The great and wonderful part of art is exercising imagination and discovering new ways to solve problems. One of my favorite memories in art school was the day our professor came to class with a single red clay brick. Our first thought was this is going to be the most boring drawing class ever, but then he asked us, “How many uses can you find for a brick?”
Thick as a Brick
After we quickly named multiple uses for a single brick—doorstop, paperweight, weapon, counterweight, and bookend—we were at a loss to name much more. As we scratched our heads, our teacher prompted us, “Did I restrict you to a single brick?” And we were off to the races! Wall, fireplace, house, road, sidewalk, planter, sculpture, picnic table, bookshelf, and more. I can’t remember if this was an early morning class or we were just dense, but I’ve come to believe we can teach creativity. At the very least, we need to give people permission to accept “multiple art answers can be true” and give them the opportunity to consider “other possibilities.”
Canvas bound in strings
When I taught art years ago, children who were troublemakers in regular classrooms were usually well behaved in art class. I attribute this outcome to their ability to express their own individuality in solving the weekly art assignments. Math always has a right answer; there is no “alternative fact” to 2 + 2 = 4. History is the same: the Confederacy seceded from the Union to keep their economic system of enslavement. There was no “states rights movement,” no matter what the Lost Cause proponents pushed in our state approved textbooks. All we had to do was look at the original source documents from the 1860’s.
Simple Color Wheel
Adults usually conform to socially acceptable norms. Helping adults with creative thinking is important because the creative process is more important than the tangible result. Most adults give up the idea they will ever paint the Sistine Chapel ceiling, while children are humble enough to realize they need many more years of practice before they get that kind of opportunity. Also, what we know about creativity can’t be applied in the same way to all creative endeavors because they involve different subjective decisions and processes.
Gino Severini: Expansion of Light. (Centrifugal and Centripetal), ca. 1913 – 1914, Oil on Canvas. 65 x 43.3 cm Museo Nacional Thyssen-Bornemisza, Madrid
Creative insight depends in part on new combinations of existing ideas, concepts, and perceptions that the brain has stored over time. This is why we begin each class looking at famous art works. We need good art influences and inspiration to “prime our creative pumps” so we can draw up from the pure wellsprings of our own creativity. Just as we need spiritual food for our soul, we need beauty for our creative ideas.
First stage
Last year we worked on copying the color wheel and matching it. That is an intellectual skill. To make this into a creative, intuitive activity, we took strings and wrapped our canvases. This made multiple shapes for our colors. Using the primary colors—red, yellow, and blue, plus white—we mixed various combinations and surprised ourselves with the results.
Gail W’s first stage
Our first class was lightly attended, due to doctor appointments and vacations, so we still have room for anyone else who wants to come. All skill levels are welcome, for I’ve taught from K-5 to adults. Everyone progresses from their own level, so the longer you sit and think you wish you were good enough for lessons is merely time wasted when you could be working with a practiced teacher! Anyway, the lessons are free; you bring your materials and discover your unknown abilities and gifts. We journey with fellow travelers. Plus it keeps your brain young.
We will continue to work on this project next Friday at 10 am.
Joy and peace,
Cornelia
National Endowment for the Arts: Creativity and the Brain
In times of cultural change and uncertainty, some faith-based communities turn to apocalyptic literature to find meaning, if not solace, for their suffering. Other communities of faith look forward to a future of hope and joy, even though they live in the same circumstances.
Apocalyptic literature is a genre of writing that appeared during times of crisis or persecution. It often presents a vision of the end times and the ultimate triumph of good over evil. Apocalyptic literature has several major characteristics:
“The supreme manifestation of Satan in this world is war.” By William Blake, 1805, apocalyptic painting with tempera, gum, glue, and chalks, Tate Galleries, London.
Dualism: Apocalyptic literature often portrays a cosmic battle between good and evil forces, highlighting the struggle between light and darkness.
Symbolism: Deeper meanings and abstract concepts are represented by symbolic language and imagery.
Eschatology: Apocalyptic literature focuses on the end times (Greek eschatos last, farthest) and the ultimate judgment of humanity, exploring themes of divine justice and the afterlife.
Pseudonymity: Many apocalyptic texts attribute their authorship to famous figures from the past, using pseudonyms or false names.
Visions and Dreams: Apocalyptic literature often includes visionary experiences and dreams as a means of conveying divine messages and revelations.
The future is fixed and decided in apocalyptic literature, whereas with prophecy, people can change their future by repentance and restoring their relationship with God.
Since John was already in exile, “The Revelation to John” doesn’t bother to hide his authorship for his safety. He does claim it’s a vision of Christ mediated by an angel. It also checks the boxes of good vs evil, symbolism, the end times, and a fixed future. The actual date of this future isn’t revealed, however.
An interpretive mistake many make is to take this letter written to encourage the persecuted churches of the first century and project its message into our modern-day society. The symbols which were meaningful to John’s audience are for that historical context alone. Reinterpretations of these signs to make them relevant to our current geopolitical situation is bad scriptural interpretation.
Plate 12, First book of Urizen, by William Blake
What we can do is ask, “What can persecuted communities or suffering societies of the past teach us about resilience, hope, and faith?” Some will focus on God’s destructive forces to eradicate evil and harm. Belief in God’s power to overcome evil is a source of deep comfort for people without power. These are often the ones who feel excluded from the halls of power, but also those who believe their privilege and place is slipping away.
God’s fridge would be covered with photos!
Both these groups forget they are beloved of God, just as God loves all God’s children. Sometimes we forget God’s refrigerator is large enough to have the photographs of all the people of the world on its door, along with all our latest art works also. If that’s a humongous refrigerator, then that gives us an idea of the expansive reach of God’s love, mercy, and grace for all creation.
The First Day of Creation, by Francisco de Holanda (1545), with caption, “Let there be light.”
A negative outcome of this dualist, apocalyptic belief is extremist beliefs about the end times. Unfortunately, some extremist pastors have convinced their followers to end their lives to meet their predicted apocalyptic end of the world. The leader creates the fiction of an evil out-group to bind the members more closely to their cult and proclaims apocalyptic themes to brainwash their members. Numerous mass suicides worldwide have occurred as a result, including 914 people of Jim Jones’ People’s Temple. In 1997, 39 members of the Heaven’s Gate cult in San Diego, California, committed mass suicide by poisoning to coincide with the arrival of the Hale-Bopp comet, considering this a signal for their exit from Earth. Others have given away their entire nest eggs to apocalyptic cults because “no one will need money in the new creation.”
Paul Klee: Clarification, 1932, Oil on canvas, 27 3/4” × 37 7/8” (70.5 × 96.2 cm), The Berggruen Klee Collection, 1984 Accession Number: 1984.315.54
Some of us prefer to focus on The New Heaven and the New Earth instead, as found in Revelation 21:1-4—
Then I saw a new heaven and a new earth; for the first heaven and the first earth had passed away, and the sea was no more. And I saw the holy city, the new Jerusalem, coming down out of heaven from God, prepared as a bride adorned for her husband.
And I heard a loud voice from the throne saying,
“See, the home of God is among mortals. He will dwell with them; they will be his peoples, and God himself will be with them; he will wipe every tear from their eyes. Death will be no more; mourning and crying and pain will be no more, for the first things have passed away.”
Stage 1—strings and base colors
What a day that will be! The last time God destroyed the earth with a great flood, God placed a rainbow in the sky as a promise the earth would never be destroyed again by water.
Leonardo da Vinci said, “Where the spirit does not work with the hand there is no art.” For some people, the only “good art” is representational art, or art which faithfully describes a landscape, portrait, or still life. With abstract art, colors carry emotions and shapes to form pleasing patterns for the viewer. What will the new heaven and the new earth look like? Revelation 21:11 says “It has the glory of God and a radiance like a very rare jewel, like jasper, clear as crystal.”
Stage 2—addition of gold and silver washes
While many today think of heaven as an earthly paradise, this concept is a Persian idea of an enclosed garden, much like the original garden of Eden. We tend to imagine a heaven as being a better place than the world we know, but imagining an altogether different world is next to impossible! Luke 20:27-38 is Jesus’ answer to the law-abiding Sadducees about how relationships work in heaven, and a reminder to us heaven isn’t just a perfect earth.
