On Orthodox chant

Great piece on liturgical music, specifically Orthodox chant. Yes! The music is not sacred- it's the words! She gets it.

Here's a nice video.

BOB ABERNETHY, anchor: This weekend of Easter Sunday for Western Christians, we have a profile coming up of an inspiring Christian musician. We also have a “Belief and Practice” segment on chanting in Eastern Orthodox churches where this is Palm Sunday. Because of differing church calendars, Eastern Orthodox Easter— Pascha — is next week.

Our guide to Orthodox chanting was Emily Lowe, a member of the choir at the Holy Cross Antiochian Orthodox Church in Linthicum, Maryland. She told us not only about chanting, but also about her personal experience as a singer of the Eastern Orthodox conviction that worship brings change.

EMILY LOWE (Choir, Holy Cross Antiochian Orthodox Church, singing): Glory to the Father and to the Son and to the Holy Spirit.

The Orthodox Church is unique in modern times, having a completely-sung liturgy. Everything is sung from the very beginning to the end.

In Orthodoxy, the music is not sacred. The words are sacred. The music is really meant to fit the text. So when we talk about heaven, the voice goes up. And when you talk about hell or Hades or sin, it goes down. For instance, (singing), “The company of the angels was amazed when they beheld the number among the dead.”

During the time of the Ottoman Empire, the Greek chants took on sort of a very Middle Eastern character and that’s when you hear this sort of dissonant, odd sounding things: (singing) Hallelujah, Hallelujah, Hallelujah, glory to thee oh God.” It sounds very foreign to western ears.

For instance, (singing) “rejoice o Bethany.” Rejoice O Bethany — it’s a beautiful hymn and it’s very dear to the heart of our Arabic parishioners — (singing) — “God came to thee; God came to thee.” That little flourish at the end, (singing “la la la la”), very unusual and very otherworldly sounding. And that’s kind of — that’s the impression that people get. They might hear 20 things when they walk into an Orthodox church. But that’s what they’re going to take away. They’re going to go, “Whoa, I remember that. That was really unusual.”

I converted about 12 years ago. I was 16. And my family converted together. It was initially my father’s decision. He said, “I think this is the place for us to be. This is where God’s calling us. And this is really the fullest expression of the Christian faith.”

One thing about Orthodoxy is that it really demands change — and expects change. It expects that you will grow spiritually, that you won’t just be the same person that you were the week before or the month before.

From a personal standpoint, I never had a very good voice before we became Orthodox. I believe that I found my voice in Orthodox music — that I didn’t have it in Protestant music or in secular music.

When people say, “Oh, you did such a wonderful job,” I feel like telling them it wasn’t me because it really wasn’t. It doesn’t feel like me when I chant. I’m thinking about God and expressing the words the best that I can.

My icon instructor in action...

Here's Vladislav Andrejev working on the parish of St. Michael, in St. Michael, Minnesota. The first image is the dome bearing the icon of Christ the Teacher. Very cool stuff...
I hope to take another icon class sooner than later.

In my email box today....

The Seventh Ecumenical Council Approves the Veneration of Icons

The Seventh Ecumenical Council which opened in Nicea, Bithynia, on September 24, 787, was attended by 350 bishops, and soon joined by 17 other hierarchs, who abjured the Iconoclast heresy. Next to the papal delegates and those sent by the Patriarchs of Antioch and Jerusalem, the monks, who had been relentlessly persecuted under the Iconoclast emperors Leo III the Isaurian (717-741) and Constantine V Copronymus (741-775), were well-represented with a count of 136.

In this last great council recognized by all the Apostolic Churches, the holy fathers proclaimed the eternal memory of the defenders of Orthodoxy: Patriarch Germanus (715-730), Saint John Damascene, George of Cyprus, and all who had been subjected to exile and torture in their defense of Holy Icons.

The council fathers decreed:

"We define with all certitude and accuracy that just as the figure of the precious and life-giving Cross, so also the venerable and holy images, as well in painting and mosaic as of other fit materials, should be set forth in the holy churches of God, and on the sacred vessels and on the vestments and on hangings and in pictures both in houses and by the wayside, to wit, the figure of our Lord God and Savior Jesus Christ, of our spotless Lady, the Mother of God, of the honorable Angels, and of all Saints and pious people."

