Vatican Museums Evangelize with Art
The Vatican Museums have the following inscription placed on the main door: "Ad augendum Urbis splendorem et asserendam religionis veritatem" (To promote the splendor of the city of Rome and affirm the truth of the Christian religion). Closing the year-long celebration of the 500th anniversary of the Vatican Museums - one of the first places we will visit - Pope Benedict XVI reaffirmed this view.
Museums -- though keeping in mind the changed social conditions -- can become places of artistic mediation, links of relationship between the past, the present and the future, crossroads of men and women of several continents, in addition to sources of research and forges of cultural and spiritual enrichment.Remarking on the "enormous number of people who visit them each day" (which is why we are scheduled to arrive very early so as not to stand in line forever), the Pope said that,
through the different works exhibited, [the museums] offer visitors an eloquent testimony of the continuous intertwining that exists between the divine and human in life and in the history of nations.We do not usually think of art and museums as sources of evangelization -- yet our pilgrimage and opportunity for reflection may achieve exactly that effect.
1 comment:
The Pope seems to have been reading both our syllabus and The Catechism of the Catholic Church (2502):
“Genuine sacred art draws man to adoration, to prayer, and to the love of God, Creator and Savior, the Holy One and Sanctifier.”
I hope our travelers will keep this in mind in planning their days in the Vatican Museum, throughout Rome, and in Assisi and Florence.
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