Sacred Images And The Liturgy
By DON FIER
Among the special signs that are essential and integral to liturgical worship in the Catholic Church, singing and music hold a pre-eminent place. As the Catechism of the Catholic Church (CCC) and Vatican II’s Dogmatic Constitution on the Sacred Liturgy teach, it is “a treasure of inestimable value” (Sacrosanctum Concilium [SC], n. 112 § 1; CCC, n. 1156).
To underscore the distinctive importance reserved for sacred music, Pope St. John Paul II, on the Feast of St. Cecilia, the patroness of sacred music, echoed words written a century earlier by his Predecessor Pope St. Pius X: “Being an integral part of the solemn Liturgy, [it] participates in the general purpose of the Liturgy, which is the glory of God and the sanctification and edification of the faithful” (chirograph for the centenary of Tra le Sollecitudini [November 22, 2003], n. 1).
The historical roots of vocal and instrumental music, as we saw last week, date back to the Old Testament. Throughout the books of the Bible, various forms of the verb “to sing” appear literally hundreds of times — indeed, it is difficult to think of the Church and the worship of God without singing and music.
But as was also highlighted last week, in order to be suitable for the liturgy, sacred music must possess three qualities: holiness, beauty of form, and universality.
Moreover, as expressed by the Compendium of the Catechism of the Catholic Church, liturgical song and music “should conform to Catholic doctrine in their texts, drawn preferably from Sacred Scripture and liturgical sources, . . . be a beautiful expression of prayer, . . . be of high quality, . . . and should encourage the participation of the liturgical assembly” (n. 239).
All that is banal or profane must be avoided so the minds and hearts of the faithful may be lifted up to God.
The Catechism now focuses its attention on the place of sacred images in the liturgy. The topic is introduced with an affirmation that “the sacred image, the liturgical icon, principally represents Christ. It cannot represent the invisible and incomprehensible God” (CCC, n. 1159).
Why begin in this manner? As explained by St. John Paul II in his 1999 Letter to Artists (LtA), “the Law of the Old Testament explicitly forbids representation of the invisible and ineffable God by means of ‘grave or molten image’ (Deut. 27:15), because God transcends every material representation” (n. 5). Also forbidden in the Old Testament is the depiction of created things with images in order to avert the danger of idolatry (see Exodus 20:4; Deut. 5:8).
It was only in the New Testament with the Incarnation, with the coming of the Son of God as man, that God Himself has given us His true image in Christ, who is “the image of the invisible God” (Col. 1:15).
St. John Damascene, an eighth-century doctor of the Eastern Church, beautifully describes the new “economy” of images that was ushered in with the Incarnation:
“Previously God, who has neither a body nor a face, absolutely could not be represented by an image. But now that he has made himself visible in the flesh and has lived with men, I can make an image of what I have seen of God . . . and contemplate the glory of the Lord, his face unveiled” (De imag. 1, 16; as cited in CCC, n. 1159).
It was in the eighth and ninth centuries that the Catholic Church was rocked by a great controversy regarding the use of sacred images in the liturgy: iconoclasm. As defined by Fr. John A. Hardon, SJ, iconoclasm is “a heresy that rejected the use of religious images and advocated their destruction” (Modern Catholic Dictionary, p. 263).
It opposes the veneration of images that depict Jesus Christ, the Mother of God, and the angels and saints. In its essence, it also has Christological implications in that rejection of sacred images of our Lord is ultimately a rejection of the incarnational principle, of the humanity of Christ.
Fr. Hardon goes on to explain that iconoclasm was occasioned by the rise of Islam, which considers veneration of all sacred images as idolatrous. It took place in two phases, the first beginning in 726 under Emperor Leo III the Isaurian when he made a public declaration of his opposition to icons. The iconoclast heresy was condemned at the Seventh Ecumenical Council (Nicea II in 787) which, by solemn declaration, “justified against the iconoclasts the veneration of icons — of Christ, but also of the Mother of God, the angels, and all the saints” (CCC, n. 2131).
