“The Main Thing is to be Moved” : Lessons from Rodin and Rilke

Go to the Limits of Your Longing

God speaks to each of us as he makes us, then walks with us silently out of the night.

These are the words we dimly hear:

You, sent out beyond your recall, go to the limits of your longing. Embody me.

Flare up like flame
and make big shadows I can move in.

Let everything happen to you: beauty and terror. Just keep going. No feeling is final.
Don't let yourself lose me.

Nearby is the country they call life. You will know it by its seriousness.

Give me your hand.

-Rainier Maria Rilke, Rilke’s Book of Hours: Love Poems to God.

In the poem above, Rainier Maria Rilke offers incredibly powerful advice on how to live a life in Christ. Simultaneously simplistic and endlessly complicated, Rilke’s message is both inspirational and solemn: Live, do not be afraid. Be impactful, find meaning, seek truth. Persevere, experience boldly but stray not from the path. Seek greatness. Walk with the Lord in all you do.

The first pictured Rodin sculpture, which is nestled in Holy Cross’ Memorial Plaza, is outstanding in a similar way. It depicts Eustache de Saint-Pierre,  (as found in The Burghers of Calais, Rodin's best-known public monument) who was the oldest of the six burghers and the first to volunteer to be sacrificed to save his native city. The weight of this situation can be clearly felt, even today. The precise way the light hits it, the telling physicality of the figure, the depth of emotion, and the seriousness it exudes invite the viewer to adopt a contemplative attitude in a similar way that Rilke does.

The second pictured Rodin sculpture is active yet serene, depicting a youthful sprite. It is different from the somber Eustache de Saint-Pierre, but is equally enigmatic nonetheless. This is the genius of Rodin, able to portray a vast range of figures, perspectives, and emotions with the most careful technique and attention to detail. When observing his work, one is forced to pause, to think, to reflect, and to look beyond the present moment. Rilke incites this beautiful disruption in us as well, through the layers of meaning that lie beyond the surface of his words. 

It is not a well known fact that sculptor Auguste Rodin and poet Rainier Maria Rilke crossed paths numerous times during their lives. Their story, though, is one worth telling: it serves as a reminder for all of us at Holy Cross that we must orient ourselves to virtuous ends. Patience, strength, dedication, faith, purpose. These are traits that Rodin and Rilke embodied, and they are traits that should define us all. Moreover, Rilke and Rodin both embraced the apprenticeship model to develop their talents. They humbly grounded themselves in the greatness which came before them, acknowledging that this turn to the past is not only a worthy, but necessary endeavor. This is the lesson which I fear is missing from the classrooms of Holy Cross and from the hearts of Holy Cross students. 

But it is the precise mentality from which Rilke began. Before his poetic career took off, Rilke traveled to Paris in search of inspiration and became Rodin’s secretary. Immediately drawn to the great sculptor, Rilke was willing to take any opportunity to observe Rodin’s masterful artistry. After days, Rilke was deeply and seriously inspired by Rodin. After years, Rilke was able to craft a beautiful and poignant monograph of Rodin’s art and Rodin’s life. Rilke also dedicated the second volume of his breakthrough collection New Poems (1908) to his mentor, without whom, he acknowledged, the work would not exist. 

What Rilke took away from Rodin changed his life. Rodin taught him to see the beauty and terror of the world at the same time and demonstrated the importance of committing fully to one's craft in pursuit of perfection. For these reasons, Rodin left an indelible mark on Rilke, who, in turn, opened his eyes, heart, and mind and allowed them to be molded. Their relationship moved from one of master and pupil to one of equals. Both were visionaries in their own right. 

Rilke’s monograph of Rodin includes a similar story of inspiration from Rodin’s youth. Rodin was influenced by legends such as Dante, Baudelaire, and Michelangelo, names which are notably inscribed into the walls of Dinand’s reading room. Rilke recounted:

 “After having read the works of these two poets they remained always near him, his thoughts went from them and yet returned to them again. At the time when his art took form and prepared itself for expression, when life as it presented itself before him had little significance, Rodin dwelt in the books of the poets and gleaned from the past. Later, when as a creator he again touched those realms, their forms rose like memories in his own life, aching and real, and entered into his work as though into a home.” 

These great men left an indelible mark on Rodin, so that he could leave an indelible mark on Rilke. Thus is the cyclical and generational- amazing- tide of influence. This is the kind of mark that a liberal education should make on each of us. It is the mark that Holy Cross should leave on us- the kind of experience that we should seek. To cite Rilke’s above poem once again, we should feel inspired–almost terrified–at the necessary pursuit of truth. Objective truth, rooted in objective goodness. 

Like the Rodin sculpture, many important things are overlooked and undervalued by this campus. We overlook our history, as made evident by the thoughtlessness with which we pass our campus’s art and architecture everyday. We overlook the liberal tradition, and with it the radical principles of the American Founding which gave birth to us and our freedoms. Lastly, we overlook the centrality of our Creator, without whom none of this would exist. 

But this is the age in which we live: utilitarian and ideological, rapidly changing and swaying with the tides of popular and fleeting beliefs and moral codes. The superficiality of Holy Cross is reflective of the superficiality of the American culture which surrounds it. This is the student body we have become, but it’s not the student body we have to be. 