When I think of the providence of God, which is grounded in creation and is always recreating the face of the earth, I remember God’s promise to Noah in Genesis 9:11-13—
“I establish my covenant with you, that never again shall all flesh be cut off by the waters of a flood, and never again shall there be a flood to destroy the earth….This is the sign of the covenant that I make between me and you and every living creature that is with you, for all future generations: I have set my bow in the clouds, and it shall be a sign of the covenant between me and the earth.”
Stage 3—Added circles and more gold and silver washes
It is this cosmic rainbow of colors, the spiritual energies which most of us cannot see for the overwhelming ordinariness of daily life. We race from chore to chore, dash from task to task, and drop exhausted at the end of our days. We long for a better life, but we’re stuck on a galloping treadmill trying to keep our feet under us. I long to walk rather than run through my days. When I was younger, older people told me to slow down. As I hit middle age, I heard I would soon start slowing down. Now that I’m inching closer to 80, slowing down is finally becoming a reality!
Vincent Van Gogh said, “Paintings have a life of their own that originate in the soul of the artist.” We cannot see the new heaven and new earth unless we stop our busywork and allow God to attend to the business of our spiritual life. When we see the first glimmers of the new heaven and the new earth, we’ll realize how imperfect our world is and begin to help change it for the better, one small act of kindness at a time. This is soul work.
Sometimes that kindness first means being kind to ourselves, when we admit we can’t say YES to everything and everyone. When we admit we actually need eight hours of sleep for our health and a daily quiet time, and we can stop to study the flowers in the cultivated gardens of our neighborhoods and in our parks.
Cosmic Rainbow—acrylic on canvas, 24” x 30”, 2024.
Then we can be a beautiful rainbow, God’s light in this world for good, and bring the hope and joy of the end times to these times. We then will bring the radiance of the new heaven and the new earth to this present age and to these yearning people.
Joy, peace, and rainbows,
Cornelia
what are the five major characteristics of apocalyptic literature – brainly.com
Middle English paradis, paradise “the Garden of Eden, heaven,” borrowed from Anglo-French paradis, borrowed from Late Latin paradīsus, borrowed from Greek parádeisos “enclosed park or pleasure ground” (Xenophon), “the Garden of Eden” (Septuagint), “the abode of the blessed, heaven” (New Testament), borrowed from an Iranian word (perhaps Median *paridaiza-) cognate with Avestan pairidaēza- “enclosure,” nominal derivative of pairidaēz- “build a barrier around,” from pairi- “before, around” (going back to Indo-European *per-i, whence also Sanskrit pári “around, about,” Greek péri “around, in excess”) + -daēza- “heap up, build” (occurring only with prefixes), going back to Indo-European *dhoi̯ǵh-éi̯e-, iterative derivative of *dhei̯ǵh- “knead, shape” — more at PERI-, FEIGN
NOTE: As an independent derivative of the verb, Avestan daēza- “heap, pile (of earth, stones)” has been compared with Greek teîchos (neuter s-stem) “wall, fortification,” toîchos (masculine) “wall of a house or enclosure,” Sanskrit dehaḥ “body,” dehī́ “wall, embankment,” Oscan feíhúss (accusative plural) “walls.” For a Germanic derivative from the same verbal base with a different sense, see DOUGH.
The older I get, the faster time flies! When I was a child, summers were long and lazy times. I actually got so bored, by the first of August I’d start to play school. I’d line up my brothers and the neighborhood children and pretend to teach them. It was our way of “playing ourselves into a new reality.”
Art has many right answers!
Children practice life lessons during their play experiences. We can also play our way into learning a new skill in art class. All we need is a “beginner’s mind.” The Japanese Zen term shoshin translates as ‘beginner’s mind’ and refers to a paradox: the more you know about a subject, the more likely you are to close your mind to further learning. As the Zen monk Shunryu Suzuki put it in his book Zen Mind, Beginner’s Mind (1970): “In the beginner’s mind there are many possibilities, but in the expert’s there are few.”
Jerzy Nowosielski: Landscape with a vision of the Sun, oil on canvas, 1965, National Museum of Krakow, Poland.
In a similar vein, Picasso once said, “When I was young, I could paint like Raphael, but it took me my whole life to learn to draw like a child.” Part of our art class experience is to learn to suspend our adult ego’s need to constantly be ranking, besting, and giving into our competitive natures. We learn more when we give up our egos and our needs to protect our false selves, and allow our true selves to learn. This story in Luke 9:46-48 on “True Greatness” speaks to this:
“An argument arose among them as to which one of them was the greatest. But Jesus, aware of their inner thoughts, took a little child and put it by his side, and said to them, “Whoever welcomes this child in my name welcomes me, and whoever welcomes me welcomes the one who sent me; for the least among all of you is the greatest.”
Our first meeting will be Friday, September 6, at 10 am in the old Oaklawn UMC fellowship hall. Bring your own acrylic paints, brushes, and a canvas or canvas panel to paint on. We begin with a short visual inspiration from some great art works, so that we can wonder and be filled with awe at some great artists’ works.
Basic 2 point perspective
I’ll give some direction on the skill we’ll work on in the session, and then everyone is free to bring their own unique expression to their paintings. We don’t copy my work and judge how well a person can match it. Instead, we learn from the masters or from real life. We can learn to stretch our own skills to create something new.
That’s US!
Of course, making great art isn’t our first purpose. As we age, the harsh truth is we will lose our ability to learn new skills until we lose our memory of what we just ate for breakfast or how to work the tv remote. Challenging our brains is one of the best ways to keep our brain cells firing and “chatting with one another.” We can actually grow new neurons as we grow older. Our brains don’t have to shrink like a cotton shirt washed in hot water. Socialization and encouragement also helps to keep our brains young. Teaching this class helps me stay young! We help each other in this matter.
That goes for children of any age!
Of course, making art means we have to give up our desire to be perfect. Children always have a “beginner’s mind,” so they are free to explore and experiment. Artists quickly learn perfection comes from practice, or working at it. Every baby stumbles and falls as they learn to walk, but we dotting adults still encourage every trembling step. This is what art teachers also do. I’ve always had a rule in my classes, especially when I taught in middle school:
“No Negative Talking about People or Art.”
This includes a student’s own art works. My students always had to give at least three positive comments about their work before they spoke about the negative. “My work needs improvement” is better than saying, “My work stinks!” After all, this way of thinking is more positive than negative and helps to build confidence in a person.
God would post your art on Heaven’s Refrigerator
Of course, we’ve all grown up and worked in environments where negativity is the rule. Art class is a place of grace because this is how life should be. If we can transform a blank canvas into a field of color, why can’t we transform our communities and our world into fields of hope, joy, and love?
The Light overcomes the Darkness
Perhaps because we try to make everyone copy/fit into our idea of the proper end product, rather than allow everyone discover their own creative response to the given subject of the day. The museums of our world are richer and more vibrant because artists have listened to the Spirit of the Creating God. We might do well to realize God’s creative energies are varied and vibrant also, just as Isaiah wrote about his vision of God’s Glorious New Creation:
“For I am about to create new heavens and a new earth;
the former things shall not be remembered or come to mind.
But be glad and rejoice forever in what I am creating;
for I am about to create Jerusalem as a joy, and its people as a delight.” (65:17-18)
I hope to see you there. I don’t charge for the class sessions, since this is one of my ministries as a retired elder in the United Methodist Church. As John Wesley once said, “The World is my Parish.” When we grow in confidence in the joys of creating, we find more beauty in the created world. Optimism is one of the side benefits of the creative life, not fame or riches, and sometimes not even accomplishment. Just the act of being a co-creator with the creating God helps us to find more peace in life.
In the dead heat of summer, our gardens aren’t putting forth the fruit of our planting. Maybe the animals of our neighborhood have made their too frequent nightly visitations, so our harvest is skimpy. We can forget God is a both a creating god and a recreating god as well. The first words of the alternate NRSV translation of the Bible’s first book Genesis (a word meaning “origin”) are—
First stage: string, fabric scraps, and under painting
“When God began to create…”
In the old KJV, Genesis 1:1 reads—“In the beginning, God created the heaven and the earth.”
