Lithographs of Victorian Catholic Churches in North America

Church of the Holy Trinity, Columbia, Pennsylvania.

Website is here

The church was founded by the then Bishop Saint John Neumann

St. Vincent de Paul's Church, Germantown, Pa.

The church was built 1849-1851 and enlarged 1857 and was part of a complex which included a seminary and chapel completed in 1879

The church was the first parish named after St. Vincent de Paul

Website is here 

Eglise du Precieux Sang, Woonsocket, Rhode Island (The Church of the Precious Blood of Woonsocket, RI)

Woonsocket, Rhode Island, was the fourth largest Franco-American town. Besides having a beautiful name, it also had one of the highest percentage of French Canadian population in all of New England (60%). There were five French-Canadian parishes in the city by the 1920’s.

The church was founded in 1828 and the building was constructed in 1873 and is listed in the National Register of Historic Places

Contact details are here

The Church of the Most Holy Redeemer, now known as Santísimo Redentor, 161-165 East 3rd Street, the East Village, Manhattan

It was once the most important in Manhattan's  Kleindeutschland "Little Germany" 

The Wikipedia entry is here

The parish website is here

The Favey Library at Villanova University  has put on line a collection of Catholic church lithographs by the Philadelphia lithography firm of Packard and Butler (later Packard, Butler and Partridge), 

There are over 400 prints of interior or exterior views of Catholic churches throughout the United States and parts of Canada during the nineteenth century

The prints seem to have been produced for a variety of uses. There are a number of prints that were used as certificates commemorating First Holy Communion and Confirmation.

There are also a few portraits of priests:

Reverend B.F. McLoughlin, Pastor of St Mary`s Church, Cortland, New York

Brescia and the Eucharist

Alessandro Bonvicino ("il Moretto") (1498 circa – 1554)

Il Cristo eucaristico con i santi Cosma e Damiano

Christ in the Eucharist with Saints Cosmo and Damian

c. 1540

Oil on canvas

261 x 160 cm

Chiesa parrocchiale dei Santi Cosma e Damiano, Marmentino (Brescia)

The inscription on the altar in the above painting reads:

"Panem Angelorum Manducavit Homo"

Alessandro Bonvicino ("il Moretto") (1498 circa – 1554)

Il Cristo eucaristico con i santi Bartolomeo e Rocco

Christ in the Eucharist with Saints Bartholomew and Rocco

c. 1545

Oil on canvas

254 x 175 cm

Chiesa parrocchiale di San Bartolomeo, Castenedolo (Brescia)

It is often forgotten that the Reform or Renewal  of the Catholic Church did not begin with the Council of Trent (1545–1563), Saint Pope Pius V and St Charles Borromeo

Unlike Luther and his followers, reformers stayed within the Church and reformed from within

These reformers did not change doctrine but reformed morals and acts, starting with themselves

They started their work before Luther issued his 95 Theses in 1517

One of these centres of reform or renewal  before Trent was Brescia in Northern Italy

The great impetus of this conservative   reform came from the bottom up and was not top down and in particular came from lay confraternities aided and encouraged by sympathetic clergy

Unlike in Germany and unlike Luther and the reformers there, these conservative reformers were not clergy and not academics 

They also kept out of the secular politics of the time and did not seek secular power

One of the great figures in this reform based in Brescia was St Angela Merici  (21 March 1474 – 27 January 1540) who in 1535 with twenty eight companions founded the Company of St Ursula  on 25 November

But this was part of a wider movement for renewal

Along with other Brescian painters, Moretto strove to interpret sacred themes in light of the fervent desire for church reform and renewed piety on the part of the lay community that swept through northern Italy from the 1520s

Moretto himself participated in this movement by his involvement in confraternities, such as that of the Santissimo Sacramento based in Brescia's cathedral of which Moretto was himself consigliere. He is also buried in the common tomb of the Confratelli della Scuola del Santissimo Sacramento in San Clemente

The thirteenth session of the Council of Trent was held on 11 October, 1551; it promulgated a comprehensive decree on the Sacrament of the Eucharist (in eight chapters and eleven canons)

At the twenty-second session, which was not held until 17 September, 1562, four decrees were promulgated: the first contained the dogma of the Church on the Sacrifice of the Mass (in nine chapters and nine canons); the second directed the suppression of abuses in the offering of the Holy Sacrifice; a third (in eleven chapters) treated reform, especially in regard to the morals of the clergy

As can be seen Moretto`s works with his own great devotion to the Blessed Sacrament anticipate the conclusions of the Council of Trent which did not publish its conclusions until well after his death