To mitigate this problematic contemporary tendency towards easy, seemingly obvious short term solutions and understandings, one must dive into the richness of history and those who came before. It is only within this context that we can make sense of reality, yet this crucial fact has been largely forgotten. Following Rilke’s advice, we must take life more seriously. We must seek to fulfill our unique purposes. We must stand firm, and focused, in the face of a culture that values change, a culture that is inconsistent and shallow. 

Holy Cross physically embodies a time of the past, and for this we are lucky. The campus serves as a reminder of the school’s roots. Our roots. Great wisdom is undeniably preserved here, so long as it continues to be recognized, and sought, instead of rejected. Yet, figures from history are being erased and discarded at alarming rates. Names are wiped off the slates of time, here at Holy Cross, and around the country. Rodin sculptures are carelessly glanced over, Rilke’s words fall on deaf ears. If we can no longer look to history for answers in which to ground our humanity, where can we turn?

 It is clear that the vast majority of American society is turning the wrong way. Holy Cross should turn back and look to the past. We all stand on the shoulders of those who came before. We must acknowledge that there is truth to glean from history and tradition.

As highlighted in Rachel Corbett’s book, You Must Change Your Life: The Story of Rainer Maria Rilke and Auguste Rodin, Rilke offers advice for how to find meaning; 

“Search for the reason that bids you to write; find out whether it is spreading out its roots in the deepest places of your heart. Then ask yourself, would you die if it were denied you to write. This above all — ask yourself in the stillest hour of the night: must I write? If the heart utters a clear, I must, then build your life according to this necessity, but be prepared to surrender to the imperative forever, for art is not a choice, but an immutable 
disposition of the soul.”

So notice it all, the art around you. Think about what came before, think about what exists now. Take it all in, reflect on your own talents in the context of that which came before, and then turn that passion outwards. What kind of art are you meant to make? What gives your life meaning? Who do you draw inspiration from? 

This is a deep, reflective exercise. One that requires a liberal education and awareness of the important things; religion, philosophy, and history as mentioned before. Holy Cross must do better to inspire these contemplations. 

During a time when people seek instant gratification, immediate pleasures, coddling, and exceptions, this task of the pursuit of meaning becomes even harder, almost unorthodox. Now, moral relativism rules the day, and with this, so does complacency, mediocrity, and a system of judgment which changes with the tide of popularity. What does it mean to be great in the modern age? 

According to Rilke and Rodin, to be great is to be focused, to better oneself and to grow in likeness to the image of God, and to take oneself and one's life seriously. Liberal education is the means through which this greatness can be cultivated. As Holy Cross students, we all have this special opportunity. It is our job to make the most of it. 

So I end where I began: In the words of Rodin, “The main thing is to be moved, to love, to hope, to tremble, to live.” This is how we become the people we are meant to be, how we find ourselves, and figure out our unique contributions to the world. The first step in this journey is to find inspiration in what is all around us. 

References 

“Go to the Limits of Your Longing” Rainier Maria Rilke, Rilke’s Book of Hours: Love Poems to God, 2005.

“Auguste Rodin” by Rainer Maria Rilke 1903, translated by Jessie Lemont and Hans Trausil, 1919. 

You Must Change Your Life: The Story of Rainer Maria Rilke and Auguste Rodin, Rachel Corbett, 2016. 

Thanksgiving for Summorum Pontificum Almost 17 years Later

           In 2007, Pope Benedict XVI signed a groundbreaking motu proprio which affirmed the right of all Latin rite priests to offer the sacraments according to the books in place before the second Vatican Council, restoring a liturgical unity within the Latin church and reconciling her to the principles of liturgical continuity. What comes to most peoples’ minds will be the liberty given to offer the old Mass (the 1962 Missale Romanum or Usus Antiquior), but it must also be noted that Summorum Pontificum (SP) gifted the Church all the traditional sacrament books (which includes all the traditional forms of the sacraments, breviaries, etc.) that were in use prior to the Second Vatican Council. Even other traditional Latin rites (e.g. the traditional Dominican, Carmelite, or Ambrosian rites) have since experienced their own revivals in the aftermath of SP. The heart of the Holy Father’s philosophical justification was articulated in his letter accompanying SP in which he wrote: 

What earlier generations held as sacred, remains sacred and great for us too, and it cannot be all of a sudden entirely forbidden or even considered harmful.  It behooves all of us to preserve the riches which have developed in the Church’s faith and prayer, and to give them their proper place.

As we see in  many of his liturgical writings and reflections, this principle of valuing what came before as sacred permeates Pope Benedict’s understanding of liturgy and the Church itself. Even in his pre-papal memoirs, “Milestones: Memoirs: 1927-1977”, then-cardinal Ratzinger, reflecting on his first hand-missal, writes of the Church’s sacred Liturgy: 

It was becoming more and more clear to me that here I was encountering a reality that no one had simply thought up, a reality that no official authority or great individual had created. This mysterious fabric of text and actions had grown from the faith of the Church over the centuries. It bore the whole weight of history within itself, and yet, at the same time, it was much more than the product of human history. Every century had left its mark upon it. The introductory notes informed us about what came from the early Church, what from the Middle Ages, and what from modern times. Not everything was logical. Things sometimes got complicated, and it was not always easy to find one's way. But precisely this is what made the whole edifice wonderful, like one's own home.