I appreciate even more the next verse from Genesis 1:2—
“The earth was a formless void and darkness covered the face of the deep, while a wind from God swept over the face of the waters.”
Alternate translations read— “while the spirit of God or while a mighty wind” swept over the face of the waters. This reminds us nothingness and darkness aren’t problems for God, who is able to bring glorious light to any situation.
Psalms 139:12 speaks of the nature of God:
“Even the darkness is not dark to you; the night is as bright as the day, for darkness is as light to you.”
I’ve lived for over half a century with chronic depression, so I can recognize darkness, not only in my own life, but also in the lives of others. Most of my ministry and even my secular work was done with a calling to bring others to the light of hope and confidence that anything was possible.
In art classes, I asked my students to trust in ABC—Attitude, Behavior, and Consequences. If they had a Positive Attitude, they would have Positive Behavior and work on their assignments. If they worked, they would see Positive Consequences or Improvement over time. Asking people who’ve been told they can’t do art to believe they can learn even if they aren’t “talented” is a big ask, but if they have faith in this promise, they discover it’s true.
When I sold insurance, I asked people to trust in the idea of making a small sacrifice now to prevent a greater loss later. Also, if they had no loss, they shared in a community to underwrite the group losses and keep the cost of protecting their own property low. Not everyone has the light to see this benefit of community, but for those who do, I could help keep their consequences from being a disaster.
Second stage: overpainting, printed circles, and added ruler lines
When I entered the ministry, I discovered congregations who had lost their faith in the God who could make something out of nothing This began with the creation story, the choosing of the nation of Israel to be God’s people (even though they were once no one’s people), and feeding them in the extended wilderness wandering before they arrived at the promised land. The Bible is full of examples of God’s providing more when people have too little to sustain them: Elijah and the widow of Zarephath, the feeding of the crowds with a few fish and loaves, and the water turned into wine. These modern people didn’t have a “recreating faith” that God could work in their lives today, just as God had once worked in the lives of others in the days of Christ.
That is what we call a “dead faith,” or as John Wesley put it in his notes on the New Testament at 2 Timothy 3:5— “An appearance of godliness, but not regarding, nay, even denying and blaspheming, the inward power and reality of it.”
It’s dead, because the Spirit isn’t at work in it. I used to tell my beloved evangelism professor, the late Dr. Billy Abraham, the first place we needed to do evangelism was in the local church, because folks hadn’t heard the good news. If they weren’t excited enough to have a living faith, they wouldn’t go out and spread the good news to others.
I’ve never been a cheerleader, although I did have some time in my high school pep squad. I was more often involved in making the football banners and pep posters for the other sports activities. Also debate team took up much of my time. One of the best practices I learned in debate was positive points sell better than negative ones. Also, it’s better to make the same point over and over with different facts and examples.
When I say our God is a creating and recreating God, I can point to the beautiful verses of John 1:1-5—
“In the beginning was the Word, and the Word was with God, and the Word was God. He was in the beginning with God. All things came into being through him, and without him not one thing came into being. What has come into being in him was life, and the life was the light of all people. The light shines in the darkness, and the darkness did not overcome it.”
In the beginning was the Word
As believers in the Holy Trinity, the Word made flesh is Christ, so he was co-creating with God the Father and God the Holy Spirit from the beginning. By virtue of the incarnation, Christ takes on our flesh to redeem us and make us whole again. This comes to completion through the cross. When we place our faith in Christ’s act of love for all creation, we are made one with Christ, and one with God. The Holy Spirit brings us ever closer to the true nature of Christ, until we’re perfected in love of God and neighbor.
I painted on unprimed canvas, just to see what would happen. Also, because I knew the paint surface would be different than the usual texture on the primed canvas. After I painted several different colors in blocks with the scrap pieces of cut canvas used as “masking tape,” I decided to use a mix of iridescent gold and silver acrylic paints to glaze over the under painting. I also added some circles and straight lines. I’ve collected a few jar tops recently, I used some string elements, and I had a school ruler left from my last teaching job back in the 1980’s. (Yes, I keep things. They are tools of the trade. My Sears Craftsman staple gun from art school finally died after half a century of use.)
I’ll be working some more of these experiments for a while. Creating and recreating our lives is what keeps us new every morning. As someone who has been renewed and recreated more than one time can attest, along with the prophet Jeremiah,
“For surely I know the plans I have for you, says the LORD, plans for your welfare and not for harm, to give you a future with hope.” (29:11)
Joy and peace,
Cornelia
John Wesley’s Notes on The New Testament, 1755:
2 Timothy 3:5—“holding to the outward form of godliness but denying its power. Avoid them!”
We are a people who follow Jesus, “the pioneer and perfecter of our faith, who for the sake of the joy that was set before him endured the cross, disregarding its shame, and (who) has taken his seat at the right hand of the throne of God,” as the writer of Hebrews 12:2 reminds us. The suffering servant motif of Christ was once a model all early Christians expected to inherit and emulate.
The Suffering Servant
Paul spoke to this suffering model in his letter to the Romans:
“…How can we who died to sin go on living in it? Do you not know that all of us who have been baptized into Christ Jesus were baptized into his death? Therefore, we have been buried with him by baptism into death, so that, just as Christ was raised from the dead by the glory of the Father, so we too might walk in newness of life. For if we have been united with him in a death like his, we will certainly be united with him in a resurrection like his.” (6:2-5)
Paul’s first sentence is perceptive because he recognizes many who call on the name of Christ nevertheless go on living an unchristlike life. In the early Christian centuries, many didn’t get baptized until they were near death because they weren’t ready to change their wicked ways. The early Christian habit of hyper-delayed baptism is well attested by the later fourth century. Apparently, the reasoning behind waiting until fairly late in life was the belief baptism cleansed sin once and only once. Consequently, any meaningful sin after baptism could leave one in a serious lurch in the economy of salvation. We have the well-known example of the early 4th CE Emperor Constantine who delayed baptism until his deathbed.
Of course, this is a misunderstanding of the Holy Spirit’s work of perfecting our human nature, but it took many centuries to work this out. We can thank John Wesley for our understanding the works of grace in the ongoing process of Christian Perfection. Baptism washes us from the stain of original sin, which is common to all humanity. Baptism also anoints us with the Holy Spirit to be continually with us and bring us to know God’s saving love in Jesus Christ.
As we grow in faith and the Spirit of God calls us to give our lives to Christ, we are justified from past sins. Some faith communities stop here, so they need over and over justification. They have no ongoing theology of sanctifying grace. We United Methodists do have this great gift, which we can give to the world. When we aren’t going on to perfection in love quite as fast as our neighbors wish we were, it’s because we’re being stubborn and resisting God’s grace.
W. H. Auden says it best:
“We would rather be ruined than changed,
We would rather die in our dread
Than climb the cross of the moment
And let our illusions die.”
The Cross and Self-Denial
The cross is ever a witness to our willingness or unwillingness to bear the cross of Christ. As Jesus told his disciples:
“If any want to become my followers, let them deny themselves and take up their cross and follow me. For those who want to save their life will lose it, and those who lose their life for my sake will find it. For what will it profit them if they gain the whole world but forfeit their life? Or what will they give in return for their life? (Matthew 16:24-26)
Often we interpret this verse in terms of giving up material possessions, but we can never give up outward things unless we’re first willing to give up our false images of ourselves. We might want to be large and in charge, or soft and sweet. Perhaps our self image is invested in being holy and serious. We may even be the class clown. These are only masks behind which we hide our truths and vulnerabilities.
Jesus spoke a parable in John 12:24-25—
“Very truly, I tell you, unless a grain of wheat falls into the earth and dies, it remains just a single grain; but if it dies, it bears much fruit. Those who love their life lose it, and those who hate their life in this world will keep it for eternal life.”
If we want to be changed, we must die to our ordinary selves, and then rise as a new creation. If we remain the same, we won’t be much, but if we’re willing to take on the image of Christ, we can be a new creation of the first order.