These conclusions at Trent were not in reaction to the Lutheran reformers but reflected the understanding of the faith prior to the break with the Lutherans and others

The works by Moretto were commissioned by Donato Savallo, the archpriest of the Cathedral in Brescia

Savallo had been in Brescia since 1524 and also had tied benefits to parishes in the region around Brescia including Marmentino and Castenedolo

It would appear that there was a strong and close connection between Savallo and Morettp since 1530 when Savallo corresponded with  Moretto about the construction of the organ for the church at Salo at Lago di Garda

It should be noted that Aurelio Durante and Donato Savallo, archdeacon and archpriest of the Cathedral of Brescia were given papal authority to  execute the Bull Regimini Universalis Ecclesiae (5th June 1544) confirming the Order of Ursulines after the death of St Angela Merici

It would be good to know more about the life of this rather unknown priest Donato Savallo who appears to have been one of the major figures in the renewal at Brescia

Moretto also had close connections with Vincenzo Stella and Agostino Gallo both closely associated with the Oratory of Divine Love in Brescia as well as St Angela Merici herself

The legacy of the reformers lasted well after they had passed to another life and their influence reverberated for centuries

Both works were for  Chapels of the Blessed Sacrament and were built by the Confraternity of the Blessed Sacrament of which Moretto was a distinguished member

At Marmentino the work is still in situ but not in the Chapel but above the High Altar and it is a wonderful work. It can be seen on this website Itinerari Brescia from where the following photographs by Laura Gatti were taken:

On the website of the Parish of S Bartolomeo in Castenedolo, we learn that the picture of Saint Bartholomew  can not be seen in the original chapel of the Chapel of the Blessed Sacrament again built by the Confraternity of which Moretto was a member. 

Unfortunately, the original church was destroyed by an earthquake in 1799 

It would appear from the website that the Confraternity there at the time was called the ‘Disciplina di San Rocco e San Sebastiano’ which explains the presence of San Rocco

The commentary on the work and its history in the website is most interesting

Here is  a picture of the work in its present setting:

Four hundred years later,  it was that great citizen of Brescia, Pope Paul VI with his Encyclical Mysterium Fidei (3rd September 1965) who had to step in and set out clearly concisely and precisely the dogmas on the Eucharist and the Holy Sacrifice of the Mass in the face of misguided calls (again mainly from Germany and Northern Europe especially the Netherlands) to undermine and change the Dogmas at the Second Vatican Council

He wrote:

"3. In order to make the indissoluble bond that exists between faith and devotion perfectly clear, the Fathers of the Council decided, in the course of reaffirming the doctrine that the Church has always held and taught and that was solemnly defined by the Council of Trent, to offer the following compendium of truths as an introduction to their treatment of the Most Holy Mystery of the Eucharist: 

4. "At the Last Supper, on the night when He was betrayed, our Saviour instituted the Eucharistic Sacrifice of His Body and Blood. He did this in order to perpetuate the Sacrifice of the Cross throughout the centuries until He should come again, and so to entrust to His beloved Spouse, the Church, a memorial of His Death and Resurrection: a sacrament of love, a sign of unity, a bond of charity, a paschal banquet in which Christ is eaten, the mind is filled with grace, and a pledge of future glory is given to us.''

5. These words highlight both the sacrifice, which pertains to the essence of the Mass that is celebrated daily, and the sacrament in which those who participate in it through holy Communion eat the flesh of Christ and drink the blood of Christ, and thus receive grace, which is the beginning of eternal life, and the "medicine of immortality" according to Our Lord's words: "The man who eats my flesh and drinks my blood enjoys eternal life, and I will raise him up on the last day."

Both the paintings depict Eucharistic Adoration.

Of this Pope Paul VI said this:

"ON THE WORSHIP OF LATRIA 

56. The Catholic Church has always displayed and still displays this latria that ought to be paid to the Sacrament of the Eucharist, both during Mass and outside of it, by taking the greatest possible care of consecrated Hosts, by exposing them to the solemn veneration of the faithful, and by carrying them about in processions to the joy of great numbers of the people. 

57. The ancient documents of the Church offer many evidences of this veneration. The bishops of the Church always urged the faithful to take the greatest possible care of the Eucharist that they had in their homes. "The Body of Christ is meant to be eaten by the faithful, not to be treated with irreverence," is the serious warning of St. Hippolytus.  

58. In fact, the faithful regarded themselves as guilty, and rightly so as Origen recalls, if, after they had received the body of the Lord and kept it with all reverence and caution, some part of it were to fall to the ground through negligence.  

