Friday Links, September 22, 2017

Tired of trendy and overly academic church architecture? Try a do-it-yourself grassroots church building movementlike Poland did. "The grassroots, unofficial origins of each church produced a baffling array of styles across the country. ‘Every time we thought we had found some regularity or pattern, it broke down,’ Cichońska says. There is no logical connection between location and style, or even size of building."

A consideration of the relation between beauty and morality is going on at Crisis Magazine. "But beauty, as Hildebrand knew—taking cues from Augustine—is also the sign that invites contemplation, care, and union which directs one back to the Author of Beauty itself. Beauty allows for a moral re-awakening and is available to all since it is linked to the Spirit calling us to sing those songs of ascent."

In addition to occasionally gracing us with his writings, Daniel Mitsui's talks on Catholic art are beginning to find their way online, including his Gold Out of Egypt: Christian Art and International Influences. "The mines of God’s providence are everywhere scattered abroad. If the Metamorphoses can be moralized and read as a dim Christian allegory, so too can Norse and Celtic and Persian and Chinese mythology; if aught that is true in Platonism can be claimed for Christian use, so too can aught that is true in Confucianism, however much or little."