The Black Madonna of Mount Irazú

In 1635 a young black girl found a small black stone statue of Our Lady and the Holy Child in the woods near Cartago. She took it home with her but it returned by itself to where she had found it. After several futile attempts to keep it, she took the statue to the village priest, who tried hiding it, but to no avail. It was always found back in the woods.

The black families nearby built a little chapel to house their treasured Mother and Child on the spot that she herself had chosen to stay. In time it became a famous place of pilgrimage for all of Costa Rica. The image of the black Madonna, gaily dressed with Jesus, was solemnly crowned in 1927.

New interview on the Shroud of Turin

A New Era for the Shroud of Turin
Interview With Expert Father Gianfranco Berbenni

By Paolo Centofanti

ROME, FEB. 15, 2008 (Zenit.org).- Leaked information about a BBC interview to air on Holy Saturday reports that Christopher Bronk Ramsey, director of the Oxford Radiocarbon Accelerator Unit, thinks the 1998 tests on the Shroud of Turin should be re-evaluated.

The 1988 carbon-14 tests -- done in the Oxford laboratories -- dated the shroud in the Middle Ages, thereby negating that it could be Christ's burial cloth.

ZENIT spoke with Capuchin Father Gianfranco Berbenni, professor of "Science and Theology Regarding the Holy Shroud" at Rome's Regina Apostolorum university. In this interview, he comments on the long history of research on the shroud, as well as photographic reproduction made for display at this summer's World Youth Day.

Q: How do you see these possible new elements related to the Holy Shroud and to a possible disproving of the 1988 carbon-14 analyses?

Father Berbenni: Going beyond the leaked information, I think that a new era of investigations about the Shroud is opening; 20 years have passed since those scientific studies.

Q: Did Ramsey form part of the 1988 analysis team?

Father Berbenni: He worked in the laboratory in which the analyses were done. We could say that this is a new generation of scientists who are joining the research on the Shroud. Many of the older generation have left us, even physically, and this new generation rightly is taking up again the investigations, also because of a refining of the methods and instruments for archaeological dating over these years.

Some have even spoken about a kind of conspiracy, as if the $1 million offered for verifying the non-authenticity of the Shroud could have motivated the scientists, let's not say to falsify, but at least to direct the final results.

Perhaps this could be considered a bit of "scientific gossip." Little credit should be given to rumors when they do not have serious proof. The problem perhaps is that both sides, the one favorable to the Holy Shroud and the other against it were very much in conflict. Perhaps both sides brought to the surface their best arguments in that period. Both probably need to historically review those events.

Q: Regarding your statement about "scientific gossip," how do you evaluate the communication and information generally published about the Holy Shroud and up to what point do you think that at times it is used to make a circus of the information?

Father Berbenni: One of the weak points, recently examined as well in the International Center of Turin, is indeed ensuring the quality of information related to the Holy Shroud. Because of this a good press office is fundamental in order to give journalists trustworthy materials. It is, therefore, more than anything, a task of organizing communication. Information, if incomplete, becomes more easily manipulated.

Q: Therefore the manipulation of information can even be involuntary?

Father Berbenni: About the willfulness of it, there are many hints, but beyond the hints, there are no proofs.

Q: What do you think about the photographic enlargement being made of the Holy Shroud to be displayed in Novara, Italy, and then for World Youth Day in Sydney? Do you think that it can run the risk of trivializing the Holy Shroud?

Father Berbenni: The essential thing is that this initiative of the enlargement maintains that elegance of communication that the Holy Shroud has always brought to its surroundings. Thus this is a very good initiative; the essential thing is that a non-superficial tone is protected.

Q: Is there anything new in the studies about the Holy Shroud?

Father Berbenni: Beyond the intervention regarding protecting the preservation of the Holy Shroud, in these days, I think the Church does not intend to accelerate, at least at the moment, new investigations. The essential thing is its optimal conservation, something that has been verified for almost 10 years with its placement in the new, and splendid chest.

Q: Are there misunderstandings about the theological meaning of the Holy Shroud?

Father Berbenni: Sadly this is one of the weakest areas right now, in the popular and social perception of this cloth. In part because of the conflict that has sometimes marked it.

It is a splendid cloth, but is always at the center of aggravated discussions with a cultural character, and at times even about theological positions.