59. These same bishops were severe in reproving any lack of due reverence that might occur. We have evidence of this from the words of Novatian, whose testimony is trustworthy in this matter; He felt that anybody deserved to be condemned who "came out after Sunday service bringing the Eucharist with him, as was the custom, . . . and carried the holy body of the Lord around with him," going off to places of amusement instead of going home.  

60. In fact, St. Cyril of Alexandria denounced as mad the opinion that the Eucharist was of no use to sanctification if some of it were left over for another day. "For Christ is not altered," he says, "and His holy body is not changed; instead the power and force and life-giving grace of the blessing remain in it forever."  

61. Nor should we forget that in ancient times the faithful—whether being harassed by violent persecutions or living in solitude out of love for monastic life—nourished themselves even daily on the Eucharist, by receiving Holy Communion from their own hands when there was no priest or deacon present.  

62. We are not saying this with any thought of effecting a change in the manner of keeping the Eucharist and of receiving Holy Communion that has been laid down by subsequent ecclesiastical laws still in force; Our intention is that we may rejoice over the faith of the Church which is always one and the same."

The Redeemer and the Cross

Alessandro Bonvicino  (c. 1498 – December 22, 1554) ("Il Moretto da Brescia")

Il Redentore con la croce e un devoto

The Redeemer with the Cross and a Worshipper

1518

Oil on panel

78 x 62 cm

Accademia Carrara, Bergamo

At first they thought the painting was by Titian. It was certainly Northern Italian

Then they attributed it to Il Moretto from Brescia who in his early years certainly was influenced by Titian and the Venetians

This is an early work

Alexis-François Rio (20 May 1797 - 17 June 1874),  in his revised and extensively expanded 1861 edition of De l`art chretien described Moretto as "one of Italy's greatest painters."' and saw in him a "hint of sadness which when it appears in his paintings lends them an inexpressible charm."

Rio also noted Moretto's "calm and noble imagination, a spirit at once tender and serene, and a greater aptitude for meditation than for the intuition of sublime things."'

Moretto was the dominant artist active in Brescia in the 1530s and 1540s.

He was a very active member of the Scuola del Santissimo Sacramento attached to the cathedral in Brescia and painted a group of pictures for the confraternity

He and the Brescian school at the time were intent on depicting humble and natural reality

It is a puzzling and complex work

Outside a fortified town or fortress, the man - a solitary -  has been reading a book

It seems a dull and oppressive day

It is a sombre work

The landscape is dark and strange and it has been noted that it is similar to the landscape depicted by Giorgione in his Tempest

The work is Christian allegory and the artist is obviously familiar with Titian`s Noli me Tangere  (now in The National Gallery, London)

In his reading, the man has come to a part of the text from the Psalms (Psalm 31, verses 17 - 18):

"17 Illustra faciem tuam super servum tuum;

salvum me fac in misericordia tua.

18 Domine, non confundar, quoniam invocavi te.

Erubescant impii, et deducantur in infernum"

"17 Make thy face to shine upon thy servant; save me in thy mercy.

18 Let me not be confounded, O Lord, for I have called upon thee. Let the wicked be ashamed, and be brought down to hell."

He drops the book and we see what he has been reading

We see what he sees now: Christ standing before him. A risen Christ but carrying his Cross which he is just about to plant in the ground

Psalm 31 is one of the keys to understanding the painting

It is a lament. The man is alone and isolated and being hounded by all, his enemies. He is in distress

What has gone before in the narrative of the painting is in the first sixteen verses, the ones before we see written in the book

In full the Psalm reads:

"For the leader. A psalm of David.

2 In you, LORD, I take refuge;

let me never be put to shame.

In your righteousness deliver me; 

3 incline your ear to me;

make haste to rescue me!

Be my rock of refuge,

a stronghold to save me. 

4 For you are my rock and my fortress;

for your name’s sake lead me and guide me. 

5 Free me from the net they have set for me,

for you are my refuge. 

6 Into your hands I commend my spirit;

you will redeem me, LORD, God of truth. 

7 You hate those who serve worthless idols,

but I trust in the LORD. 

8 I will rejoice and be glad in your mercy,

once you have seen my misery,

[and] gotten to know the distress of my soul. 

9 You will not abandon me into enemy hands,

but will set my feet in a free and open space. 

II 

10 Be gracious to me, LORD, for I am in distress;

affliction is wearing down my eyes,

my throat and my insides. 

11 My life is worn out by sorrow,

and my years by sighing.

My strength fails in my affliction;

my bones are wearing down. 

