How did we get from this...
to this in less than 5 years?
Can you even make out the figures of Mary, Joseph and the manger in this travesty of the Nativity scene?
Bergoglio has chosen to sacrifice the Christmas message in order to propagandize his 'mercy', though it seems all he cares about
are the corporal works of mercy. What about the spiritual?
When one must search the Vatican's
'Nativity' scene for the Holy Family
who seem like intruders in a
social activism tableau
Translated from
December 18, 2017
Finally I went. To see the Nativity scene in St. Peter’s Square. It was my friend from my favroite pizzeria in Borgo Pio who pushed me to do it: “Go...go... then tell me what you think”.
- You didn’t like it?, I asked.
- Not on your life.
- Why not?
- It made me uncomfortable. With that nude man in the foreground? The gym buff? That’s no poor man to be clothed! He seems to have just come out of a wellness center. And Mary and Joseph are lost somewhere in there, certainly almost hidden by all the other figures. But go and see, then we can talk about it.
And so I went. I must say that the nude man just overpowers everything in the tableau. He’s there in the foreground, pink-fleshed, shaved all over, muscles well-defined. My friend is right – this is no poor man who needs to be clothed! He looks more like a model well-pleased with his attributes.
Then the dead man – who seems to be on display on a table. He is covered with a white sheet, and all we see is a cadaveric arm hanging inert down one side of the table. Next to him there is a big man: we do not know what he is supposed to be doing, but he seems rather threatening, with one hand raised above the corpse and looking rather grim.
[He illustrates the corporal work of mercy ‘bury the dead’].
This Nativity scene was donated by the territorial abbey of Montevergine, and is supposed to be, as Vatican Radio tells us, “a work of art using 16th century figures executed according to the most ancient Neapolitan tradition”.
[Why the 16th century exactly? Something to do with the Lutheran schism?]
Produced by ‘a Neapolitan artisans’ workshop’, the Nativity scene occupies “a space that is almost 80 square meters and a maximum height of seven meters". It is inspired “by the corporal works of mercy, represented by 20 figures, each about 2 meters high, made up of polychrome terracotta, with crystal eyes and fabric clothing.”
I do not have any articistic competence. The statues, as single statues, are
certainly praiseworthy.
[Frankly, I don’t see anything praiseworthy at all in the individual figures, none of whom look particularly ‘aesthetic’: they are generic figures devoid of any expression – literally blank-faced - that might make them sympathetic to the beholder. The figure that is supposed to be Mary (who was 17 when she gave birth) looks like a common Neapolitan matron without the least bit of holiness about her, and I can’t see enough of Joseph to tell how he is portrayed. One commentator has noted that the nude man appears to have been lifted from some other work, which explains why the figure is so incongruous in every way – i.e., the artisan studio that made these figures did not think it worthwhile to cast a new figure to depict ‘the naked’ who must be clothed, for this grotesque and really quite ugly ensemble whose theme was approved by the pope himself.]
The impression is that one is not looking at a Nativity scene at all – that is, a representation of the birth of Jesus – but at a group of people who are quite busy doing their own thing and are really indifferent to the miracle of the Nativity.
The corporal works of mercy are represented by figures in the act of performing them: a man visits a prisoner (of whom we see only the head, which looks creepy because it seems disembodied); a woman with a jug in hand gives water to a thirsty man; a young man assists a sick one; a man looks down on the nude man and seems to offer a piece of cloth (that hangs from his hand and has not even managed to cover anything of the naked man); there’s someone who houses pilgrims; and the man who is presumably preparing to bury the corpse laid out on the table.
In the midst of all this social activism, Joseph and Mary seem to be almost like intruders who happen to be there by accident. Who knows, perhaps when the Baby Jesus takes his place in the manger on Christmas Eve, the Holy Family will probably find some space amid all this busy-ness, but for now, this ‘Nativity scene’ looks like a rather messy and disordered tableau depicting a social cooperative.
I repeat that I have no artistic competence, and what I am saying may horrify art experts, but I cannot deny my disconcertment. Even the Magi seem to be more concerned with the activities going on around them than by anything else. And of course, the whole tableau lacks a stall or a cave or a roof that indicates a refuge, instead of which there is the suggestion of a dome, as though Jesus had chosen to be born in a quake-damaged church of which only a small tottering piece has been left behind.
I read somewhere that Facebook refused to publish a photo of this tableau because it is “sexually allusive and provocative” – because, of course, of the nude man whom my friend calls the gym buff. I do not know how Facebook works out its criteria for 'acceptability' and I do not wish to get into it. I will limit myself for now to imagining what a child might say who is brought to look at this ‘Nativity’ scene.
- Excuse me, mamma and papa, but where is Our Lady? And St Joseph? And the Baby Jesus?
- You have to look closely, son.
- Where?
- There... to the left of the man who is... well, naked. Don’t you see?
- No, I see nothing...
- OK, let’s move a bit... Now, do you see?
- No, I see the head of a dark-haired man seen through a small window. Did they cut it off?
- No my son, they didn’t. That is a man in prison, with his head showing through the window. He is being helped.
- Well, but where is Baby Jesus?
