has no clothes. Robert Hughes takes on Damien Hirst in this article from the Guardian. Hughes is the author of a thoughtful book on modern art, The Shock of the New. Hirst is probably most famous as the artist who slices animals in two and preserves them in glass tanks. His most recent works include a diamond encrusted skull and managing to stay in the public eye as if his art were important. He's become a master of publicity--which is, after all, one of the greatest traits of modern artists.

New Life for an Old Violin

2008-09-11T14:56:00.003-05:00

The Milwaukee Journal Sentinel reports that the concertmaster of the of the Milwaukee Symphony was offered the loan of a Stradivarius. In a time when collectors, and not musicians, are the only ones able to afford to own the celebrated instruments, this is indeed a generous gift--but, thankfully, perhaps not as unusual as one would think. After all, great instruments were meant to be played.

Intelligibility

2008-09-11T14:51:00.000-05:00

What is the use of correct speech if it does not meet with the listener’s understanding? There is no point in speaking at all if our words are not understood by the people to whose understanding our words are directed.
—Augustine, On Christian Teaching

Rhetoric in Defense of Truth

2008-09-11T14:49:00.000-05:00

Since rhetoric is used to give conviction to both truth and falsehood, who could dare to maintain that truth, which depends on us for its defense, should stand unarmed in the fight against falsehood? This would mean that those who are trying to give conviction to their falsehoods would know how to use an introduction to make their listeners favorable, interested, and receptive, while we would not; that they would expound falsehoods in descriptions that are succinct, lucid, and convincing, while we would expound the truth in such a way as to bore our listeners, cloud their understanding, and stifle their desire to believe; that they would assail the truth and advocate falsehood with fallacious arguments, while we would be too feeble either to defend what is true or refute what is false; that they, pushing and propelling their listeners’ minds towards error, would speak so as to inspire fear, sadness, and elation, and issue passionate exhortations, while we, in the name of the truth, can only sit idle along sounding dull and indifferent. Who could be so senseless as to find this sensible? No; oratorical ability, so effective a resource to commend either right or wrong, is available to both sides; why then is it not acquired by good and zealous Christians to fight for the truth, if the wicked employ it in the service of iniquity and error, to achieve their perverse and futile purposes?
—Augustine, On Christian Teaching

Symbols

2008-09-11T11:38:00.001-05:00

"Symbols are the natural speech of the soul, a language older and more universal than words."
--Edmund Spenser (1552-99)

Prayer

2008-09-11T09:45:00.000-05:00

“The trouble with me is lack of faith…The irrational dead weight of my old skeptical habits and the spirit of this age and the cares of the day steal away all my lively feeling of the truth, and often when I pray I wonder if I am not posting to a nonexistent address. Mind you, I don’t think so—the whole of my reasonable mind is convinced: but I often feel so.”
—C.S. Lewis

The Music of the Spheres

2008-09-02T10:56:00.000-05:00

Quotes from Jamie James:

There was a time when the universe was believed to cohere, when human life had a meaning and purpose. A person who devoted himself to a lifetime of study, instead of coming out at the end of it the author of a definitive treatise on the pismire, or a catalogue of the references to Norse sagas in Finnigans Wake, would actually have a shot at discovering the key to the universe.

The concepts of the musical universe and the Great Chain of Being originate in the classical bedrock of our culture, flow through the Christian tradition, and remain firmly centered in the Renaissance and the Age of Reason. They are at the core of the culture. It was not until the nineteenth century that the perspective shifted decisively to the earthly, the tangible. Materialism and sensuality, qualities that had been deeply mistrusted throughout most of the Western tradition, emerged ascendant.

Quotes from Augustine's On Christian Teaching

2008-08-25T10:06:00.000-05:00

“For we ‘walk by faith and not by sight,’ and faith will falter if the authority of Holy Scripture is shaken; and if faith falters, love itself decays. For if someone lapses in his faith, he inevitably lapses in his love as well, since he cannot love what he does not believe to be true.”