12 To all my foes I am a thing of scorn,

and especially to my neighbours

a horror to my friends.

When they see me in public,

they quickly shy away. 

3 I am forgotten, out of mind like the dead;

I am like a worn-out tool. 

14 I hear the whispers of the crowd;

terrors are all around me.

They conspire together against me;

they plot to take my life. 

15 But I trust in you, LORD;

I say, “You are my God.” 

16 My destiny is in your hands;

rescue me from my enemies,

from the hands of my pursuers. 

17 Let your face shine on your servant;

save me in your mercy. 

18 Do not let me be put to shame,

for I have called to you, LORD.

Put the wicked to shame;

reduce them to silence in Sheol. 

19 Strike dumb their lying lips,

which speak arrogantly against the righteous

in contempt and scorn. 

III 

20 How great is your goodness, Lord,

stored up for those who fear you.

You display it for those who trust you,

in the sight of the children of Adam. 

21 You hide them in the shelter of your presence,

safe from scheming enemies.

You conceal them in your tent,

away from the strife of tongues. 

22 Blessed be the LORD,

marvelously he showed to me

his mercy in a fortified city. 

23 Though I had said in my alarm,

“I am cut off from your eyes.”

Yet you heard my voice, my cry for mercy,

when I pleaded with you for help. 

24 Love the LORD, all you who are faithful to him.

The LORD protects the loyal,

but repays the arrogant in full. 

25 Be strong and take heart,

all who hope in the LORD."

In his misery and distress the man repeats the words of Christ on Calvary:

"6 Into your hands I commend my spirit"

They are the last words of Compline, the last prayer of the night

In the painting we see God`s face shining on his servant, saving and redeeming through his infinite mercy and love. The servant sees the face of God

On the column there is another inscription

The abbreviated inscription reads:

"VNI DEO/ ET HO MEDI/ HO CHRI/ IESU"

The text is from St Paul`s First Letter to Timothy (1 Tim. ii. 5):

 "Unus enim Deus, unus et mediator Dei et hominum homo Christus Jesus"

" There is one God, and one Mediator of God and men, the man Christ Jesus."

The theme is individual salvation

The devotee calls and looks on the face of Christ.

Christ beckons him forward but is looking at the top right of the painting: angels ascending into Heaven

On the far left one can just see the shepherd with his flock of sheep. There is a sheep around his shoulders as he carries it to safety,  a symbol of the Good Shepherd and the mercy of God

We recall the parable of the lost sheep in Luke 15: 1 - 7 and in particular verse 5:

"And when he does find it [the lost sheep], he sets it on his shoulders with great joy"

The Last Supper by Pourbus the Younger

Frans Pourbus the Younger (1569–1622)

The Last Supper

1618

Oil on canvas

287 x 370 cm

Musée du Louvre, Paris

Frans Pourbus the Younger (1569–1622)

The Last Supper

1617

Black stone, black and brown ink on paper

33 cm x 52.1 cm

Musée du Louvre, Paris

The Last Supper was painted for the high altar of the church of Saint-Leu-Saint-Gilles in Paris, which dates back to the 13th century

Apparently Poussin admired the work and praised it greatly

It was considered to be Pourbus` masterpiece

It had a considerable influence on French painting

The work appears to have been commissioned when Cardinal Henri de Gandi, Archbishop of Paris, (« cardinal de Retz »)  made it into a parish church in its own right in 1617 after the erection of the choir of the church in 1611

Flemish by birth and training, Pourbus was court painter of Archduke Albert in Brussels when in 1600 he went to Italy at the invitation of Vincenzo Gonzaga, Duke of Mantua

In 1611 he became Maria de' Medici's court painter in Paris as well as that of Louis XIII

He is renowned now mainly for his portraits and for his historical scenes

His religious art is often overlooked

Late Mannerist, he was the son and grandson of artists

It has been said of the artist that he inherited from them "an incredibly ornate, decorative style, and the ability to depict the various textures of skin, hair, fabric, lace and pearl with admirable precision"

In his portraits he followed the international style where the portrayal of character was less important than the meticulous reproduction of sumptuous costumes and jewellery.