The heresy, though temporarily defeated, was not to die an easy death. The second phase began under the reign of Emperor Leo V the Armenian who, in 814, once again began to promote iconoclasm. It was condemned by the Eighth Ecumenical Council (Constantinople IV in 869-870), which reiterated the doctrine of Nicea II: “We decree that the sacred image of our Lord Jesus Christ must be venerated with honor equal to that given to the book of the holy Gospels. . . . Likewise we honor and venerate the image of his immaculate Mother and the images of the holy angels, just as they are represented by the words of Sacred Scripture, and also [the images] of all the saints” (Denzinger, Enchiridion Symbolorum, nn. 653, 656).
The Catechism beautifully reinforces Constantinople IV’s teaching on the complementarity of the Word of God and the message conveyed by sacred images: “Christian iconography expresses in images the same Gospel message that Scripture communicates by words. Image and word illuminate each other: ‘. . .[T]he production of representational artwork, which accords with the history of the preaching of the Gospel . . . confirms that the incarnation of the Word of God was real and not imaginary . . . for realities that illustrate each other undoubtedly reflect each other’s meaning’ (Conciliorum oecumenicorum decreta, n. 11)” (CCC, n. 1160).
Important to understand for all sacred art is that the images are venerated not for their own sake, but because they point beyond to the objects they represent.
St. John Paul II notes that the decisive argument to which the Fathers of Nicea II appealed to settle the controversy is related to that very principle. In the mystery of the Incarnation, “if the Son of God had come into the world of visible realities — his humanity building a bridge between visible and invisible — then, by analogy, a representation of the mystery could be used, within the logic of signs, as a sensory evocation of the mystery” (LtA, n. 7 § 4). The image draws us into contemplation of the mystery it represents.
When do we first see evidence of sacred art in the Church’s history? As noted by Christoph Cardinal Schönborn, “From the second and third centuries we find a wealth of paintings in the burial places of Christians, in the catacombs. There are depictions of the scenes of the Old Testament, from the life of Jesus, and from the Church. They are meant to bear witness to the redemption Christ gives us. They are images of hope for eternal life” (Living the Catechism of the Catholic Church: The Sacraments, p. 27).
“All the signs in the liturgical celebrations are related to Christ, as are sacred images of the holy Mother of God and of the saints as well,” explains the Catechism. “They truly signify Christ, who is glorified in them. They make manifest the ‘cloud of witnesses’ (Heb. 12:1) who continue to participate in the salvation of the world and to whom we are united, above all in sacramental celebrations” (n. 1161). In other words, in gazing upon the images of the saints, we honor or venerate them because they reflect Christ by the holiness of their lives.
As delightfully expressed by St. John Damascene, “The beauty of the images moves me to contemplation, as a meadow delights the eyes and subtly infuses the soul with the glory of God” (De imag. 1, 27; as cited in CCC, n. 1162).
Friend Of The Fine Arts
The Fathers of the Second Vatican Council emphasized the importance of holy images by devoting the seventh chapter of Sacrosanctum Concilium (articles 122-130) to “Sacred Art and Sacred Furnishings.”
In recognizing Holy Mother Church as “the friend of the fine arts,” they affirm that “these arts, by their very nature, are oriented toward the infinite beauty of God which they attempt in some way to portray by the work of human hands; they achieve their purpose of redounding to God’s praise and glory in proportion as they are directed the more exclusively to the single aim of turning men’s minds devoutly toward God” (SC, n. 122 § 1).
While not adopting “any particular style of art as her very own” (SC, n. 123), the Church expects of her bishops that they “strive after noble beauty rather than mere sumptuous display . . . [and] carefully remove from the house of God and from other sacred places those works of artists which are repugnant to faith, morals, and Christian piety” (SC, n. 124 §§ 1, 2).
Thanks to the noble ministry of artists, “the knowledge of God is better manifested and the preaching of the Gospel becomes clearer to human intelligence” (Gaudium et Spes, n. 62).
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(Don Fier serves on the board of directors for The Catholic Servant, a Minneapolis-based monthly publication. He and his wife are the parents of seven children. Fier is a 2009 graduate of Ave Maria University’s Institute for Pastoral Theology. He is doing research for writing a definitive biography of Fr. John A. Hardon, SJ.)