“For it is the instinct of a corrupt mind to covet and claim as its due what is really due to God alone. This kind of self-love is better called hatred. It is unjust because it wants what is beneath it to serve it while refusing to serve what is above it; and it has been very well said that ‘the person who loves injustice hates his own soul’ (Psalm 11:5).”

“For the treatment of human beings God’s wisdom—in itself both doctor and medicine—offered itself in a similar way. Because human beings fell through pride it used humility in healing them. We were deceived by the wisdom of the serpent; we are freed by the foolishness of God. But just as that was wisdom yet was foolishness to those who despised God, so this so-called foolishness is wisdom to those who overcome the devil. We made bad use of immortality, and so we died; Christ made good use of mortality, and so we live.”

Must Read

2008-08-25T07:34:00.000-05:00

Pithy, Short. Interesting article.

PS Note the six-word prayers.

Current Reading

2008-08-15T07:00:00.002-05:00

Pre-Teens and Violent Films

2008-08-09T07:56:00.003-05:00

The Los Angeles Times has a disturbing article that cites a study tracking the alarming number of pre and young teens who watch violent films. Considering I never saw an R-rated film until my sophomore year in college, I can only imagine the effect of those images on developing minds. In addition, the article doesn't consider the language and sexual content usually connected with such films.

Reagan on the Economy

2008-08-09T07:52:00.001-05:00

"Government's view of the economy could be summed up in a few short phrases: If it moves, tax it. If it keeps moving, regulate it. And if it stops moving, subsidize it."
--Ronald Reagan

Ignoring Music

2008-08-08T11:20:00.001-05:00

David Robertson has written an interesting article about the concert experience in the age of music as commodity. While I don't agree with all of his conclusions, he makes some interesting points as well.

With Reverence and Awe

2008-07-06T20:32:00.001-05:00

“The Bible does teach that God has promised to bless the means of grace that he provides in worship in a way that he has not promised to bless anything else…To take the Word, sacraments, and prayer for granted—in other words, to disregard public worship as something to be added on to personal devotions or small-group fellowship—is to trivialize worship and put ourselves at risk…The means of grace are part and parcel of Christian worship. We worship to praise God and to give Him the glory that he alone deserves. And in worship, through the means of grace, God is also at work, extending his blessing to his people, and transforming us into his image.” D.G. Hart and John R. Muether

Disadvantages of an Elite Education

2008-07-03T07:41:00.002-05:00

"Our best universities have forgotten that the reason they exist is to make minds, not careers.

William Deresiewicz, former professor at Yale, has written an excellent article critiquing the pitfalls and shortcomings of an "elite" education.

Quotes from Children of Men

2008-06-13T22:08:00.002-05:00

In The Children of Men, P.D. James describes a particular church as “a place where silence was more than the absence of noise.”

Later, she rightly describes true cultural change:

“No government can act in advance of the moral will of the people.”
Julian said: “Then we will have to change the moral will. We have to change people.”
Theo laughed. “Oh, that’s the kind of rebellion you have in mind? Not the systems but human hearts and minds. You’re the most dangerous revolutionaries of all, or would be if you had the slightest idea how to begin, the slightest chance of succeeding.”
Julian asked, as if seriously interested in his answer: “How would you begin?”
“I wouldn’t. History tells me what happens to people who do. You have one reminder on that chain round your neck.”
She put up her distorted left hand and briefly touched the cross.

Current Reading

2008-06-02T07:50:00.003-05:00

Quotes by Igor Stravinsky

2008-05-23T16:32:00.001-05:00

I know that the twelve notes in each octave and the variety of rhythm offer me opportunities that all of human genius will never exhaust.

To listen is an effort, and just to hear is no merit. A duck hears also.

Sins cannot be undone, only forgiven.

Music is given to us with the sole purpose of establishing an order in things, including, and particularly, the coordination between man and time.

I was born out of due time in the sense that by temperament and talent I should have been more suited for the life of a small Bach, living in anonymity and composing regularly for an established service and for God.

The Church knew what the psalmist knew: Music praises God. Music is well or better able to praise him than the building of the church and all its decoration; it is the Church's greatest ornament.