Image was more important than the reality

But here in this religious work we see the intelligent characterisation and dramatisation of an historical event which  was to change the history of mankind

We see a Christ who is majestic yet human, humble and of common stock

He is seated not lying down on a couch

His authority is evident and natural

His hands are in a tender embrace towards his apostles

Each apostle is differeniated

Judas rises from the table, with his purse, the sole object of his attention

In the standard work on the artist, Blaise Ducos, Frans Pourbus le Jeune (1569-1622): Le Portrait d’apparat à l’aube du Grand Siècle entre Habsbourg, Médicis, et Bourbons. Paris : Faton, 2011. 399 pp. ISBN: 978-2-87844-151-2,  Ducos (curator of Dutch and Flemish Painting at the Louvre) argues that the artist`s key to success was his ability to adjust his pictorial style subtly to suit the particular needs and tastes of the court for which he was working 

This was the age of Rubens, a man Pourbus knew very well. It was a time when  the artist was expected to serve and advance the interests of his patrons as players in a highly theatricalised court culture. 

But in this work there is no flattery and no advancement of human patrons

It is simply a prayer and a statement of an article of the artist`s faith

Jacopo da Sellaio and The Passion

Jacopo da Sellaio (c. 1441–1493), sometimes known as Jacopo di Arcangel

Cristo salvatore con i simboli della passione

1480

Tempera on panel

28.3 cm x 35 cm

Accademia Carrara, Bergamo

Jacopo da Sellaio (c. 1441–1493), sometimes known as Jacopo di Arcangel

Christ with Instruments of the Passion

c. 1485

Tempera on panel

67 cm x 50.8 cm

Museum of Art, Birmingham, Alabama

Jacopo da Sellaio (c. 1441–1493), sometimes known as Jacopo di Arcangel

Votive Altarpiece: the Trinity, the Virgin, St. John and Donors

c. 1480 - 5

Tempera on panel

127 cm  x 75 cm

The National Museum of Western Art, Tokyo

The Passion and the Crucifixion are the themes of the above three works by the Florentine artist, Jacopo da Sellaio (c. 1441–1493)

He was so named because his father was a saddler

Said by Vasari to be a pupil of Fra Filippo Lippi, his style is eclectic and his more mature work  shows the influence of  Filippino Lippi, Botticelli, and also of  Domenico Ghirlandaio

From the late 1470s until his death, Sellaio was one of the most productive Florentine painters of his generation. He maintained a professional workshop in Florence with Filippo di Giuliano

The first two works depict Christ with Arma Christi ("Weapons of Christ"), or the Instruments of the Passion

They were an aid to the  contemplation of the suffering of Christ.

As well as the Crown of Thorns we see the  whips by which he was scourged, the nails that pinned him to the Cross, the spear that pierced his side and the sponge full of vinegar he was given to drink

As the Man of Sorrows, we recall  Isaiah (53: 3): 

‘He was despised and rejected of men, a man of sorrows, and acquainted with grief’.

In Thurston, H. (1911). Devotion to the Passion of Christ. In The Catholic Encyclopedia. New York: Robert Appleton Company. Retrieved April 7, 2014 from New Advent we learn of the great lay devotion to the Passion of Our Lord in the Middle Ages:

"[I]n the fourteenth and fifteenth centuries we have innumerable illustrations of the adoption by the laity of new practices of piety to honour Our Lord's Passion. 

One of the most fruitful and practical was that type of spiritual pilgrimage to the Holy Places of Jerusalem, which eventually crystalized into what is now known to us as the "Way of the Cross". The "Seven Falls" and the "Seven Bloodsheddings" of Christ may be regarded as variants of this form of devotion. 

How truly genuine was the piety evoked in an actual pilgrimage to the Holy Land is made very clear, among other documents, by the narrative of the journeys of the Dominican Felix Fabri at the close of the fifteenth century, and the immense labour taken to obtain exact measurements shows how deeply men's hearts were stirred by even a counterfeit pilgrimage. 

Equally to this period belong both the popularity of the Little Offices of the Cross and "De Passione", which are found in so many of the Horæ, manuscript and printed, and also the introduction of new Masses in honour of the Passion, such for example as those which are now almost universally celebrated upon the Fridays of Lent. 

Lastly, an inspection of the prayer-books compiled towards the close of the Middle Ages for the use of the laity, such as the "Horæ Beatæ Mariæ Virginis", the "Hortulus Animæ", the "Paradisus Animæ" etc., shows the existence of an immense number of prayers either connected with incidents in the Passion or addressed to Jesus Christ upon the Cross. 

The best known of these perhaps were the fifteen prayers attributed to St. Bridget, and described most commonly in English as "the Fifteen O's", from the exclamation with which each began"

The third painting was  an altarpiece commissioned by a widower in memory of his wife and daughter and was donated to a church in Florence. 