It is precisely this organic development which gives, and continues to give the liturgy her unity, beauty, and depth. Liturgy is not something static, but ever slowly developing and shaping the Church. Likewise, Liturgy, properly understood, is not the product committee or community, but rather of centuries of tradition and development. By reading the same readings and by praying the same orations over centuries it bridges Catholics of the past and the present. This unity of prayer between Catholics over history is both a beautiful and fitting characteristic of our traditional liturgy. It is what marks us as truly “Catholic;” that is, universal. 

           Because of the principles outlined in SP and its accompanying letter, Tradition was no longer to be relegated to a few isolated chapels and banished from diocesean life. Instead, it could be a part of the heart of the Church’s worship. SP served to normalize tradition, welcoming it back into the mainstream of Catholic life. What the Church regarded as sacred and great was once again recognized as “sacred and great for us too.”

           Benedict also had the foresight to see how the Church’s youth would be attracted to what were her normative liturgical rites for over 500 years. He wrote in his letter accompanying SP: “It has clearly been demonstrated that young persons too have discovered this liturgical form, felt its attraction and found in it a form of encounter with the Mystery of the Most Holy Eucharist, particularly suited to them.” Here I hear the Pope speaking about young people like myself who, until encountering the traditional liturgy, experienced a great deal of difficulty participating in and praying the Holy Mass. I can say from my own experience that I find the older liturgical books to be more accessible and that they communicate to me more clearly, both verbally and non verbally, this Fons et apex (Source and Summit) of Christian life. I’m not claiming that every young person prefers the traditional rite, but from my own experience I have noticed that there is both greater interest in and greater tolerance for the traditional rite among the youth. Despite the prejudices of some septuagenarians, I am certain that, under God’s providence, this trove of liturgical treasures opened up by Summorum Pontificum will survive for generations to come.

References: 

Ratzinger, Joseph. Milestones: Memoirs: 1927-1977. San Francisco: Ignatius Press, 1998. 

The Crisis of Meaning at Holy Cross

I have been a student here at Holy Cross for four years. I have lived and breathed this campus for four years of my life. I have been immersed in various classes, social groups, campus events, and way too many Thirsty Thursdays at Weagle. Even after all this immersion, I still do not know what it truly means to be a Holy Cross student. 

However, I do know that I have been inundated with a lot of slogans that tell me what it means to be a Holy Cross student. According to these slogans, a Holy Cross student must be “a man or woman for and with others,” who always seeks “magis” and “cura personalis” above all else. By themselves, these slogans are pretty good. Who is opposed to being a “man or woman for and with others?” Are we going to be men and women for ourselves? Or cura personalis? Are we really just going to care for one aspect of ourselves to the detriment of the rest? Nonsense. The vast majority of people, even those outside Jesuit-sponsored institutions, intuitively understand that these things are good and important. 

These slogans allow Holy Cross to escape from answering the big question of “what does it mean to be a member of this community.” The administration uses these amorphous statements as a substitute for answering the tough questions posed at the beginning of our mission statement. These questions, which you might have glanced at in Montserrat (which, by far, is one of the most misguided programs at Holy Cross), are very good. In order to live the good life, we must figure out “how to find meaning in life and history” and “what are our obligations to one another.” It is impossible to live a truly human life without answering these questions.

The sad fact is that Holy Cross has made these questions, which lie at the heart of the College’s current mission statement, impossible to answer. They have made them impossible to answer because, above all else, Holy Cross has made the institutional decision to become a corporate institution. 

You might be asking what is the difference between a corporate institution and an educational institution. Well, for starters, a corporate institution seeks above all else the minimization of conflict, the maximization of the endowment, and the growth of the administrative bureaucracy. Can anybody with a straight face tell me that these goals are not the main goals of our administration? 

An educational institution does not seek these things. These goals, while sometimes important for the survival of the institution, are not the telos of an educational institution. To Holy Cross, these three corporate prongs are our final end. We have no greater end. Our end is not “in hoc signo vinces” or “ad maiorem Dei gloriam,” but rather it is “make sure that we soothe the concerns of alumni (whether they are progressive or conservative; old or young; white or non-white) enough that they are still willing to remember us, and the endowment, in their will.”

This corporate model has inevitably hurt the student body because it has produced an administration that is fundamentally incapable of giving students anything more than amorphous, relatively subjective, and undefinable slogans. For example, can anybody really define for me what it means to be “a man or woman for and with others?” Or, does it just mean whatever I want it to be? 

The scariest consequence of the administration’s corporate approach to institutional management is that they have entrusted these questions to people who fundamentally disagree with the mission of our college: the progressive academic.

