SACRED ART AND SACRED FURNISHINGS:
WHEN BEAUTY LEADS THE SOUL TO GOD
Today we continue our journey through Sacrosanctum Concilium with Day Nine – “Sacred Art and Sacred Furnishings: When Beauty Leads the Soul to God.”
Today’s reading invites us to consider what we see when we enter a church. The altar, tabernacle, sacred images, and other furnishings should help us recognize that this is a place set apart for the worship of God. The Council teaches that sacred art should turn our minds devoutly toward Him.
Chapter VII welcomes worthy art from every age and culture. At the same time, it calls the art handed down through the centuries a treasury to be carefully preserved. It asks those responsible for our churches to protect valuable works, seek knowledgeable counsel, and choose what serves the liturgy with reverence and beauty.
We also look honestly at the years after the Council. In many churches, historic altars, Communion rails, images, and other furnishings were removed. For parishioners who had worshiped there for years, these changes were deeply painful. The Council did not command the removal of the Church’s inheritance. Its own words cause us to question whether the choices made respected what earlier generations had entrusted to the Church.
As you read, think of a church that has helped you pray. What in that space draws your attention to Christ? What does it teach you about the faith of those who came before you?
Please join us for Day Nine as we read the Council in continuity with Sacred Scripture, Sacred Tradition, and the perennial teachings of the Catholic Church.
May the beauty of our churches lead us to the One we come there to meet. May we care faithfully for the sacred inheritance we have received.
