Tomas Spidlik: Thoughts on Iconography and the Church Building

NewLiturgicalMovement ^ | Sunday, August 30, 2009 | Shawn Tribe

[GonzoII]

I was taken by the desire to share some further brief thoughts from the Christian East, picking up from our consideration of last week on the holy Icon and the depth of theological meaning to be found there in its various regards. I turned to a set of books published as part of the Cistercian Studies series, The Spirituality of the Christian East by Tomas Spidlik, SJ.

I began with a consideration of various paragraphs and sections, but I determined to simply instead present a few very brief quotations from those books, that might serve as a point of some brief reflection and consideration.

"The icon is one of the manifestations of the holy Tradition of the Church, just the same as the written and oral tradition.' Following Basil, the Seventh Ecumenical Council (787) compared painting to the proclamation of the faith..."

"It is not a mere painting... one venerates and contemplates icons. The aim of the art of iconography is to give witness to the presence of God in his visible image... the composition and the perspective, the colors and the light, the decorative elements: everything takes on a spiritual meaning..."

[GonzoII]