Our faculty, composed mostly of very kind and overly generous people, is also stacked with dangerous ideologues. The faculty, by and large, has proposed solutions to these fundamental questions, but many of these solutions are inhuman and drastically opposed to the traditional mission of our college. Their solutions are not grounded in claims of Truth, but rather you will hear plenty of variants of “the truth is whatever you want it to be,” “objective truth does not exist,” or “just live your (undefined, subjective, and constantly transforming) truth, babe” from them. 

By grounding their answers in these morally relativistic terms, they have fundamentally destroyed the student body’s ability to answer these questions. Every man, woman, and child who labored to answer these questions in generations past would have been unable to answer them without resting them on solid, morally secure foundations. However, the progressive academics have intentionally destroyed this capacity in order to fulfill their ideological goal–the transformation, and thus destruction, of the liberal arts and humanities.

The modern academic is not a traditional academic, rather they are ideological conquistadores intent on colonizing the liberal arts and humanities in an attempt to “decolonize” and deconstruct them. In their opinion, one does not become a “man or woman for and with others” through living lives of charity and faith; rather, one only becomes a “man and woman for and with others” through actively working to dismantle “systems of oppression” and “recentering” social structures both on and off campus (ideas that would have been very foreign to Ignatius, Fenwick, and Arrupe).

The question remains: what can we, people who are opposed to this ideological colonization and believe that the administration is weak-kneed, do about this institutionally existential crisis? 

The answer is honestly not much. Holy Cross has made the active decision to become an Amherst College with a pretty chapel. No amount of complaining, arguing, or writing op-eds in The Fenwick Review will change this fact. As a result, somebody has to lay out a plan for institutional recapture, and the good thing is that, unlike the progressive academic, we do not have to start from scratch. The plan for institutional recapture has been laid out since 1843.

The plan is evident in our campus’ architecture. Holy Cross was built by men who believed in the good, true, and beautiful. And so, they built a campus that corresponded to all that is good, true, and beautiful. There is no greater example of such a building than Dinand Library. Dinand, an intentionally imposing neoclassical structure, tells that our mission is “ut cognoscant te solum deum verum et quem misisti Iesum Christum.” Institutionally, we exist in order for students to be able to “know you, the one true God and Jesus Christ whom you sent.” That is our mission. 

Holy Cross also knew that one can only truly know Christ and live this mission through the liberal arts and humanities. One can only truly be immersed within this tradition by studying “religio, philosophia, ars, literae, historia, scientia, medicina, jus.” These disciplines “nourish youth [and] delight old age.” They make us human. They answer these fundamental questions posed in our current mission statement. The works, conquests, and ideas of men such as Aquinas, Benedict, Bellarmine, Columbus, Copernicus, Dante, à Kempis, and Justinian (whose names are all prominently featured in the Main Reading Room) are examples of individuals (and there are many more, including modern, female, and non-Western figures) who show us what it means to be truly human and Christian. These figures have engaged in the Great Conversation through studying and participating in the triumphs and failings of our civilization, the liberal arts, and the Church. They are the models that our administration and faculty should point us toward.

Holy Cross, like much of our world, is in a crisis of meaning. We are unable and unwilling to answer the fundamental questions posed by our very institution because our current corporate administration acts primarily out of fear. As a result, they leave these human questions to the province of ideologues whose intent seems to be the destruction of the institution itself. However, this story does not have to end with Ignatius wishing that the cannonball hit his head instead of his leg, rather Holy Cross can go “ad fontes.” Holy Cross can return to the sources of her heritage, her very self, as evidenced through her very campus. There, she will find the answers that she poses to herself; there, she will be able to tell her students what it truly means to be a member of this college.

What I Have Learned at Holy Cross

           I began my Holy Cross career by taking a class entitled “The Meaning of Life.” We read Viktor Frankl’s Man’s Search for Meaning, The Book of Job, Plato’s Dialogues, Marcus Aurelius’s Meditations, and more. The class, perhaps for the first time in my life, sparked an interest in the meaning of life and the significance of suffering. After all our reading and discussion of what makes life meaningful, our final assignment was to do a research project on someone whose life and writings exemplify the meaning of life, and to share what we thought this meaning was. I chose Mother Teresa and paraphrased the Greatest Commandment, saying, “I want to live a meaningful life, like Mother Teresa, by doing all I can to love and serve God and my brothers and sisters on Earth.”

           I was saying more than I knew. I had forgotten what I wrote in this final Montserrat paper. As I re-read sections of it to write this reflection, I expected to disagree with what I wrote as a freshman. I do not disagree at all. I believe what I wrote in freshman year now more than before. What has changed throughout my 4 years at Holy Cross is my understanding of what it means to love God above all things and my neighbor as myself.

        My education has introduced me to saints, martyrs, and holy fools. When I said, “to love and serve God and my brothers and sisters on Earth,” I think I, with the best intentions, meant, “to be a good person.” Not to be too weird or over-the-top about the faith, but to be kind, pleasant, and helpful to others. To go to church on Sundays, some other days as well. But even then, I felt a longing for something deeper. The saints, martyrs, and holy fools I have encountered showed me what it means to truly and deeply love God and neighbor. They are more than what we think of as a “good person.” A good person is kind to his friends, maybe even to those he does not like, but he does not necessarily die rather than renounce his faith. A good person is grateful when things are going well in his life, St. Paul sang a hymn of praise when he was imprisoned. A good person goes to Church on Sundays out of mere habit, a saint goes because he recognizes it is Heaven on Earth.