- Let’s move again... Now, do you see?
- No, now I see a man on a table covered with a white cloth. Why?
- Because he is... mmm, dead.
- A dead man! Why? Who killed him? What did they do to him?
- Nothing, my son. He died, and now he must be buried.
- And the Child Jesus?
- Let’s move again, and I will lift you up. Now, do you see?
- No, what I see is one of the Three Kings with a turban around his head. I don’t like it.
- Come on, son, don’t say that!
- Papa, mamma! Let us go! I am afraid...
- Why? Don’t you like this Nativity scene?
- No. I don’t like it. It gives me the creeps...
So there! Now I shall go find my friend the pizzamaker. I know we shall have much to chat about!
While we're at it, let's remind ourselves of the works of mercy:
I can't seem to find any reference to when the Church drew up these lists, about which the Catechism says the following:
2447 The works of mercy are charitable actions by which we come to the aid of our neighbor in his spiritual and bodily necessities. Instructing, advising, consoling, comforting are spiritual works of mercy, as are forgiving and bearing wrongs patiently.
The corporal works of mercy consist especially in feeding the hungry, sheltering the homeless, clothing the naked, visiting the sick and imprisoned, and burying the dead. Among all these, giving alms to the poor is one of the chief witnesses to fraternal charity: it is also a work of justice pleasing to God...
2448 In its various forms - material deprivation, unjust oppression, physical and psychological illness and death - human misery is the obvious sign of the inherited condition of frailty and need for salvation in which man finds himself as a consequence of original sin. This misery elicited the compassion of Christ the Savior, who willingly took it upon himself and identified himself with the least of his brethren.
Hence, those who are oppressed by poverty are the object of a preferential love on the part of the Church which, since her origin and in spite of the failings of many of her members, has not ceased to work for their relief, defense, and liberation through numerous works of charity which remain indispensable always and everywhere.
In the Catholic Church, the works of mercy are encouraged as an act of both penance and charity. The Protestants see the works of mercy as a means of grace which lead to holiness and aid in sanctification. The works of mercy are based on specific mitzvah (commandments based on divine law) found in the Jewish Torah (as a Jew, Jesus and his family would have observed all these mitzvahs - more than 600 of them - religiously). The corporal works of mercy are echoed in the New Testament by the so-called 'sheep and goats' preaching of Jesus as recounted in the Gospel of Matthew (25:31-46), in which the allusions to specific works of mercy come from examples that the Lord gave in his Sermon on the Mount:
"But when the Son of Man comes in his glory, and all the holy angels with him, then he will sit on the throne of his glory.
Before him all the nations will be gathered, and he will separate them one from another, as a shepherd separates the sheep from the goats. He will set the sheep on his right hand, but the goats on the left.
Then the King will tell those on his right hand, ‘Come, blessed of my Father, inherit the Kingdom prepared for you from the foundation of the world; for I was hungry, and you gave me food to eat. I was thirsty, and you gave me drink. I was a stranger, and you took me in. I was naked, and you clothed me. I was sick, and you visited me. I was in prison, and you came to me.’
“Then the righteous will answer him, saying, ‘Lord, when did we see you hungry, and feed you; or thirsty, and give you a drink? When did we see you as a stranger, and take you in; or naked, and clothe you? When did we see you sick, or in prison, and come to you?’
“The King will answer them, ‘Most certainly I tell you, because you did it to one of the least of these my brothers, you did it to me.’
Then he will say also to those on the left hand, ‘Depart from me, you cursed, into the eternal fire which is prepared for the devil and his angels; for I was hungry, and you didn’t give me food to eat; I was thirsty, and you gave me no drink; I was a stranger, and you didn’t take me in; naked, and you didn’t clothe me; sick, and in prison, and you didn’t visit me.’
“Then they will also answer, saying, ‘Lord, when did we see you hungry, or thirsty, or a stranger, or naked, or sick, or in prison, and didn’t help you?’
“Then he will answer them, saying, ‘Most certainly I tell you, because you didn’t do it to one of the least of these, you didn’t do it to me.’ These will go away into eternal punishment, but the righteous into eternal life.”
But since Bergoglio and Bergoglianism apparently believe that everyone will be saved ultimately, everyone goes to heaven and there really is no Hell, it would seem they do not think there is a Final Judgment at all, so I don't know that this pope ever thinks at all about this 'sheep and goats' teaching. Anyway, did we hear any of these Last Judgment considerations at all from this pope in the weeks of Advent of which it is the theme?
But back to Christmas and some relatively unknown facts about how St. Francis of Assisi thought it ought to be celebrated, after adoring the Christ Child wherever the Nativity scene is re-created as he first did in Greccio in the early 13th century...
That infamous 'consumeristic Christmas'?
It originated with the poor Saint of Assisi -
here is how and why
Translated from
December 17, 2017
Every year at Christmas we hear moralistic sermonizing deprecating the ‘consumeristic Christmas’, replete with anathemas against giftgiving and denunciations of Christmas feasting as sinful waste.
Leading this pontifications in banality, as usual, is the Pontiff himself, Bergoglio, who thunders against ‘the feast of commercial consumerism’, ‘useless gifts’, and ‘abundant waste’. Superficial thoughts that find no equivalent in the great treasury of spiritual literature about the Birth of Jesus.