It is an "In Memoriam", a symbol of grief by those left behind

Like the second painting, the composition shows the city of Florence straddling the Arno River in the background

Florence is the scene of grief and Christ is at the centre of those who suffer

But in the third painting we see  the Holy Trinity of God, the Holy Spirit and Christ seen at the top of the composition. At the base of the Cross, the corpses of two women, thought to be mother and daughter, are laid out. 

On either side, the donor of the work and his son are shown accompanied by the Virgin and St John.

They are in mourning and the mourners invoke the Saints who mourned Our Lord while he died and at the moment of his death and beyond. Until His glorious Resurrection

The bereft father and son seek consolation and explanation

In the Encyclical Evangelium Vitae, Blessed Pope John Paul II made what seemed a digression but which went to the very heart of what was one of the great themes of his Pontificate: "The Gospel of Life".

At the centre of his meditation was the Passion and Crucifixion of Our Lord which puts into proper context and relief all of the medieval Church`s  devotion to the Passion

He wrote:

""They shall look on him whom they have pierced" (Jn 19:37): the Gospel of life is brought to fulfilment on the tree of the Cross

50. At the end of this chapter, in which we have reflected on the Christian message about life, I would like to pause with each one of you to contemplate the One who was pierced and who draws all people to himself (cf. Jn 19:37; 12:32). Looking at "the spectacle" of the Cross (cf. Lk 23:48) we shall discover in this glorious tree the fulfilment and the complete revelation of the whole Gospel of life. 

In the early afternoon of Good Friday, "there was darkness over the whole land ... while the sun's light failed; and the curtain of the temple was torn in two" (Lk 23:44, 45). This is the symbol of a great cosmic disturbance and a massive conflict between the forces of good and the forces of evil, between life and death. 

Today we too find ourselves in the midst of a dramatic conflict between the "culture of death" and the "culture of life". 

But the glory of the Cross is not overcome by this darkness; rather, it shines forth ever more radiantly and brightly, and is revealed as the centre, meaning and goal of all history and of every human life. 

Jesus is nailed to the Cross and is lifted up from the earth. He experiences the moment of his greatest "powerlessness", and his life seems completely delivered to the derision of his adversaries and into the hands of his executioners: he is mocked, jeered at, insulted (cf. Mk 15:24-36). 

And yet, precisely amid all this, having seen him breathe his last, the Roman centurion exclaims: "Truly this man was the Son of God!" (Mk 15:39). It is thus, at the moment of his greatest weakness, that the the Son of God is revealed for who he is: on the Cross his glory is made manifest. 

By his death, Jesus sheds light on the meaning of the life and death of every human being. 

Before he dies, Jesus prays to the Father, asking forgiveness for his persecutors (cf. Lk 23:34), and to the criminal who asks him to remember him in his kingdom he replies: "Truly, I say to you, today you will be with me in Paradise" (Lk 23:43). After his death "the tombs also were opened, and many bodies of the saints who had fallen asleep were raised" (Mt 27:52). 

The salvation wrought by Jesus is the bestowal of life and resurrection. Throughout his earthly life, Jesus had indeed bestowed salvation by healing and doing good to all (cf. Acts 10:38). But his miracles, healings and even his raising of the dead were signs of another salvation, a salvation which consists in the forgiveness of sins, that is, in setting man free from his greatest sickness and in raising him to the very life of God. 

On the Cross, the miracle of the serpent lifted up by Moses in the desert (Jn 3:14-15; cf. Num 21:8-9) is renewed and brought to full and definitive perfection. Today too, by looking upon the one who was pierced, every person whose life is threatened encounters the sure hope of finding freedom and redemption.  

51. But there is yet another particular event which moves me deeply when I consider it. "When Jesus had received the vinegar, he said, `It is finished'; and he bowed his head and gave up his spirit" (Jn 19:30). Afterwards, the Roman soldier "pierced his side with a spear, and at once there came out blood and water" (Jn 19:34). 

Everything has now reached its complete fulfilment. 

The "giving up" of the spirit describes Jesus' death, a death like that of every other human being, but it also seems to allude to the "gift of the Spirit", by which Jesus ransoms us from death and opens before us a new life. 

It is the very life of God which is now shared with man. It is the life which through the Sacraments of the Church-symbolized by the blood and water flowing from Christ's side-is continually given to God's children, making them the people of the New Covenant. From the Cross, the source of life, the "people of life" is born and increases. 

The contemplation of the Cross thus brings us to the very heart of all that has taken place. Jesus, who upon entering into the world said: "I have come, O God, to do your will" (cf. Heb 10:9), made himself obedient to the Father in everything and, "having loved his own who were in the world, he loved them to the end" (Jn 13:1), giving himself completely for them. 