           I encountered these saints and deepened my faith thanks to my education, both inside and outside the classroom, at Holy Cross. I like to think that I got the experience of a Holy Cross of which St. Ignatius would be proud. I think he would have negative feelings towards a lot of what happens on the Hill, but I am happy to report that hope silently lives on here. A handful of great professors have taught me language, literature, theology, and philosophy, and they have nourished my mind with wisdom (and folly). They have taught me what it means to live out our noble mission statement, to be “men and women for and with others,” but they have taught me this by teaching me the necessary prerequisite to all love: to know Love Himself. To do all for the greater glory of God and to live a meaningful life.

The Critical Need for Institutional Thinking

“Civil man is born, lives, and dies in slavery. At his birth he is sewed in swaddling clothes; at this death he is nailed in a coffin. So long as he keeps his human shape, he is enchained by our institutions.”  – Rousseau

Institutions, in the modern period, have gained the reputation of purveyors of oppression, restriction, and normative binding. Really, discussion around institutions today revolves around ideas of ‘institutional racism’, anachronistic modes of thought, and criticisms of how the past continues to inhibit progress for today’s society. Yet, we seldom consider the benefits we have gained from these inherited structures, and further how we may continue to live in excellence in accord with them.

Man inherently derives his identity from an institution, be it his church, school, profession, or even  sport. In essence, an institution is the binding of tradition, mission, and purpose to a field of habit. We often decry lawyers, doctors, accountants, etc. for their collective manner of action; they seem to act very much alike despite only sharing a profession. But these attributes are ingrained into the persona of their field. A lawyer acts like a lawyer because he has been taught by lawyers and mimics his predecessors in law. A lawyer derives his identity from the sanctity and purpose of the law, invoking figures like Cicero and Aristotle, while clerically thinking of the policy of circumstance. In fact, the idea of a lawyer, though seemingly off-putting in character to most, helps bind delinquent lawyers to a greater form of behavior in representing their field. One may think of Saul Goodman in contrast to his stereotypical lawyer brother, Chuck McGill.

To think institutionally is to first inherit an institution, with its customs, tradition, history, figures, and mission and carry its legacy forward so future generations may not be deprived of the value it has provided. The benefit of such a system of thought is that we are not divorced, in arrogance, from our ancestors nor are our progeny disinherited from the long system of reason which our society has built. Institutional thought drives us to esteem our tradition and act in a manner befitting it, rising above immediate temptations for the sake of our lineage. It is the sort of mode of habit that keeps the world running. Institutional thinkers kept our Church active and able in times of disheartening war and peril; they maintained Japan functioning in the wake of utter defeat in World War II; bankers and clerks aided the Western world function despite being overwhelmed by the black death. It is the “business as usual” model that maintains stability and some form of certainty in the face of absolute fear and turmoil.

In today’s academic schools, we are rather imbued with “critical thinking” skills, prized for its skeptic and ‘rational’ analysis. Often, to think critically is to criticize everything inherited and take nothing as a guarantee. But people do not function like that. We live with assumptions. No skeptic wakes up and devotes his day to analyzing all he eats and all his relationships. He does not question that the world is still turning, that the police will come when needed, that the law of gravity persists, etc. Rather, it is habit that allows us to live our lives efficiently, and habit can only be made with the assumption that there is some consistency in the world. These helpful habits are related to the institutions that operate our world. For example, we as Americans live with the assumption that there is a definable law, a functioning grid, and a trust that we can lend our fellow Americans. So called “critical thinkers” are more preoccupied with questioning our assumptions about everything: is the US really under the rule of law? Can we really trust our neighbors? Does religion really help improve man? Is capitalism fair? Exceptions and circumstances are constantly used by these sophists as justification to undermine every institution that has aided the survival and betterment of man.These questions are useful, but they have their time, place, and certainly must be in respect to the institution rather than in malice.

Yet, institutional thinking does not ask you to receive everything faithfully and blindly, as may be presumed. Rather, what you inherit must be innovated with faithfulness to those who came before and those that will come after you. As Sir William Slim put it, “[t]radition does not mean that you never do anything new, but that you will never fall below the standard of courage and conduct handed down to you. Then tradition, far from being handcuffs to cramp your action, will be a handrail to guide and steady you in rough places.”

Post Scriptum, I wish I were wise enough to have figured these ideas out for myself, but unfortunately not. A great deal of this article is a paraphrase of Hugh Heclo’s exceptional piece: “Thinking Institutionally”, from the Oxford Handbook of Political Institutions. I exhort everyone who finds a modicum of inspiration from this argument to check it out.

References 

Heclo, Hugh, 'Thinking Institutionally', in Sarah A. Binder, R. A. W. Rhodes, and Bert A. Rockman (eds), The Oxford Handbook of Political Institutions (2008; online edn, Oxford Academic, 2 Sept. 2009), https://doi.org/10.1093/oxfordhb/9780199548460.003.0037, accessed 1 Apr. 2024.