How The Witness was made
Ukrainian children’s hospital bombed by Russia
This is how art gets made. I saw an image of a bombed-out children’s hospital in Ukraine. Because the photographer had cropped it in a certain way, I saw an image of a cross on the brickwork. Those rectangular bricks contrasted with the diamond shaped wire work in the darkened areas in the four outer quadrants. I usually weave the whole painting surface, but this time I wove only the cross area. That was a challenge. I had to invent a new way to secure the woven canvas strips on the wooden stretcher strips.
Weaving two paintings together
As I painted the first layer, I made all the contrast of bright colors in the cross and dark blues and reds in the outer quadrants. The next day, I added a gold wash over the cross squares and painted diamond line patterns over the dark quadrants. I came back to add silver into the diamond shapes and to touch up the diagonal lines. I also painted the sides of the canvas to unify it.
Adding blocks of color to the cross of witness
I began with a gritty black and white image, but ended up with bright colors, silver and gold. This too is a metaphor for for the change which we undergo when we die to old selves and begin our transformation into the wholeness of the new creation in Christ. As Paul wrote to the Corinthians:
Gold cross and diamond shapes in the dark quadrants
“So if anyone is in Christ, there is a new creation: everything old has passed away; see, everything has become new! All this is from God, who reconciled us to himself through Christ, and has given us the ministry of reconciliation; that is, in Christ God was reconciling the world to himself, not counting their trespasses against them, and entrusting the message of reconciliation to us.” (2 Corinthians 5:17-19)
Finished painting: Cross of Witness
The cross isn’t a means to divide us from one another, just because we hold varying views on baptism, holy communion, pastoral authority, and scriptural authority or interpretation. The cross stands as a witness to all who are willing to give up their identities to their old egos and claim the only one uniting all persons every day.
Unity through the Cross
This is the Christ, whose love was so great for all creation, he was willing to be lifted up on the cross to draw all humankind unto himself. As Jesus said in John 12:32-33—
“And I, when I am lifted up from the earth, will draw all people to myself.” (He said this to indicate the kind of death he was to die.)
We want to have our Big Mac and Eat it too.
Delusional Mathematics
As we self interested people today have difficulty with many of the words of Christ, we resort to our cafeteria style of choosing which bites we want to enjoy. If a dish in the line is too expensive or not on our diet plan, we can ignore it. The problem with Christ is how we can ignore one claim upon our faith, reject another, and keep another. As a dieter from way back days, I splurged on many a Big Mac or Whopper and large fries, which I washed down with a giant Diet Coke. Unfortunately, my body didn’t follow the same mathematical logic of my mind. I was practicing delusional math.
“Cheeseburger and fries, with a side of Diet Coke.”
“This is my commandment, that you love one another as I have loved you. No one has greater love than this, to lay down one’s life for one’s friends. You are my friends if you do what I command you” (John 15:12-14). John Wesley, in his sermon, The Almost Christian, talks about those who have the outward form of Christianity, but not the inward being. They can be recognized by their attendance at Sunday services, their good deeds, and their attention to the outward shows of ritual. Inside, however, their hearts aren’t filled with love, but with anger, spite, or mere duty instead. They lack sincerity, which is a classic characteristic of one who wears a false mask.
The Last Presidential Assassination
When Ronald Regan was shot by a would-be assassin, his diary recorded his thoughts on his excruciating experience.
“Getting shot hurts. Still my fear was growing because no matter how hard I tried to breathe it seemed I was getting less & less air. I focused on that tiled ceiling and prayed. But I realized I couldn’t ask for God’s help while at the same time I felt hatred for the mixed-up young man who had shot me. Isn’t that the meaning of the lost sheep? We are all God’s children & therefore equally beloved by him. I began to pray for his soul and that he would find his way back to the fold.”
The Altogether Christian
To be a Christian in the true sense, Wesley says the “Altogether Christian” requires us both to “love God and neighbor in our hearts until nothing else exists.” This means even our enemies. I personally find this the most difficult part. I can hold a grudge with the best of the nonbelievers. Yet I don’t find myself calling those people evil or deranged, like so many others who seek to find a reason for their scapegoating.
I can still see people, even myself, as part of flawed and fallen humanity.
Christian Perfection
Wesley defines the pure faith: “Now, whatsoever has this faith, which purifies the heart, (by the power of God, who dwelleth therein,) from pride, anger, desire, from all unrighteousness, from all filthiness of flesh or spirit; which fills it with love stronger than death, both to God and to all mankind; love that doth the works of God, glorying to spend and be spent for all men, and that endureth with joy, not only the reproach of Christ, the being mocked, despised, and hated of all men, but whatsoever the wisdom of God permits the malice of men or devils to inflict: whosoever has this faith, thus working by love is not almost only, but altogether a Christian.”
Under John Wesley’s exacting standards, we may all be “almost Christians,” but the good news is we can always hope in the one who gave his life to begin a new life in us and others. If we pray for our enemies’ faults, which we spot so easily because they are our own, God will help to heal both them and us.
Mending Broken Hearts
The Cross Supplants Division
An ancient wisdom story told among the rabbis says the students were questioned on the difference between night and day. All their answers marked divisions: some prayers are said only at certain hours, or there isn’t enough light to distinguish one field or a house from another. The rabbi grew frustrated and cut them off. “You only know how to divide! Daylight begins when you can look on your neighbor’s face and see a friend, not an enemy.”
In this time of division, the witness of the cross reminds us Christ died for all humanity, so no one is outside the love of Christ. If we’re to love our neighbor as ourselves, caring for the poor and marginalized should be a priority for the people of faith. Our neighbors don’t stop at our borders, for our world is interconnected.
Migrations were a fact back in Abraham’s day, when Egypt was the land of opportunity. We ought to treat immigrants better than the Pharaohs treated the Hebrew people. Moreover, in our current political landscape, we might want to quit name calling and playing to the lowest denominator of our bases. Policy statements won’t get sound bites on television, but that’s a good thing. Sound bites play to our false selves and not to our true selves in Christ Jesus.
DeLee: Sun Mandala, 2022, private collection
I can close with a poem from the Persian poet Rumi:
I only speak of the Sun because the Sun is my Beloved I worship even the dust at His feet.
I am not a night-lover and do not praise sleep I am the messenger of the Sun ! Secretly I will ask Him and pass the answers to you.
Like the Sun I shine on those who are forsaken I may look drunk and disheveled but I speak the Truth.
Tear off the mask, your face is glorious, your heart may be cold as stone but I will warm it with my raging fire.
No longer will I speak of sunsets or rising Moons, I will bring you love’s wine for I am born of the Sun I am a King !
Joy, peace, and sacrificial love,
Cornelia
—W. H. Auden, The Age of Anxiety: A Baroque Eclogue (Princeton, NJ: Princeton University Press, 2011), 105.
When does an image become a meme? Or an icon, an idol, or a shibboleth? I ask those questions, and then have go about defining them. We all know what an image is—a representation of something which actually exists. An icon is the Greek word for image, but to become a venerable image, it must bring the viewer into the spiritual realm, rather than leave the viewer only in this earthly world.
An idol is an inert representation of a god, but isn’t a god at all, for the god is invisible and spiritual. Praying to a golden calf or a carved wooden statue will get no response since it has no power or animation. The same can be said for shibboleth, which is a word or saying used by adherents of a party, sect, or belief and usually regarded by others as empty of real meaning. If the Ten Commandments are held up as mere words, idolized, but not kept in their hearts and lives, then they are as empty of power as golden calves. They also aren’t to be worshipped, but the God who gave them is.
Are the Ten Commandments now a meme? Memes are an amusing or interesting item (such as a captioned picture or video) or genre of items that are spread widely online especially through social media. Because this version of the Ten Commandments had its origin in the Charlton Heston movie, “The Ten Commandments,” which we see every single Easter and Passover season, it’s definitely in the public sphere. I’m of the opinion it’s fast becoming a meme—devoid of actual meaning and held up to ridicule.
DeLee: Icon of Christ, acrylic on woven canvas , 2022.
The version in the Louisiana law matches the wording on the Ten Commandments monolith that stands outside of the Texas State Capitol in Austin. It was given to the state in 1961 by the Fraternal Order of Eagles, a more than 125-year-old, Ohio-based service organization with thousands of members. In 2005, a divided U.S. Supreme Court ruled it did not violate the constitution and could stay.
