Yes, I Know
Yes, I know it’s Easter. Yes, I know Easter is a pagan converted religious holiday. Yes, I know the place is filled with anti-Semitic symbols. Yes, I know it doesn’t really have much to do with the actual text.
But . . . it’s still magnificent, and it was nice to feel God’s presence anyway.
The Easter Service at the Duomo in Parma
Thanks for the update and YOUR feelings. It’s obviously an opinion and therefore you felt it necessary and lovely to share. Thanks. And the fact that you have shared it. It can allow the question to also be asked and that is how you are comfortable about ‘Rome’ and it’s history? Rome does have a history and so does France. I just thought that I would mention the current news besides your feedback concerning your pleasure expressed if the feelings one would have from this real place and its picture captured by yourself and shared. If what you have done that in any way has contradicted Torah that would be dangerous. And Ecclesiastes it ends (we are in those days now) saying:- “ Let us hear the conclusion of the whole matter. Fear Elohim and keep His mitzvoth: for this is the entire duty of all mankind. Shalom
I don’t think I’m the least bit confused about the influence of Rome and its deliberate departure from Torah, but I still find the art quite uplifting.
Wow I am surprised at your confidence in how you say that YOU know about ‘Rome’ Unleavened Bread and leaven don’t go together ok? Shalom
What a contradiction…..yesterday you wrote in TW about how we should be concerned by the translation changes….today you write ‘ yes I know’!?!
Makes me think of the Kings of Israel……going on in their way……but never taking down the high places.
Yes it’s your journey Skip but it’s also your example. What happened to Pesach? I’m totally on my own at present however doing my best celebrating Pesach and Yeshua’s atonement because it’s one of the festivals we are encouraged to honor ……entering freedom and beginning the new year in Him. Isn’t that more important than visiting a place like that and then saying ‘I know’ ?!?
Sorry to confuse you. I didn’t mean Pesach was unimportant, or even replaced by this Christian celebration. I only meant that the artistry, the grandeur and the pageantry was quite overwhelming. Yes, the theology is wrong and the substitution of Easter for Passover is mistaken, but it’s still a beautiful place. Should we do as the Muslim do and tear down all human efforts to demonstrate the majesty of God because they don’t fit our theology? Or should be recognize the amazing creativity of Man, even if it’s in the wrong place?
I’m sorry you had no community for Pesach. Neither did we.
‘magnificent’? Skip?
Perhaps as ‘magnificent’ as other beautiful art done in all kinds of religious temples, shrines, mosques and churches……..
Let’s hope and pray that it was Elohim’s presence, the G-d of Israel that you felt.
Thank you Skip for being a “real” human in a fallen world. I have had the same thoughts myself at one time or another. Still believe in God as well and I agree that it is good to feel His presence. Felt it a few times out in the timber yesterday hunting mushrooms (found exactly none!).
I am laughing at Macron’s saying that the Notre Dame Cathedral will be rebuilt “even better”. One look at the artisanship in the picture from above (I realize it is a different place) and I know that fire took something that can never be replaced. Better appreciate what we have while we have it 🙂
Yes, that’s right. Never be replaced. The lost is not just the artistry but the sense of history, of culture, of all those whose lives were altered by the God of Israel in a pagan world. And yes, there is precious little time left to marvel at what men did in the past to seek and honor God, even if they were theologically incorrect.
I wonder what the eternal temple of Yahweh will look like?
Yes, indeed. Will He build it with or without human hands? Will there be skilled workmen who have already ‘made the cut’ during their lives on this earth, who are assigned the work of building the holy temple? As we see the most breathtaking examples of human inspiration destroyed (such as Notre Dame), it causes me to wonder if all of these are akin to offerings in the tabernacle. How does Yahweh see it when such destruction occurs? I grieve at these losses, but I wonder what it means in another realm.
Absolutely magnificent!
The living God, and our fleeting perception of His presence in our lives is good in any color.
I was in a stand of majestic pine trees yesterday. I could not help but to lift my head and worship. It reminded me of being in a great temple.
I’d like to add another perspective to this discussion. I believe that Revelation 2:20’s remarks about things sacrificed to idols could just as well include, in modern parlance, Christmas traditions and Easter traditions. The verse singles out “teaching” these things as being wrong. To me, this means that if a person wants to indulge in a Christmas tree, for example, that person can look at it as being just a pretty tree. It’s like food sacrificed to idols. It’s nothing. But if that person wants to teach others to put up their trees, that’s wrong. You risk offending someone. You risk leading people astray from genuine worship. Now I know Skip was NOT trying to convince all the rest of us to join him in attending Easter Sunday church services. Being a sensitive man of the arts, he was just moved by the skill behind the beauty. And I can see why some would find this offensive.
Thanks for the reply. I am always amazed that people are so convinced of their own theological positions that they don’t allow God to work in any other way. This seems to be especially true when Messianic followers try to deal with subjects like the history of art. There is no doubt in my mind that some of these artists and craftsmen believed sincerely that they were dedicating their efforts to God as they understood Him. Of course, we now look back on this and recognize that the Church had its own agenda and that a great deal of this work was anti-Semitic and not biblical, even if it was religious. But to utterly reject all this effort because it doesn’t fit CURRENT theological understanding seems to me to be quite narrow-minded. Of course, I could also suggest that a position like this is really very Western, not biblical, that is to say, it is based on the philosophical conviction that there is ONLY ONE right way. I hope all of you know me well enough by now to realize that I am NOT arguing that the Hebraic view, the basis of Scripture, is only one of many possible ways to God. I don’t believe that. But I do believe that God is much bigger than our pedestrian attempts to box Him into our “right” thinking, and I find that if I look hard enough I will see Him as work all over the world. He’s there sitting with the prostitutes in Jakarta, comforting them in their dire economic state that forces them into sex slavery. And He’s there with De Vinci when he tries to paint a biblical scene even if he paints it as if it took place in the 15th Century. What I am trying to say is this: “Allow God to be bigger than you.” Now if you want to critique that fact that I actually went to the Easter service at the Duomo in Parma, feel free. You don’t have to go and I don’t expect you to. I just wanted to see what the interior of this cathedral looked like when the lights are on, and that happens only two times a year: Easter and Christmas. If you found the picture so disturbing that it caused offense, perhaps it would be worth while to look inside and see why you were offended when there were hundreds of people there who came to seek God, even if they were taught the wrong thing about Him.
Anne Lamott said, “You can safely assume you’ve created God in your own image when it turns out that God hates all the same people you do.” One could add “hates all the same things you do” as well.
Great quote. Please send the source.
From the book by Anne Lamott: “Bird by Bird: Some Instructions on Writing and Life” page 22. She attributes this quote to “my priest friend Tom”.
I’m not sure what my own emotional and spiritual response would have been in the context of the environment at that moment, but I appreciate that you shared the moment with us, both through the lens of your camera and in your post. I know that in truth God desires we sense and experience his presence in whatever circumstances we find ourselves.
“…And whoever is not offended by me is blessed.”
Thanks. Now let me add this. Perhaps we just make too much of it all. After all, it was a VISUAL experience, not necessarily emotional or spiritual. Sometimes I think our need to be spiritually correct just interferes with the rest of life. And then I remember the rabbis who said it was a sin NOT to enjoy the pleasures that God provided in the world. Oh, I’m sure I’ll get another round of critique over that, like, “Pleasure? Are you saying that we should be hedonists?” Notice that the operative terms are “what God provided.” Now it’s time to walk away.