“And the bishops shall carefully teach this,-that, by means of the histories of the mysteries of our Redemption, portrayed by paintings or other representations, the people is instructed, and confirmed in (the habit of) remembering, and continually revolving in mind the articles of faith; as also that great profit is derived from all sacred images, not only because the people are thereby admonished of the benefits and gifts bestowed upon them by Christ, but also because the miracles which God has performed by means of the saints, and their salutary examples, are set before the eyes of the faithful; that so they may give God thanks for those things; may order their own lives and manners in imitation of the saints; and may be excited to adore and love God, and to cultivate piety. But if any one shall teach, or entertain sentiments, contrary to these decrees; let him be anathema.
And if any abuses have crept in amongst these holy and salutary observances, the holy Synod ardently desires that they be utterly abolished; in such wise that no images, (suggestive) of false doctrine, and furnishing occasion of dangerous error to the uneducated, be set up. And if at times, when expedient for the unlettered people; it happen that the facts and narratives of sacred Scripture are portrayed and represented; the people shall be taught, that not thereby is the Divinity represented, as though it could be seen by the eyes of the body, or be portrayed by colours or figures.” —Decretum de invocatione, veneratione, et reliquiis Sanctorum, et sacris imaginibus (Decree On the Invocation, Veneration, and Relics, of Saints, and on Sacred Images), Council of Trent, December 3, 1563
(As Eamon Duffy noted in his papal history Saints and Sinners, the Council of Trent “came a generation too late, a generation during which the split in the Church had widened and hardened.” Yet the Council, which lasted through five pontificates and nearly 20 years, off and on, was crucial in the Roman Catholic Church’s Counter-Reformation—its attempt to halt the Protestant Reformation in its tracks and, wherever possible, win back the hearts and minds of people and their rulers. It clearly defined the major issues separating the Church from the Protestant movement, including justification, transubstantiation, the sacraments, and purgatory. As the session drew to a close, it rendered what I believe was particularly important service to the history of European culture with its decree on religious imagery.
Among the matters dividing Protestants from Catholics was religious art. At the height of the Renaissance, artists such as Michelangelo, powerfully influenced by “rediscovered” art from ancient Greece and Rome, had increasingly emphasized the human body, including through nudity. That greater stress prompted an outcry that this art was secular, even pagan, violating sanctions against worshipping statues dating back to Deuteronomy 5:9. Increasingly, Protestant leaders removed such images from their own houses of worship.
Nowadays, art historians are wont to lament that the post-conciliar period resulted in the removal of genital nudity from religious art. But the alternative—the removal of all religious art—was far worse. By inducing artists to modify those elements that gave rise to charges of superstition, the Council of Trent managed to defang additional opposition. At least now, the architects, sculptors and painters who would follow in the Baroque Era—including Bernini and El Greco--could relax in the knowledge that they still had livelihoods.
As a blogger, I can’t be anything but grateful for the democratization of the written word fostered by the Reformation. But I also don’t see why artists can’t trace, with all the skills God gave them, the ways of the Lord to humanity, or celebrate the beauty of His creation. Whether touring a cathedral or even a smaller house of worship such as my own St. Cecilia’s Church in Englewood, NJ, Catholics can take pride in contributing so much of the great splendor of Western art.
The leaders of the Council of Trent were correct to emphasize the instructional function of religious art; over the years, it fostered an appreciation for narrative and the sense that God could be found everywhere—what theologian David Tracy and sociologist-novelist Andrew Greeley have termed “the sacramental imagination.”)
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