The Eagles organization notes on its website that it distributed about 10,000 Ten Commandments plaques in 1954. The organization also partnered with the creators of “The Ten Commandments” to market the film, spreading public displays of the list around the country.
“It’s significant that the Louisiana law uses the same text created for ‘The Ten Commandments’ movie promotions by the Fraternal Order of Eagles and Paramount Pictures because it reminds us that this text isn’t one found in any Bible and isn’t one used by any religious faith,” Kruse said via email. “Instead, it’s a text that was crafted by secular political actors in the 1950s for their own ends.” Kevin M. Kruse is the author of “One Nation Under God: How Corporate America Invented Christian America” and a history professor at Princeton University.
Unknown Flemish Artist: God speaks to Moses while the people worship the golden calf, colored ink and gold leaf on parchment, 1372, National Library of the Netherlands.
The actual biblical Ten Commandments are spiritual and can bring us closer to understanding God’s relationship with God’s chosen people during their wilderness journey. We can learn about boundaries, justice and mercy. Also we learn God wants us to be imitators of God’s nature, something that’s missing in the movie version of the Ten Commandments. The movie commandments are a Reader’s Digest version of the Biblical commandments and miss the grace of God entirely.
For Benjamin Marsh, a North Carolina pastor watching the Louisiana law, his primary concern is people’s spiritual formation, so altering the Ten Commandments is worrisome to him. “The problem with changing the text of the Ten Commandments is you rob the spiritual implications of the actual biblical text. So you’re giving some vague likeness to the Ten Commandments that isn’t the real thing,” said Marsh. He leads First Alliance Church Winston-Salem, which is part of a conservative evangelical denomination.
So I offer these two versions below for you to read. I believe the placing of the Ten Commandments in the schools in these states has less to do with “religion” than with culture wars, which these politicians hope to use to their advantage. If we see these in our communities, we should ask for comparative religions to be taught, or none at all. I find the misuse of scripture abusive. This isn’t what we should be doing to vulnerable children. We should give them a God who loves, cares for, and provides for their needs. The Ten Commandments in the school houses is like having a cop in the classrooms.
FROM THE MOVIE, “The Ten Commandments:”
The Ten Commandments I AM the LORD thy God. Thou shalt have no other gods before me. Thou shalt not make to thyself any graven images. Thou shalt not take the Name of the Lord thy God in vain. Remember the Sabbath day, to keep it holy. Honor thy father and thy mother, that thy days may be long upon the land which the Lord thy God giveth thee. Thou shalt not kill. Thou shalt not commit adultery. Thou shalt not steal. Thou shalt not bear false witness against thy neighbor. Thou shalt not covet thy neighbor’s house. Thou shalt not covet thy neighbor’s wife, nor his manservant, nor his maidservant, nor his cattle, nor anything that is thy neighbor’s.
FROM KJV: Exodus 20:2-17
I am the LORD thy God, which have brought thee out of the land of Egypt, out of the house of bondage. Thou shalt have no other gods before me. Thou shalt not make unto thee any graven image, or any likeness of any thing that is in heaven above, or that is in the earth beneath, or that is in the water under the earth: Thou shalt not bow down thyself to them, nor serve them: for I the LORD thy God am a jealous God, visiting the iniquity of the fathers upon the children unto the third and fourth generation of them that hate me; And shewing mercy unto thousands of them that love me, and keep my commandments. Thou shalt not take the name of the LORD thy God in vain; for the LORD will not hold him guiltless that taketh his name in vain. Remember the sabbath day, to keep it holy. Six days shalt thou labour, and do all thy work: But the seventh day is the sabbath of the LORD thy God: in it thou shalt not do any work, thou, nor thy son, nor thy daughter, thy manservant, nor thy maidservant, nor thy cattle, nor thy stranger that is within thy gates: For in six days the LORD made heaven and earth, the sea, and all that in them is, and rested the seventh day: wherefore the LORD blessed the sabbath day, and hallowed it.
Honour thy father and thy mother: that thy days may be long upon the land which the LORD thy God giveth thee. Thou shalt not kill. Thou shalt not commit adultery. Thou shalt not steal. Thou shalt not bear false witness against thy neighbour. Thou shalt not covet thy neighbour’s house, thou shalt not covet thy neighbour’s wife, nor his manservant, nor his maidservant, nor his ox, nor his ass, nor any thing that is thy neighbour’s.
Joy, peace, and time to read your Bible,
Cornelia
Louisiana Ten Commandments law raises preferential treatment concerns | AP News
Anne Frank’s Last Birthday Cake, acrylic on canvas, mixed media, 18” x 20,” 2024.
We never know when the tides of time will change. Most of us aren’t creatures of change, but prefer instead the well-worn and familiar paths. As a United Methodist pastor, I moved every two or three years during my ministry, so one thing I kept was my telephone company. I know some people like to switch providers almost as often as they switch their underwear, but that’s not me. Having to switch utility companies, banks, and hairdressers was more than enough agony for me. I signed up for this life, however, so I kept my moving boxes and made a spreadsheet for notifying all my address changes.
I talk about this because I only lived in three homes as a child. I never had to leave in the middle of the night to escape bad debts, the law, or a hateful Nazi regime. I have no way to imagine Anne Frank’s life, except when I was also 13 years old, I read her wonderful diary. Anne kept her diary, beginning at the same age, during the two years she spent in hiding while the Germans occupied her homeland during World War II. She had received a red, cream, and beige checkered cloth notebook diary for her 13th birthday on June 12, 1942. The underground Dutch radio station had encouraged people to keep diaries so future generations would know what the conditions were under the German occupation.
Because of the Nazi purity rules, Jews weren’t allowed to mix with non-Jewish persons. According to the Nazis, Jews were not Aryans or the Master Race. They thought Jews belonged to a separate race that was inferior to all other races. The Nazis believed that the presence of Jews in Germany threatened the German people. They believed they had to separate Jews from other Germans to protect and strengthen Germany. Their Nuremberg Laws were an important step towards achieving this goal.
We hear this same sentiment today from the neo-Nazi movement groups who say, “Jews shall not replace us,” and “Immigrants are poisoning the blood of our nation.” As a result, only Anne’s Jewish friends could come to her birthday party. Her father set up a movie projector to show “Rin Tin Tin,” the famous Hollywood dog film star. The chairs were set up in rows like a movie theater. The family went all out for their Anne. Her mom had baked cookies for her classroom to share, since they couldn’t come to the party, but she baked a strawberry cream cake for this party attended by her Jewish friends. This was early June and the strawberries would be juicy, fresh, and in season.
Anne and Hanna playing before the Frank family fled into hiding.
Two weeks after her 13th birthday, Anne and the Frank family had disappeared from the neighborhood. They left no forwarding address. Her best friend of eight years, Hannah Pick-Goslar, didn’t see her again until they were both in the same concentration camp. Hannah survived. Anne did not, but the enduring story of her life in hiding continues through her diary.
When I was painting this, I used a large doily as the “cake.” I’d been saving it for a halo for a saint painting, but it works great for a cake top too. My viewpoint is from above, and I omitted the 95 candles. No need to burn the house down! The cream color was a bit pink, but if I were a young teen girl, I’d want it more pink than just white. I painted the background as a blue sky, because young people almost always have hope and optimism. The left side of the canvas has the storm clouds approaching, as well as the grey soot soiling the sky from the overworked crematoriums at the concentration camps where so many Jewish people lost their lives in the Holocaust.
If we can learn anything from one small girl who ate strawberries on an early summer day, I hope it will be to appreciate the beauty of this brief moment and to love one another deeply. Also, life is too short to hate anyone just because they are in someway different from you. Celebrate their differences as part of God’s creative generosity to this world. Also as Mary Oliver reminds us about the importance of keeping a journal:
“Instructions for living a life. Pay attention. Be astonished. Tell about it.”
One of my favorite icons is the Rublev Trinity of 1411, which represents the three angelic visitors who came to Abraham and Sarah’s tent in the wilderness. They stopped there on the way to Sodom and Gomorrah, two cities known for their lack of hospitality to strangers, so the largess Abraham showed by preparing a feast for them in the wilderness was notable in contrast. Of course, while Abraham couldn’t see these strangers’ wings and halos, nevertheless we should “not neglect to show hospitality to strangers, for by doing that some have entertained angels without knowing it” (Hebrews 13:2).