Music and Food

2008-05-22T08:52:00.001-05:00

The Kansas City Star ran an interesting article on the possible connection between musicians and cooking. You can find the article here.

John Cage Plays One of His "Compositions"

2008-05-13T06:39:00.002-05:00

This is long, but the absurdity of what is meant as "music" is worth watching.

Love and Covenant Community

2008-05-09T07:49:00.000-05:00

“I feel that there is nothing more truly artistic than to love people.”
—Vincent van Gogh

“The beginning of love is to let those we love be perfectly themselves, and not to twist them to fit our own image. Otherwise we love only the reflection of ourselves we find in them.”
—Thomas Merton

“I love you, and because I love you, I would sooner have you hate me for telling you the truth than adore me for telling you lies.”
—Pietro Aretino

“Faithful are the wounds of a friend.”
—Solomon

Time and Work

2008-05-02T10:51:00.001-05:00

There was still a faint smell of pumpkins, though the stock had eaten them all. A woodsy smell came from the pile of beech leaves, and a dry, strawy smell came from the wheat. Outside the wind was screeching and the snow was whirling, but the South-Barn Floor was warm and quiet.

Father and Almanzo unbound several sheaves of wheat and spread them on the clean wooden floor.

Almanzo asked Father why he did not hire the machine that did threshing. Three men had brought it into the country last fall, and Father had gone to see it. It would thresh a man’s whole grain crop in a few days.

“That’s a lazy man’s way to thresh,” Father said. “Haste makes waste, but a lazy man’d rather get his work done fast than to do it himself. That machine chews up the straw till it’s not fit to feed stock, and it scatters grain around and wastes it.

“All it saves is time, son. And what good is time, with nothing to do? You want to sit and twiddle your thumbs, all these stormy winter days?”

“No!” said Almanzo.

—Laura Ingalls Wilder, Farmer Boy

Misc. Graham Greene Quotes

2008-04-30T07:15:00.000-05:00

It is impossible to go through life without trust: that is to be imprisoned in the worst cell of all, oneself. The Ministry of Fear

My two fingers on a typewriter have never connected with my brain. My hand on a pen does. A fountain pen, of course. Ball-point pens are only good for filling out forms on a plane.

Sentimentality - that's what we call the sentiment we don't share.

Success is more dangerous than failure, the ripples break over a wider coastline.

We are all of us resigned to death: it's life we aren't resigned to.

Vision Questions for Parish Church Architecture

2008-04-28T12:18:00.002-05:00

As we think Biblically about architecture and Church construction, here are some salient points to consider:
We’re building a Parish Church not Cathedral.
A building needs to be modest and within financial means—especially for the sake of conserving resources for Church Planting.
We must think multi-generationally and lay plans and foundations now for future additions and buildings.
Beauty, Goodness, and Truth are all essential considerations.

How should the physical facility encourage and support our vision and philosophy as a Church?
As you consider a Biblical worldview application of architecture, what is your overall desire or vision when you think of the new facility?
How should our priorities as a Church family and individual families be reflected in the design and process of building?
What are some specifics that you think should to be taken into consideration?
What are some things typically done in church architecture and building programs that you hope we do not do?

The Strangeness of Mercy

2008-04-23T13:18:00.001-05:00

You cannot conceive, nor can I, the appalling strangeness of the mercy of God.
—Graham Greene, Brighton Rock

Permanence in Architecture

2008-04-14T15:08:00.003-05:00

As the ark of salvation, the Church should literally and theologically convey a sense of safety—both spiritual and physical. The following quotes come from Michael S. Rose.

There are several ways a church can assert its permanence. First, and most obvious, is by its durability. The church, a building that will serve generation after generation, transcending time and culture, must be constructed of durable materials. Mere sticks and stones, shingles and tar won’t do. Typically, one or another type of masonry construction is used, employing the finest materials available.

Related to durability is massing: the church must be of significant mass, built with solid foundations, thick walls, and allowing for generous interior spaces. This massing is another aspect of the architectural language of churches. It’s integral to be verticality (the massing of volumes upward creates verticality) and iconography (the massing of the church helps it convey its iconic meaning, i.e., its massing can make a church look like a church and function like a church).