The Review Reviews: More than a Milestone: Mania Offers Rich Food for Theological Thought

This spring, Alternate College Theatre performed its first-ever original musical: Mania, a dark comedy written by Blake Sheridan of the class of 2024. Sheridan also stars as Billy Higgins, a father who offers to coach a struggling boys’ soccer team mostly so he can antagonize a rival coach, his old enemy Bruce (Frank Amuso). At their first match, passive-aggressive conflict builds between the families of each team, culminating when the referee (Max Coté) reveals himself to be a damned soul involved in a type of spiritual pyramid scheme, releases hallucinogens over the playing field, and encourages the characters to murder each other.

If that sounds dark, it is. It’s also very funny. I’m quick to see a clichéd gag approaching and have sometimes felt vicarious embarrassment for less-than-original “comedies,” but Mania’s humor consistently surprised me and evoked genuine laughter throughout. Acting, directing, and production were all excellent. What most interested me about Mania, though, was its engagement with religion. As a dilettante art critic, I consume film and literature reviews regularly, and in this process I’ve sometimes heard Christian critics praise a work for exploring “the absence of God.” I never quite understood this sentiment. Granted that such an exploration doesn’t make art bad, why would it inherently be a point in the art’s favor? Perhaps the highest praise I can give for Mania is that I finally understand what those critics were getting at.

It would be easy to construe Mania as anti-religious, or at least nihilistic. The storyline is quite brutal at times, and there aren’t any clear rays of grace. Petty grudges spiral into violence. A dead character (Connor Morine) who, though past the age of reason, seems too young to have committed mortal sins is unambiguously shown in hell (or at least an afterlife that’s enthusiastically marketing itself as such). The antagonist runs gleefully through the show without seeming to receive any comeuppance, and nobody else has a happy ending. By the time one of the characters (Hillary Boadu) protests her Christianity and expresses the belief that God will rescue her, we’ve seen enough of the show’s world to be doubtful of this prediction, and in any case, her treatment of others to that point has been far from an example of Christian virtue.

Yet though I’m usually quite attuned to digs at religion in media, I never felt that Mania was goading me. Part of this was due to it demonstrating a clearer understanding of Christian theology than most supernatural fiction. Seeing an afterlife cashing in on pop-culture images of hell, one character remarks that it doesn’t look too bad — whereupon the referee explains, quite rightly, that the chief torment is not physical punishment but decay of the soul. While most supernatural fiction tends to portray demons as ordinary bogeymen with an end goal to frighten or kill people, Mania’s referee is far more orthodox, striving to corrupt characters and noting that he doesn’t benefit by directly killing them himself. (The referee isn’t a demon, but he serves one.) It helps that, though many stories which try to subvert Christianity portray the demonic as a positive and misunderstood force, Mania never paints its antagonist as anything but villainous; and while the pious characters come in for their share of satire, the script is ultimately even-handed in its distribution of both criticism and understanding to all characters.

I have suggested that Mania explores the absence of God. What particularly intrigues me is how this theme is handled. In a purely nihilistic production, the absence of an ultimate good would be taken for granted, and it’s unlikely the villains would be couched in religious terms because religion would simply be irrelevant. Yet Mania’s referee explicitly engages with Christian typology. He relates a conversation he purportedly had with Satan and frequently switches from speech to cant, evoking — especially given the musical’s debut at a Jesuit university — a priest celebrating Mass. Both of these behaviors challenge the reading that God is simply nonexistent in Mania’s world. Satan’s very identity implies opposition; if God doesn’t exist, whom did Satan rebel against? Why? If religion is irrelevant, why does the referee satirize liturgical language instead of, say, royal addresses or terms-and-conditions disclaimers? These things do not negate God’s absence in Mania, but the negative space becomes a paradoxical presence, suggesting the necessity of God by drawing our attention to what’s missing.

At rare moments, other characters indicate that the bleak world of Mania is not the status quo. Near the beginning of Act II, the referee explains to the deceased young character whom I previously mentioned that he avoids the torments of hell by tempting other souls to damnation. After the vicious conflicts and self-serving behavior of Act I, one might reasonably expect the dead player to want in on the scheme. Instead, he protests, “But that’s immoral!” Much closer to the show’s end, another character (Erin Ledwith) defiantly asserts that the referee won’t get away with his crimes. The villain laughs it off, but this sense of justice should give us pause. None of the preceding events encourage the idea that Mania’s world is just; indeed, the character speaks these words bitterly amidst a field of bodies. So from where does she derive her knowledge of how things are “supposed” to be?

The story’s status as a theatrical comedy is relevant here, I think. More than any other medium, theater draws attention to its artificiality. Sets are disassembled before the audience’s eyes; dead characters get up and walk offstage at scene changes; and, of course, all of the actors reappear together for bows at the end, dispelling the illusion of enmity between them. Mania particularly embraces its fictionality when, near the climax, the referee directly addresses the audience members to mock them for their silence and stillness. As we should expect from a dark comedy, which invites us to laugh at things that would be unpleasant in real life, Mania frequently reminds us that the story is a secondary world, not the primary one, and should be engaged with as such. Perhaps this is how the characters dimly know, despite lack of evidence in their own world, what morality and justice should look like. Their world cannot exist independently but requires our world’s rules for a foundation, even when those rules are internally defied. Or perhaps Mania is simply making a point about reality. Even in our world, we sometimes know what the ideal should look like despite lacking an experiential foundation for that understanding. From where do we derive this knowledge?