Rublev’s Trinity: Original egg tempera on wood panel, Tretyakov Museum, Moscow, 1411-1425 CE
Rublev’s Trinity is a classic icon. It’s the prototype for all the Holy Trinity icons. Three figures are seated at table, under an oak tree and in the vicinity of a large house, the home of Abraham and Sarah, at Mamre in the wilderness. These figures represent the Three Persons in One God, or The Holy Trinity. The icon underlines the sameness of the three figures by using a single identical image, repeated three times but robed differently to suggest three different qualities of the three Angels—the Three Aspects of God.
The central figure represents the Son, who blesses the cup on the table. The right figure in blue is the Holy Spirit, while the rose-colored robed figure represents the Father. The Oak of Mamre stands for the cross of Christ. Even the symbolic wilderness mountain dips its peak in reverence to the holy visitors. Rublev imagined the patriarchs living in a house, but they were tent dwellers who followed herds and pastures.
Jerusalem Temple Mount, from an antique map, acrylic on canvas, 2023
I actually repainted this icon over a map of the ancient city of Jerusalem. Wars have been much in the news lately, not just in the last few months, but the last few years. Russia’s invasion into Ukraine has devastated their land and people, not to mention making a negative impact on hunger worldwide and even the price of food here at home. The Sacred Mount in Jerusalem has always been contested, so much so that the three monotheistic religions fight over that territory. Even the holiest Christian sites are often guarded by Islamic families to keep them open for everyone.
Holy Trinity, stage One
Once I chose this base, the mountain, tree, and the house wrote themselves. I found the table easily in the underlying shapes and the three visitors also. This isn’t a faithful copy of the Holy Trinity Icon, but a spiritual copy of the icon. I kept the colors and the ideas, but I wrote something new. As I painted, I had these thoughts about our faith and our life.
Holy Trinity, stage two
Not In My Backyard, Not In My Neighborhood, Not in My Church—how often do we hear these words? Sometimes we even hear them spoken in our own estranged families of origins. This isn’t a recent phenomenon. Our scripture is full of broken families: Cain and Able were the first; plus, Abraham’s children, Isaac and Ishmael and their descendants, have had sibling rivalry and struggles from the beginning. The house of David certainly had its problems even if David was a “man after God’s own heart.” In the New Testament, the Jews wanted the gentile believers to convert to their religion first, and then to keep the law, the food rules, and celebrate the festivals in order to be a “good Christian.” The leaders had to compromise on their beliefs before everyone could fully share Christian hospitality at the table together.
Holy Trinity, stage three
Paul has a dire warning for the congregations about The Works of the Flesh in Galatians 5:16-21—
Live by the Spirit, I say, and do not gratify the desires of the flesh. For what the flesh desires is opposed to the Spirit, and what the Spirit desires is opposed to the flesh; for these are opposed to each other, to prevent you from doing what you want. But if you are led by the Spirit, you are not subject to the law.
Now the works of the flesh are obvious: fornication, impurity, licentiousness, idolatry, sorcery, enmities, strife, jealousy, anger, quarrels, dissensions, factions, envy, drunkenness, carousing, and things like these. I am warning you, as I warned you before: those who do such things will not inherit the kingdom of God.
Our modern world has a problem with idolatry. We often put our work, our family, our possessions, or our politics above God. We often choose our church because of our political beliefs, when we should let the overwhelming love and grace of God for all God’s creation imbue our political choices. We forget as Christians we are grafted into the nation of Israel, as the writer of Ephesians 2:12 reminds us:
“Remember that you were at that time without Christ, being aliens from the commonwealth of Israel, and strangers to the covenants of promise, having no hope and without God in the world.”
Christ came to those who were near and to those who were far, broke down the dividing wall between the two and brought them together to eat at one table. Before they were enemies, but with Christ, they became one people. Divisions should not exist in the body of Christ, just as no one should be excluded from fellowship. The near in those days were the Israelites and the far were the Greeks, Romans and other pagan communities. In Christ, however, they were one.
DeLee: Holy Trinity after Rublev, acrylic on canvas,
Abraham knew the reputation of Sodom and Gomorrah, since Lot was his kinsman. When Abraham negotiated with God to spare those twin cities of iniquity, he managed to bargain God down to the hope of finding at least ten honest people, righteous in their ways with God. That was as low as God would go. Lot, with his two daughters, his wife, and the two would be husbands made six, but the men didn’t want to flee. That left only four and so the two cities were doomed for their lack of hospitality to strangers.
People today often think that sexual behavior doomed these cities, but lack of care for the stranger was a higher priority in a dangerous and unforgiving landscape. Offering food, water, and shelter meant life to travelers. Four thousand years ago, our spiritual ancestors remembered the stories of Abraham. In Deuteronomy 26:5, when the people brought their offerings to God, they were instructed to make this response before the LORD your God:
“A wandering Aramean was my ancestor; he went down into Egypt and lived there as an alien, few in number, and there he became a great nation, mighty and populous.”
No longer are we a wandering people. Instead, we are mostly a nation of settlers, people who have been in one place for awhile. We no longer are a nation of immigrants who are wresting a new nation out of the raw materials of the land and becoming a melting pot of different cultures which have settled it. We look with suspicion upon someone who moves into our neighborhood, especially if they don’t look or act like us. If they don’t speak our language or eat our food, we tend to shun them. We don’t show hospitality. We don’t add their flavor into our soup, and try to keep them from melting into our pot.
No one likes change. I think of the old joke about “how many United Methodists does it take to change a lightbulb?” The answer is “none—that lightbulb was given as a memorial to my Aunt Harriet’s dead husband, and it cannot be changed!”
Hospitality requires us to change the lightbulb, however, for bringing light to a dark stairway will make it safer for people of all ages to traverse. Hospitality asks us to open our pews to people who don’t think like us, so we can wrestle with the theology of God and the calling of our faith for this present age, not just our yesterdays. Hospitality calls us to serve as a respite and refuge for the aliens, the immigrants, the homeless, and the newcomers who arrive in our communities.
Unfortunately, too many of us have bought into tribal thinking, which is a form of all or nothing thinking. Gang behavior is tribal thinking, for if you don’t kowtow to the group think, you will likely be dead. Excommunication from the church is a form of punishment for wrong thinking or wrong acts, and secession or rebellion is action against authority you no longer respect or recognize. Our church has just gone through a sad time of people cutting ties because they no longer share the understanding of Abraham, who offered sustenance and protection to strangers in the midst of the barren wilderness. In ancient times, those who received this gift were bound to mutual respect and protection. Food and water in the wilderness saves a life. Our hospitality to strangers in an uncertain world can save their lives and souls. Maybe we once again need to see afresh with ancient eyes our sacred texts, instead of with our current political and cultural blinders on our eyes. Then we could truly entertain angels unawares. And we would be blessed for this.
As the writer of the letter to the Ephesians closed out his third chapter (Ephesians 3:20-21):
“Now to him who by the power at work within us is able to accomplish abundantly far more than all we can ask or imagine, to him be glory in the church and in Christ Jesus to all generations, forever and ever. Amen.”
Aristotle once said, “The hand is the tool of tools.” Our hands with their opposable thumbs are an evolutionary miracle. Our opposable thumbs evolved around two million years ago, even before humans began to make tools. Our hands helped us to develop language and procure nourishment, as well as create mysterious images on cave walls which united the physical and spiritual worlds of our distant ancestors.
Hands at the Cuevas de las Manos (Cave of Hands) upon Río Pinturas, near the town of Perito Moreno in Santa Cruz Province, Argentina (2005) (image by Mariano via Wikimedia Commons)
Richard Rohr, the Catholic priest and spiritual writer, notes “only the contemplative mind can help bring forward the new consciousness needed to awaken a more loving, just, and sustainable world. We need a practice that touches our unconscious conditioning where all our wounds and defense mechanisms lie. That’s the only way we can be changed at any significant or lasting level.”