He who had come "not to be served but to serve, and to give his life as a ransom for many" (Mk 10:45), attains on the Cross the heights of love: "Greater love has no man than this, that a man lay down his life for his friends" (Jn 15:13). And he died for us while we were yet sinners (cf. Rom 5:8). 

In this way Jesus proclaims that life finds its centre, its meaning and its fulfilment when it is given up. 

At this point our meditation becomes praise and thanksgiving, and at the same time urges us to imitate Christ and follow in his footsteps (cf. 1 Pt 2:21). 

We too are called to give our lives for our brothers and sisters, and thus to realize in the fullness of truth the meaning and destiny of our existence. 

We shall be able to do this because you, O Lord, have given us the example and have bestowed on us the power of your Spirit. We shall be able to do this if every day, with you and like you, we are obedient to the Father and do his will. 

Grant, therefore, that we may listen with open and generous hearts to every word which proceeds from the mouth of God. Thus we shall learn not only to obey the commandment not to kill human life, but also to revere life, to love it and to foster it."

In the days of when mass industrial warfare, abortion, euthanasia and suicide are legitimised and practised on a scale hitherto undreamed of, it is no wonder that we moderns can only gaze with incomprehension, incredulity and lack of empathy and emotion  at such medieval art of the Passion and Crucifixion

Nicolaus de Lyra

God Blessing All of Creation

From Nicolaus de Lyra Postilla in Bibliam

c. 1500

Illuminated manuscript

f.001, MS 0052

Tours BM

Nicholas of Lyra (French: Nicolas de Lyre) (c. 1270–October 1349), or Nicolaus Lyranus, a Franciscan teacher, was among the most influential practitioners of Biblical exegesis in the Middle Ages. 

Born into a Jewish family, Nicholas of Lyra received baptism and became a Catholic Christian. In 1291 he entered the Franciscan order, in the convent of Verneuil-sur-Avre . 

He was a doctor at the Sorbonne by 1309 and ten years later was appointed the head of all Franciscans in France. 

His major work, Postillae perpetuae in universam S. Scripturam, was the first printed commentary on the Bible. 

Postilla litteralis super Bibliam (1322-31) was, after the twelfth-century Glossa ordinaria, the most widely copied and disseminated of all medieval Bible commentaries . 

In Nicholas's own time and for centuries afterward, the Postilla served as a key reference work for scholars who wished to establish the literal sense of a passage and who wanted information on how Jews interpreted particular passages within the Hebrew Bible.

His knowledge of Jewish tradition was drawn from Rashi, whom he transcribes almost word for word, and who also was an advocate of literal exegesis ("peshaṭ").

In his Preface to the Report of the Pontifical Biblical Commission entitled The Jewish People and their Sacred Scriptures in the Christian Bible (2001), the then Prefect of the Congregation of the Faith Joseph Cardinal Ratzinger wrote:

"It is clear that a Christian rejection of the Old Testament would not only put an end to Christianity itself as indicated above, but, in addition, would prevent the fostering of positive relations between Christians and Jews, precisely because they would lack common ground. 

In the light of what has happened, what ought to emerge now is a new respect for the Jewish interpretation of the Old Testament. 

On this subject, the Document says two things. 

First it declares that “the Jewish reading of the Bible is a possible one, in continuity with the Jewish Scriptures of the Second Temple period, a reading analogous to the Christian reading, which developed in parallel fashion” (no. 22). It adds that Christians can learn a great deal from a Jewish exegesis practised for more than 2000 years; in return, Christians may hope that Jews can profit from Christian exegetical research (ibid.). 

I think this analysis will prove useful for the pursuit of Judeo-Christian dialogue, as well as for the interior formation of Christian consciousness."

The Creation

Giovannino de`Grassi (c 1350 circa – 6th July 1398) and workshop

Separation of Earth and Water and the flowering of the Earth

From Libro d`Ore di Gian Galeazzo Visconti ("L`Offiziolo di Gian Galeazzo Visconti")

c. 1389

247 x 179 mm

LF22, f.30r

Biblioteca  Nazionale Centrale Di Firenze, Florence

The "Offiziolo Visconti" (or Book of Hours Visconti) is  a two-volume illuminated codex commissioned for Gian Galeazzo Visconti, 1st Duke of Milan.

The Visconti Hours is considered to be one of the masterpieces of Lombard miniature.