My ultimate conclusion is thus. Mania is, I think, doing something complex with its religious themes. It does not make assertions about God’s status in our world. Rather, it posits a hypothetical world in which God is conspicuously absent, then asks us to contemplate that world. What would existence there be like? What would happen to morality? Does that world even make sense? Mania provides no easy answers, but it suggests — by illustrating evil as dependent on a higher good to flout, by challenging whether reality can be unjust unless there exists some external standard of justice — that the questions are more complex than one might think.

As a Catholic, I also appreciate Mania’s exploration of the absence of God for another reason. Mania debuted on Thursday, March 21st — almost exactly one week before Good Friday, when Catholics are asked to reflect on the crucifixion and death of God. We should not gloss over the existential horror those ideas should provoke. Yet it can be hard to internalize in the modern day, when Easter is familiar and we are used to happier holidays. At the end of this Lent, I appreciated the chance to (lightly, humorously) stare into the void and ponder what the world would be like without an omnibenevolent foundation.

I would ordinarily finish this review by stating whether I’d recommend the show to others, offering qualifications for those who might find the material intense, and exhorting the rest of the target audience to see it. (Here’s a litmus test: if you can see the funny side of a character attempting to kill somebody with a modified t-shirt cannon, Mania is for you.) Unfortunately, Mania has had its full run at Holy Cross, and while I’d highly recommend it to all readers, there is no news yet of where one might catch it in the future. So I shall close with this recommendation: watch the careers of those involved in Mania. There was a lot of talent on display in this production, and I would not be surprised to see it bear more fruit in the years to come. With luck, the future will bring more unique offerings from students involved in every aspect of Mania’s production.

Overall grade: A

A Reflection on Graduation

Unsurprisingly, I anticipate the end of the semester with mixed emotions. This time of the year always brings fatigue, a frazzled emotional state, and the eagerness for rest. As a graduating senior, I look forward to starting a new chapter in my life as I leave with my bachelor’s degree. Yet my readiness for the summer is tempered by sadness at departing Holy Cross permanently. Alas, such is the way of life’s great changes. I doubt I am the only member of the graduating class to feel this way.

Closing out my brief but vivid tenure at the Fenwick Review, I wanted to take the opportunity to share some thoughts I’d recently had on the nature of graduation. I will not attempt to erase the melancholic aspects of transition. Not only is that feat beyond my writing ability, I don’t think it would even be healthy. Yet as someone who believes there is no human experience which cannot be enriched by philosophical consideration, I hope that my reflection will, without negating the emotional reality of graduation, offer some consolation to those who share my conflicted feelings and some entertainment to those who don’t.

Over the last semester, I have increasingly been confronted by a novel emotion. It should not be confused with pride in others, but like pride, it’s connected to times I’ve seen my friends, acquaintances, and unknown peers come into their own. These last months have been especially rich in opportunities for Holy Cross students to show off their talents. As I write this, the Fenwick Scholar presentation and academic conference are a few days away, and seniors in the honors program are completing their theses. Music majors have been giving their end of the year recitals over the last few weeks. We had one theatrical production last month and are in the middle of another now. The dance ensemble performed for a full theater on April 12th. Battle of the Bands was held on the 20th. And in general, I witness my friends take on new responsibilities as they prepare for new jobs, new internships, or whatever comes after undergraduate education in the case of other ’24 students. These are the times I’ve recently seen my peers flourish as individuals. Perhaps you have your own examples from sports, or service work, or something else.

I have said that the emotion connected to these experiences is not mere pride. Pride in others is a familiar emotion that I’ve had throughout my life. This emotion is newer, and it relates to the fact that the people in question are now burgeoning adults obtaining independence in the world — and, for the first time, substantially affecting the world with their actions. I think it is easiest to explain the feeling with a quotation:

“It is a serious thing to live in a society of possible gods and goddesses, to remember that the dullest, most uninteresting person you can talk to may one day be a creature which, if you saw it now, you would be strongly tempted to worship, or else a horror and a corruption such as you now meet, if at all, only in a nightmare. All day long we are, in some degree, helping each other to one or the other of these destinations.”— C.S. Lewis, The Weight of Glory

Lewis was ultimately referring to human status after death with his descriptions of worship-worthy or horrifying creatures. Yet, as his final sentence indicates, humans are in the process of transforming themselves into these during their lifetimes. In Catholic thought, the process of becoming a saint is usually associated with moral practices, and indeed, I would agree that whether one acts rightly is the most important part of a person’s identity. But idiosyncrasies in personality and talent are also major parts of our ultimate identities. We remember saints not just because of their moral examples, but because of the unique flavors their personalities and lifestyles gave to the meaning of sainthood. I often cite the example of Joan of Arc, whose biography proved so compelling that she inspired Mark Twain, a man famously hostile to organized Christianity, to write a reverent fictionalization of her life.