We have many spiritual practices to change our hearts and minds, such as prayer, meditation, contemplation, reading Scripture, and hearing the word preached. Attending holy communion and practicing the presence of God are other ways to be transformed. In art or faith, we don’t take anything at face value, but we seek the deeper meanings in the experiences we have with life.
Image I took while walking downtown. I paid attention to the composition when I took the photograph.
As one who slacked off my weight training over the pandemic, the gym rat saying holds true: “Use it or lose it.” We can lose muscle tone and aerobic capacity in just a few days if we’re older or recovering from injuries. Even if we’re young and healthy, we may lose capacity in a week or so. Likewise, some of us get our diplomas and never read a book again. For instance, 42% of college graduates never read another book after college and only 32% of the US population over the age of 16 reads books for pleasure.
One of the problems even in the USA is 52% of adults read at a 7th grade level or below, and 48% read at an 8th grade level and above. Yet reading has many benefits for keeping the brain healthy:
Reading for just six minutes daily can reduce stress levels by 68%.
Reading can increase empathy and emotional intelligence.
Reading can improve sleep quality.
Reading can increase vocabulary and improve writing skills.
Reading can improve mental focus and concentration.
Reading can reduce the risk of developing Alzheimer’s disease.
When we connect the brain and the hand, this results in increased activation of the nerve cells in the sensory and motor hand representational areas. As a consequence, the hand expands its representational area in the cortical hand map because it requires more brain resources, more ‘brain space’. Thus, the hand can ‘shape’ the brain; in other words, the brain is functionally shaped based on the hand’s experiences.
If the hand, in contrast, is passive and immobile for a long time, its representation in the brain decreases and may totally disappear. Quite simply, the hand has to be active to maintain its representation in the brain: “use it or lose it.” On the other hand, we know the hand representation in the brain can be re-established by training and manual activities.
What sort of activity rebuilds the brain? The brain cortex contains more than 100 billion nerve cells and innumerable synaptic connections. The cortical body map is not fixed or hardwired, but can rapidly become reorganized as a result of a strengthening or weakening of the synaptic connections. Moreover, repetitive movements can overwhelm the hand and cause trauma, such as writer’s cramp. We need to find ways to exercise our hand, so we cause no harm, but build the brain pathways.
The hand has been called the “outer brain.”
In aging samples, for instance, there’s evidence to indicate that age‐related cognitive decline may be partly driven by a process of atrophy. Some studies have shown that adopting a less engaging lifestyle across the lifespan may accelerate loss of cognitive function11, due to lower “cognitive reserve” (the ability of the brain to withstand insult from age and/or pathology)12. Some emerging evidence indicates that disengaging from the “real world” in favor of virtual settings may similarly induce adverse neurocognitive changes.
Extensive media multi‐tasking during childhood and adolescence could also negatively impact cognitive development through indirect means, by reducing engagement with academic and social activities, as well as by interfering with sleep35, or reducing the opportunity to engage in creative thinking36, 37. I remember telling my schoolteacher mother, “Listening to the radio helps me concentrate on my homework.” She wasn’t buying that argument at all, and radio silence prevailed.
An important aspect of instant access to the internet is our ability to get information online, which has caused us to become more likely to remember where these facts could be retrieved, rather than to remember the facts themselves. This results in our becoming reliant on the Internet for information retrieval. For instance, most people no longer memorize telephone numbers anymore, but depend upon their phones to maintain their contact lists through the cloud, just as we once stored them on the internal SIM card. I personally don’t know anyone’s phone number anymore because I depend on my phone’s contact list. If it ever died on me, I’d be out of luck! The cloud better recognize me if I ever need to replace my phone.
Asklepion, Pergamum, Turkey: site of healing waters, temples, and cultural events, for pilgrims who would often stay for weeks. The ancients believed healing was a sacred art and people’s souls needed to be mended as well as their bodies.
Art and healing are intimately connected. The new Alice Walton School of Medicine in Bentonville, Arkansas, will integrate the arts in an intentional way. The students will be classically trained medical doctors who also will be equipped with knowledge to address all areas of wellness, whether it’s spiritual, emotional or social.
The science of neuroaesthetics is detailed in Susan Magsamen’s book, Your Brain on Art. She said the field can be described as the study of how art measurably influences the brain, body and behavior. The study of neuroaesthetics is “neuroarts.” Magsamen said the pursuit of creative expression is as important to humans as nutrition, sleep and exercise.
There are four parts of neuroaesthetics and “the aesthetic mindset:”
■ Being open to curiosity.
■ Playful exploration.
■ Sensory experiences.
■ Becoming a maker and beholder.
We discover this in art class when we want to draw or paint a picture beyond our skill level or the time limits of the work period. In seminary, we’d have three-hour final exams. Some of our fellow students would prepare six-hour answers to the advance sample questions our professors gave us to study. I always practiced the “triage method” of reducing everything we learned to the essentials. If we pick out the most important facts, we can best make our points in the time limits given. In the emergency room, doctors treat the most important issues first to save the patient’s life and tend to the details once the patient is out of the woods. No one can give a 6 hour answer in a 3 hour time limit. Ask yourself, “What’s the most important question here?”
Mike’s Mushroom
The same idea works in drawing or painting. We need to find the main forms and sketch them in before we get carried away with the tiny details. Mike showed me a great photo he took of the corvettes in Memphis. I suggested if he wanted to do this painting in a single class meeting, he needed to simplify it by enlarging it, so it had much less detail or plan on taking two classes to finish it. He chose to paint a mushroom in the wild instead. Even then he noticed his mushroom cap lacked the perspective to look realistic on a two-dimensional surface. We’ll have to pick up some perspective lessons in the fall again.
Cornelia’s Corvettes
This is a drawing from memory I made on my iPad. I stripped Mike’s photo down to the barest essentials. The vehicles may not even be recognized as sports cars, but they are convertibles. I do remember the great steel triangles of a bridge or other structure where the cars were parked. I did this in about 15 minutes, but I have over half a century of experience of seeing and drawing practice.
Internet image of corvettes on Beale Street
I sometimes forget my hand and brain have been trained to see the basic shapes “instantly.” Not because of some DNA of pure sight, but because I’ve practiced looking, dissecting, and memorizing what I see. Some of my experiences are blind drawing, which means I only look at the object, but never the drawing itself. This trains the hand to only go as far as the eye can “see.”
Gail S’s Landscape
Gail had the class over to her home and we were glad to see her in recovery mode. Since she’s still homebound, we took advantage of the good weather and her front porch to exercise our brains and hands.
Ansel Adams: Old Faithful Geyser, Yellowstone National Park, 1933-1942
Gail had a mountain landscape image from a screenshot she wanted to work with. The focus of our class was taking our camera photographs and using the editing software to heighten our images. Once we’d done that, we would see more clearly what was important in our image. The current theme in social media is “no filter,” but the great photographers of history always gone to the dark room to develop their photos and dodge the whites lighter or burn more black. Ansel Adams was a master at this.
Cornelia: Prang 8 color box on Arches paper, from original photograph
Notice on my short watercolor study, I didn’t bother to include the whole photograph image. I “triaged” the details I couldn’t complete in our short class time. I mixed my own blacks, rather than using the pan color available. This gave me much richer colors and more variation in my shadows. I had outlined my basic shapes in yellow, but got to talking about the others’ directions and let the paint dry too much, or I would have picked it up better. It would have been less noticeable. I see now some of my lights could have been lighter. I can go back with a clean brush full of water and pick up some of that front face of the archway.
Of course, my eye sees more than most people can see, and it’s both a curse and a blessing. I’m always graceful with my students and try to give at least half as much grace to myself. We mustn’t get discouraged, but keep pressing upward! We don’t have to be a master at something to be a maker; we just have to do it. Having no fixed expectations of an outcome is the best way to exhibit creative expression. Following the less traveled path can lead to new destinations and new discoveries.