Architects of future generations need to comprehend the language of church architecture in order to build permanent sacred edifices for their own times and future centuries. No successful church architect can be—or even pretend to be—ignorant of the Church’s historical patrimony. Continuity demands that a successful church design can’t spring from the whims of man or the fashion of the day. The architect who breaks completely with architectural tradition robs his church of the quality of permanence that is essential to any successful church design.

The Power and the Glory

2008-04-08T09:55:00.001-05:00

Having just finished The Power and the Glory for the second time, I think I can safely say that it is one of the most profound books of the twentieth century—especially dealing with issues of faith, sin, vocation, truth, and suffering. Graham Greene does not always lend himself to easy quotes because so much of the writing is dependent on the situations of the narrative. However, here are a few attempts:

The wall of the burial-ground had fallen in: one or two crosses had been smashed by enthusiasts: an angel had lost one of its stone wings, and what gravestones were left undamaged leant at an acute angle in the long marshy grasses. One image of the Mother of God had lost ears and arms and stood like a pagan Venus over the grave of some rich forgotten timber merchant. It was odd—this fury to deface, because, of course, you could never deface enough. If God had been like a toad, you could have rid the globe of toads, but when God was like yourself, it was no good being content with stone figures—you had to kill yourself among the graves.

This is a keen observation on what has become a culture of death (infanticide, euthanasia, non-sanctity of life) and self mutilation through piercings, tattoos, and even visual art (think of the disfiguring of the image of God in cubist paintings and subsequent “art” movements).

The following quote reveals the main character’s growing realization of the need to move beyond surface piety and into the heart of the Gospel and true faith.

That was another mystery: it sometimes seemed to him that venial sins—impatience, an unimportant lie, pride, a neglected opportunity—cut you off from grace more completely than the worst sins of all. Then, in his innocence, he had felt no love for anyone; now in his corruption he had learnt…

Art and Worship

2008-04-07T08:04:00.001-05:00

“People ask what are my intentions with my films — my aims. It is a difficult and dangerous question, and I usually give an evasive answer: I try to tell the truth about the human condition, the truth as I see it. This answer seems to satisfy everyone, but it is not quite correct. I prefer to describe what I would like my aim to be. There is an old story of how the cathedral of Chartres was struck by lightning and burned to the ground. Then thousands of people came from all points of the compass, like a giant procession of ants, and together they began to rebuild the cathedral on its old site. They worked until the building was completed — master builders, artists, labourers, clowns, noblemen, priests, burghers. But they all remained anonymous, and no one knows to this day who built the cathedral of Chartres.
Regardless of my own beliefs and my own doubts, which are unimportant in this connection, it is my opinion that art lost its basic creative drive the moment it was separated from worship. It severed an umbilical cord and now lives its own sterile life, generating and degenerating itself. In former days the artist remained unknown and his work was to the glory of God. He lived and died without being more or less important than other artisans; 'eternal values,' 'immortality' and 'masterpiece' were terms not applicable in his case. The ability to create was a gift. In such a world flourished invulnerable assurance and natural humility. Today the individual has become the highest form and the greatest bane of artistic creation.
The smallest wound or pain of the ego is examined under a microscope as if it were of eternal importance. The artist considers his isolation, his subjectivity, his individualism almost holy. Thus we finally gather in one large pen, where we stand and bleat about our loneliness without listening to each other and without realizing that we are smothering each other to death. The individualists stare into each other's eyes and yet deny the existence of each other.
We walk in circles, so limited by our own anxieties that we can no longer distinguish between true and false, between the gangster's whim and the purest ideal. Thus if I am asked what I would like the general purpose of my films to be, I would reply that I want to be one of the artists in the cathedral on the great plain. I want to make a dragon's head, an angel, a devil — or perhaps a saint — out of stone. It does not matter which; it is the sense of satisfaction that counts.
Regardless of whether I believe or not, whether I am a Christian or not, I would play my part in the collective building of the cathedral.” Ingmar Bergman