Fra Amadeo was responsible for the text of the book of prayers and signed his work, 

De`Grassi probably started and finished his portion of the work before he was commissioned for a number of works in Milan Cathedral as sculptor and architect

The Creation narratives in Genesis are often passed over and ignored. Possibly this is due to the distractions of the so-called "Creationism" debates, whether the Genesis accounts are fact, as distinct from the modern scientific accounts of how life came into being

These so-called "debates" cause the essential meaning of God the Creator to be misunderstood and lost

In the Easter Vigil the Creation narratives are an important part of the liturgy

In April 2011, Pope Benedict XVI at the Easter liturgy went into the subject at some length:

Here is but a short extract of what was more an extended essay than homily:

"At the Easter Vigil, the journey along the paths of sacred Scripture begins with the account of creation. 

This is the liturgy’s way of telling us that the creation story is itself a prophecy. 

It is not information about the external processes by which the cosmos and man himself came into being. The Fathers of the Church were well aware of this. They did not interpret the story as an account of the process of the origins of things, but rather as a pointer towards the essential, towards the true beginning and end of our being. 

Now, one might ask: is it really important to speak also of creation during the Easter Vigil? Could we not begin with the events in which God calls man, forms a people for himself and creates his history with men upon the earth? The answer has to be: no. 

To omit the creation would be to misunderstand the very history of God with men, to diminish it, to lose sight of its true order of greatness. The sweep of history established by God reaches back to the origins, back to creation. 

Our profession of faith begins with the words: “We believe in God, the Father Almighty, Creator of heaven and earth”. If we omit the beginning of the Credo, the whole history of salvation becomes too limited and too small. 

The Church is not some kind of association that concerns itself with man’s religious needs but is limited to that objective. No, she brings man into contact with God and thus with the source of all things. Therefore we relate to God as Creator, and so we have a responsibility for creation. 

Our responsibility extends as far as creation because it comes from the Creator. Only because God created everything can he give us life and direct our lives. 

Life in the Church’s faith involves more than a set of feelings and sentiments and perhaps moral obligations. It embraces man in his entirety, from his origins to his eternal destiny. 

Only because creation belongs to God can we place ourselves completely in his hands. And only because he is the Creator can he give us life for ever. 

Joy over creation, thanksgiving for creation and responsibility for it all belong together."

Isodore and Leander

Bartolomé Esteban Murillo (1617 –  1682)

Saint Isidore

1655

Oil on canvas

193 x 165 cm

Sacristy, The Cathedral, Seville

Bartolomé Esteban Murillo (1617 –  1682)

Saint Leander

1655

Oil on canvas

188 x 160 cm

Sacristy, The Cathedral, Seville

Murillo was born in Seville and was responsible for a number of the great treasured art works in the city and in the Cathedral

This work of St Isidore (c. 560 – 4 April 636) has its pendant in a portrait of Saint Leander of Seville (c. 534–600 or 601), brother of St. Isidore of Seville

The elder, Leander was Bishop of Seville before Isidore, who became Bishop on his brother`s death

We remember the literary works of Isidore but according to Isidore, Leander`s works were superior to his

St. Isidore wrote of his brother: "This man of suave eloquence and eminent talent shone as brightly by his virtues as by his doctrine. By his faith and zeal the Gothic people have been converted from Arianism to the Catholic faith" (De script. eccles., xxviii).

Isidore is the Doctor but Leander is the patron of their birth place and their episcopal See, Seville

The works were  composed prior to  April 1658 when Murillo is recorded as being in Madrid for several months. There  he was able to see the royal and aristocratic collections, studying in particular works by Rubens, Van Dyck and the Venetian Cinquecento masters. These artists were to have a strong influence on his subsequent work

The works were donated to Seville Cathedral by the Archdeacon of Carmona, Juan de Federigui in 1655.

Of the two works, greater emphasis is placed on Isidore as  scholar as he concentrates on the open book, while his office as archbishop is indicated by his crozier and mitre. 

In contrast, Leander is the leader and Archbishop, first and foremost. More the man of action than the intellectual

The preparatory drawings of both works are in The British Museum in London and can be seen below

Bartolomé Esteban Murillo (1617 –  1682)

St Isidore of Seville seated, his left arm rests on a book, he wears a bishop's mitre and robes and holds a staff in his right hand. 

1655 

Pen and brown ink, brown and grey wash over black chalk

260 millimetres x 208 millimetres

The British Museum, London

Bartolomé Esteban Murillo (1617 –  1682)

St Leander (Leandro) saint seated in a chair facing left, holding a paper in his right hand, wearing a bishop's mitre, robes, and holding a staff in his right hand 

c.1655 

Brush drawing in grey-brown wash, over black chalk

211 millimetres x 180 millimetres

The British Museum, London