Art has the capacity to heal, to cross-fertilize, and to challenge fixed ideas. Art can’t be confined to gallery spaces or the walls of our homes. Art can not only renew our brains, but also the practice of art can renew how we see the world because we learn to see it afresh. Sometimes for the first time, we see it as we’ve never seen it before, and then we bring our own experience and expression to what we have seen. That’s when we become artists, creators, and cocreators guided by the hand of God. As we are made in the image of the creating God, God heals us as he cares for the creation:
“I have seen their ways, but I will heal them; I will lead them and repay them with comfort, creating for their mourners the fruit of the lips. Peace, peace, to the far and the near, says the LORD; and I will heal them.” ~~ Isaiah 57:18-19
Joy and peace,
Cornelia
The Tool of Tools and the Form of Forms – 3 Wisdoms | Scott Randall Paine
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One of my favorite hymns growing up in the church was “This Is My Father’s World,” by Maltbie D. Babcock, a Presbyterian minister. Written in 1901, to the tune Terra Beata, or Blessed Earth, the song was originally a traditional English folk tune, but composer Franklin L. Sheppard arranged a variation specifically for this text. This hymn and “The Church in the Valley in the Wildwood” were my mother’s and my grandmother’s two favorites to sing. I loved them both also because of their location in nature.
This is my Father’s world, And to my listening ears All nature sings, and round me rings The music of the spheres. This is my Father’s world: I rest me in the thought Of rocks and trees, of skies and seas– His hand the wonders wrought.
As Paul wrote in Romans 1:20—
“Ever since the creation of the world (God’s) eternal power and divine nature, invisible though they are, have been understood and seen through the things (God) has made.”
Tracing history backwards from the 1st CE, the Pythagoreans (active from the late 6th to the mid 5th century BCE) thought the music of the spheres was an ethereal harmony produced by the vibration of the celestial spheres.
Aristotle said the Pythagoreans believed things are numbers or they are made out of numbers by noticing more similarities between things and numbers than between things and the elements, such as fire and water, as adopted by earlier thinkers. The Pythagoreans thus concluded things were numbers or were made of numbers. Therefore, the principles of numbers, the odd and the even, are the principles of all things. The odd was limited and the even was unlimited.
Aristotle criticized the Pythagoreans for being so enamored of numerical order that they imposed it on the world even where it wasn’t suggested by the phenomena. Thus, appearances suggested there were nine heavenly bodies orbiting in the heavens but, since they regarded ten as the perfect number, they supposed there must be a tenth heavenly body, the counter-earth, which we cannot see.
Pythagoreans presented the principles of reality as consisting of ten pairs of opposites:
1. limited—unlimited
2. odd—even
3. unity—plurality
4. right—left
5. male—female
6. rest—motion
7. straight—crooked
8. light—darkness
9. good—bad
10. square—oblong
In art we have similar categories which we use to create dynamic images. If our painting is all of one value—all white, all black, or all middle value—it lacks visual interest. We are drawn to images which have contrasting values covering multiple values. As with everything, too much of a good thing can become a bad thing! In medicine, a small dose of Botox can make wrinkles disappear, but a large dose could poison a person. As I tell folks, some things require experts, not DIY practitioners.
The Middle Path is safest and best— Unknown Artist: The fall of Icarus., Fresco of the Third style from Pompeii, 50—75 CE. (H. 35.5, W. 34.5 cm.), London, British Museum.
I’ve probably mentioned before my encounter with the Hostess chocolate cupcakes. When I realized I could buy a whole box for slightly more money than a package of two tiny cakes, of course my starving art school student budget sprung for the box. That’s when I ate chocolate cupcakes for breakfast, lunch and dinner. By the end of that box, I was cured of my chocolate cupcake desire for a very long time. This is a classic case of “too much of a good thing,” or “knowing when to stop.” The Greeks recognized the need to curb human behavior of our “all or nothing” thinking by prescribing the idea of the Golden Mean, or “nothing to excess.” I definitely went to excess on my cupcake journey.
Mies van der Rohe’s Tugendhat Armchair was designed for the Tugendhat House in Brno, the Czech Republic in 1929 and is one of several different furniture pieces designed for the home of Greta Weiss and Fritz Tugendhat. In the design of the home, Mies designed nearly every detail down to the furniture used. He also prescribed the placement of each furniture piece in the home to maintain spatial composition.
Mies van der Rohe, whose architecture and furniture design exemplified his style, “less is more,” never reduced his work to nothing. His work was faithful to the new industrial materials of steel and glass being used in skyscrapers. Our excess in art is never to nothingness, but we don’t over elaborate or over decorate, just for the sake of filling the space.
So, what do we do and how we proceed? When faced with the challenge of all we see before us, what do we select to make our images? I believe this is where the creating Spirit comes into play, for we can walk past a tree all day long, but on a certain day, the tree comes alive for us. When Moses was herding his father-in-law’s sheep out in the wilderness, his mind was on the sheep, his current family, and his past life and deeds. Scripture doesn’t tell us how long the bush burned on that mountain before Moses noticed it and said, “I must turn aside and look at this great sight, and see why the bush is not burned up.” (Exodus 3:3)
Likewise, we walk past inspiring images daily when we’re preoccupied with our day-to-day concerns. We also have difficulty finding time to create because others want our attention first. One of my seminary professors lectured us in class about taking time to keep our spiritual lives front and center as we moved through school and our church appointments. She said our spouses and children would want to be first, plus our congregations also would want to be first. We’d most likely want to put our careers first to get a bigger steeple or to please our supervisors. However, if we put anything or anyone before God, our spiritual lives would suffer, and like dominos, everything else would fall also. “Many are called, but few are chosen,” as Jesus says in Matthew 22:14.
In art as in life, we need to be deeply rooted in the life of the Spirit. I can tell when I’m going through the motions, but I keep on painting, for I figure I’ll at least learn something from my adequate work, so I’ll be found ready when the creative Spirit strikes. Sometimes I’m more present to the cares and concerns of this world and my work suffers for it. Other times, I’m under the creating power of a Greater Power and my work is altogether more inspired because of that energy. We’d all be more vigorous and creative in our everyday lives if we spent more time in prayer, contemplation, and searching the scriptures to hear God’s voice speak in the silent corners of our hearts and minds.
Mike: Sun and Moon, quick painting
Last week, only Mike and I showed up for art class. Everyone else was either tied up with doctor appointments or at home with rehab or otherwise occupied. Mike and I explored making different colors with the 8 Color Prang Watercolor Set. We can make interesting colors by combining the complementary colors or the tertiary colors. Mike’s first landscape painting got the energies of his competing needs out of the way.
Mike’s Second start—just beginning
As in journaling, we often need to make a habit of writing our thoughts so our deepest feelings can get expressed. He began a second painting with more focus on the goal of mixing new colors.
Music of the Spheres: watercolor
I started my painting with the circles by using yellow watercolor to outline intersecting circles of the same size on my paper. Then I mixed some primary colors together, some secondary colors together and some tertiary colors together. I painted different sections of the overlapping circles. Some of the paint I thinned to a wash, and others I laid on fully. When I got home, I painted in the background, allowing some areas to be a wash and other parts to be thicker.
Music of the Spheres: Creation Energy, acrylic
I finished at home an acrylic painting, which explores some of the same themes as the watercolors we’ve worked on in class. In this I used various material with different textures for my spheres. One of the circles is more three dimensional because it’s from a handmade cloth mask left over from the pandemic. I painted parts of it, also. The background has lines of “energy” all about.
While the Pythagoreans attempted to see unity and harmony in the creation in numbers, our Judeo-Christian faith recognizes God as creator of nature and nature revealing the Creator. One of the best texts to understand this distinction is 1 Kings 19: 11-13, in which Elijah meets the LORD on the mountain at Horeb:
(God) said, “Go out and stand on the mountain before the LORD, for the LORD is about to pass by.” Now there was a great wind, so strong that it was splitting mountains and breaking rocks in pieces before the LORD, but the LORD was not in the wind; and after the wind an earthquake, but the LORD was not in the earthquake; and after the earthquake a fire, but the LORD was not in the fire; and after the fire a sound of sheer silence.
When Elijah heard it, he wrapped his face in his mantle and went out and stood at the entrance of the cave. Then there came a voice to him that said, “What are you doing here, Elijah?”
No one has ever heard the music of the spheres, and the voice of God arrives in the sound of sheer silence. Perhaps that “polar opposite” of the Pythagorean’s world view was on to something after all. If we’re very quiet and still, we may hear both the music of the spheres and the voice of God in the great silence.
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