Above all – far from being an evil – the so-called ‘race for Christmas consumerism’ is, from a social viewpoint, a true manna every year for the economy in Christian nations, even in Italy which has been suffering from great unemployment.
In practice, it provides an opportunity for most families – including those with low income – to celebrate Christmas with joy.
Also, are we sure than it is consumerism that has caused Christmas to degenerate into a secular celebration of giftgiving and abundant feasting? It doesn’t seem so, since so-called ‘consumerism’ became widespread in Italy only since the 1960s and 1970s, and even the very notion of consumerism itself is relatively recent, say, the 1950s in the United States.
Whereas Christmas has been celebrated for 2000 years. And Christian tradition itself has linked such a celebration to include giftgiving and abundant feasting.
Leo the Great had a memorable homily in the 5th century:
“There is no room for sadness on the day when Life was born, a Life that destroys our fear of death and goves us the joy of eternal promises. No one is ecluded from this happiness”.
Whenever, in recent years, I chose to ‘confront’ this idea, some were horrified and accused me of wanting to ‘sanctify’ capitalistic consumerism.
Since I was born to a family of miners, in which the Catholic faith was abundant, not money, I know from experience what poverty is, but also what the joy of Christmas always was, even for a poor family like ours.
But this is best demonstrated by someone who is above any suspicion, certainly not one linked to consumerism, luxury and wealth in his chosen vocation, one who passed into history for having been a passionate lover of “My Lady Poverty” – St. Francis of Assisi.
It is not by chance that he ‘invented’ the tradition of the Nativity scene – he was the sublime poet of Christmas, hymn-singer of the Incarnation of God.
In the text containing the testimonials of Brother Leone and some other of Francis’s first friends after his ‘conversion’, which bears the title “
Compilatio Assisiensis”, we read:
“Francis had a devtion to the Birth of Christ that was far more than he had to any other festivity of the year, because although Our Lord worked out his Redemption of man in other solemnities, the holy Francis told us, nonetheless, that work began the day he was born for us. That is why he wished every Christian to exult in the Lord on Christmas, and that, out of love for Him, who had given Himself to us, we should all be generous in expressing our joy not just towards the poor but even towards animals and birds”.
The announcement of Christmas – the supreme Gift God made to men, Himself – established for St. Francis a ‘theology of giving’, to give everything in celebrating the birth of Jesus.
Chiara Mercuri, who has reconstructed the life of the saint based on these testimonials in her book “
Francesco d’Assisi. La storia negata” (Francis of Assisi: The untold story), comments:
“Therefore, Christmas should be a day of joy and abundance for everyone. Only if this is so can it really be Christmas”.
She then explains how the saint’s Christmas wish was carried out in his time:
“They had rich dishes that were usually absent from the meals of the Franciscan friars, like meat, cheeses, wine, oil, lard and fresh fruit. Beggars, peasants, doctors, notaries, nobles joined the friars in their feasting, and the women would send the friars and the poor in the vicinity cakes of almonds and honey, pasta dishes, fritters sprinkled with rosewater, pastry rolls filled with honey, raisins, nuts and cinnamon, biscuits with anise, and peppered bread”.
In short, Mercuri concludes,
“everyone tried on this day to be ‘Christmas’ for someone else, without forgetting anyone, any living creature”.
St. Francis reached a point that he wished even his beloved larks (who sing the praises of God)
[The Italian word for lark is ‘allodole’, literally ‘those who give praise’] and all other animals to be included in the feasting.
His friends wrote in their testimonials:
“We who lived with him heard him say many times: ‘If one day I could speak to the Emperor, I will plead for him that for the love of God and through my imploration, he should issue a decree that would prohibit anyone from capturing a lark or treating a lark badly. And also that all the authorities in every city, the lords of the castles and of villages, should be required every year, on the Nativity of Our Lord, to compel their subjects to sprinkle wheat and other grains on the roads outside the cities and fortresses, so that all the birds, especially our sister larks, will not want for food on such a solemn day.
And out of reverence for the Son of God, who was delivered by his mother in the presence of an ox and a donkey, every man on that night should give enough food to our brother oxen and donkeys. In the same way, let all the poor be fed to satiety by the rich”.
As we see, the way we celebrate Christmas (the Nativity scene, gifts, gestures of charity and solidarity, abundant food on the table) are the things St. Francis thought appropriate for Christmas. He gave birth to the genuine ‘spirit of Christmas’ (beyond Charles Dickens).
The saint of Assisi reminds us that happiness is in giving, in making others happy, because all the most important things in life are given to us freely: life itself, and Creation, heaven, earth, the sea, love, and above all, salvation.
Because God gave himself freely to us, he became man, he died for us, he ransomed us from original sin to rescue us from evil, and he rose again. He taught:
“Without cost you have received; without cost you are to give” (Mt 10,8).
Giving is the logic of God. Christmas Day is not an anomaly – it is life as it should always be. Can you understand that, Mr. Scrooge?
[Modificato da TERESA BENEDETTA 19/12/2017 23:31]