My emotional response to the recent actions of my peers is, I think, a type of awe. Like it or not, we are all, right now, in the process of shaping our immortal forms — either giving ourselves more dimensions and growing closer to being fully formed human beings, or turning into one-dimensional self-parodies as we give up in the struggle. When I see other students growing in their talents, using them to liven the world, and becoming truly unique in the degree and/or application of their abilities, I have a glimpse of the divine figures they have the potential to become. It is a wondrous thing and a privilege to be able to see other humans in this process. These moments are some of what I treasure most from my time at Holy Cross.

Graduation can be a melancholic time as seniors leave their friends to join other communities. I will not dispute that. But the view of human life as a metamorphic process contextualizes the transition somewhat. It is by setting out that we are able to complete what we have begun at college, coming fully into our own and finishing the process of turning ourselves into masterworks of creation. Thus, while we acknowledge the sadness of this time, let us also see it as a time for amazement. This commencement may prove to be the genesis of, in Lewis’s words, “gods and goddesses.”

Am I my Brother’s Keeper?

In the biblical account of creation, the Lord forms the world and all it possesses, appointing man over his creation with the single mandate to “be fruitful and multiply” (Genesis 1:28). Shortly thereafter, the first descendants of Adam and Eve, Cain and Abel, enter into a quarrel resulting in the death of Abel. As the Lord perused the world, He asked Cain, “where is Abel your brother” to which Cain replied, “I do not know; am I my brother’s keeper?” God’s response is not a binary yes or no, rather the Lord chose to respond, “What have you done? The voice of your brother’s blood is crying to me from the ground.” We are often confronted with the same question when considering intervening in another’s life: am I my brother’s keeper? Modern values would argue that individual autonomy is one of the highest regards of life. That we should rarely, if ever, intervene in another’s free will, even for their own sake. But we should consider God’s retort more thoroughly. God chose to reveal to Cain that there are higher responsibilities we owe to each other. While there is a clear distinction between murder and allowing someone to continue to engage destructive habits, we are also complicit in their results. In an eloquent manner, God confirmed, “yes, you are our brother’s keeper.”

There is a popular anecdote of when Margaret Mead, a famed 20th-century anthropologist, was asked when she thought civilization first began. Mead responded that civilization began with the first healing of a human femur; the first time a man was brought back from a death sentence, through the aid of his tribe, marked when man became less animal and more human. Mead’s response held with Rousseau’s concept of a society; the social contract that brings society into being is a pledge, and the society remains in existence as a pledged group. To live in a society is to pledge yourself to the aid of another. It is not simply living adjacent to each other, but also forfeiting yourself to them when in need. We are led by a ‘general social will’ to act for the benefit of our social good. Simply by living in this society, we pledge ourselves to it and its values, accepting to live by its customs and traditions. And since our society is one led by a Christian understanding of the world, we are under an even greater obligation to one another.

The prime example of Christian morality is, of course, Jesus Christ. Throughout his life, death, and resurrection, Christ provided not only for our salvation, but also the right example on how we ought to live. One of Christ’s most well-known teachings is certainly “the golden rule” —do unto others as you would have them do unto you– which mandates a baseline of obligation we have to each other. But other examples abound in which Christ taught us that we have a greater obligation to others than to ourselves. Examples such as the parable of the Good Samaritan in which the only good man was the one that stopped to help, the parable of the talents which symbolized that we are obligated to use our God-given gifts for His glory, and the supreme example of Christ being martyred for our sake. To live for others is the highest calling a Christian is subject to. Our school’s motto calls us to live as “men and women for others.” To live in a Christian society is to be obligated to help others. 

Our responsibility is easily enough argued, but the case becomes foggy when applied to specific circumstances. Yet the same principles endure; we have a responsibility to our fellow man throughout our lives. Even in cases where the recipient rejects aid, we are under the greatest commandment to give our every effort to them. Consider the case of suicide: no reasonable person would argue that, if possible, one should not step in to prevent another’s death, even when expressly denied. Thankfully, we still live in a society in which our mandate is clear. And so, the maxim to be our brother’s keeper obliges us to consider intervening when  a person is engaging in destructive habits such as drug abuse, extreme risk, or negligent behavior. Our responsibility is still the same if we truly live as if we love our neighbor. Our response should of course be measured and tactful to express our sincerity but leaving no room for excuse when we come before the throne of God and must answer for our actions.

So with this view in mind we must consider where we fall short in society. It becomes clear that we owe protection to the innocent and marginalized, those who have no advocate, and to the poor and displaced. At times, we must even give advice to our brothers who are falling short of their potential. We must also consider how we may help those who are unable to help themselves, such as those suffering from a drug addiction.  Lastly, with respect to politics, we must resist corrupt actors who harm our society’s moral and physical well-being. To live as men and women for others, we are obligated to denounce lies, for that is the root of harm, and to take action for the welfare of our society, even if it requires some sacrifice on our behalf. 

“And the king will say to them in reply, 'Amen, I say to you, whatever you did for one of these least brothers of mine, you did for me.” (Matthew 25:40)