Q: Can you speak to us about the scientific or chemical theories about the way in which the image of the Holy Shroud could have formed?

Father Berbenni: Substantially there are two major schools. Our center in Rome, which is inclined toward accepting a normal physical-chemical formation, and the majority, at least presently, of the scientific positions, in which there are groups with hypotheses going from the mysterious, because they do not yet have demonstrated bases, to the esoteric.

Investigations about the formation of the image are very linked to the characteristics of the investigations of the STURP [Project of Investigation of the Shroud of Turn] from 1976 to 1988, but with some presuppositions.

The important thing is that they continue investigations without exaggerated positions of "scientific fantasy" but with freedom of investigation.

Regarding ourselves, we would suggest returning to much simpler, "normal" hypothesis, given that we always have available the high resolution photo of the negative of the Holy Shroud, which until 2002 was not analyzable except in small parts. It helps in that which refers to the technical aspects of formation of the image.

A Rich Market for Russian Icons

An icon is restored at a Moscow gallery opened by tycoon Mikhail Abramov to display his extensive collection. (By Peter Finn -- The Washington Post)

As Tycoons Reclaim National Treasures, Counterfeiters Also Emerge
By Peter Finn
Washington Post Foreign Service
Tuesday, February 5, 2008; Page A15

MOSCOW -- Last May, Maria Paphiti, an icons specialist at Christie's auction house in London, was invited to inspect some religious paintings on wood that were among the contents of a building recently bought by an English family. The artworks had been found wrapped in plastic, and the building's new owners wondered what, if anything, they were worth.

The answer: a lot, particularly if they drew the attention of Russian buyers who have embarked on a massive spending spree to recover the country's exiled treasures.

Paphiti quickly singled out one piece as quite valuable. The 1894 icon "St. Nicholas the Miracle Worker of Myra" had a rare signature by the acclaimed Russian icon painter Mikhail Dikarev. It had also been framed in gilt and enamel by Jakov Mischukov, a well-known Moscow craftsman.

Adding to the icon's value was a dedication on the back saying it had been presented to the last czar, Nicholas II, by the Old Believers community, which broke with the established Russian Orthodox Church in the 17th century over changes to the church's rites.

How the icon got to London, only to be discarded in an obscure building, remains a mystery, Paphiti said.

The icon was put on the block last June 11. Bidding started slowly at 20,000 pounds, or almost $40,000 -- Christie's pre-sale estimate. An impatient Russian bidder quickly stepped in with an offer of $200,000 and then two bidders, both unidentified Russians, faced off in bids made by intermediaries over the phone until the icon was sold to one of them for $854,000, a world record for an icon at auction.

For the happily bewildered English family, who told Christie's they wished to remain anonymous, it was an astonishing windfall. "They couldn't believe it," Paphiti said in a telephone interview from London.

Read the rest here:
http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/
article/2008/02/04/AR2008020403089.html?referrer=emailarticle

"Icons will save the world" (from First Things)

By Susan Cushman
Thursday, December 20, 2007, 6:36 AM

Standing before the icon of Christ in the front of St. John Orthodox Church, I prepare to offer my confession at the Sacrament of Forgiveness. The Holy image of the One Who Forgives comes forth to meet me, as the father comes forth to welcome home the prodigal son in the familiar gospel passage (Luke 15:11–32). The love of Jesus pours forth from his prototype (the icon), sees the offering of my broken heart, and raises it to the heavenly realm.

After receiving the priest’s counsel and absolution, I remain in the nave (the large part of the temple, called the sanctuary in Protestant churches) to give thanks and to let God’s grace and peace fill my heart. Surrounded by icons of Christ, his Mother, the angels, saints, biblical scenes and church feasts, I think about how Prince Vladimir’s envoys must have felt when they walked into Hagia Sophia Orthodox Cathedral in Constantinople near the end of the tenth century. Their mission was to find a religion that Prince Vladimir could embrace and offer to the people of Russia. In their report they said, “We didn’t know whether we were in Heaven or on earth.” Shortly thereafter, Orthodoxy became the official religion of Kievan Russia, infusing the lives of peasants and princes, artists and writers, with the Orthodox vision of beauty. Nine hundred years later, the Russian writer Fyodor Dostoevsky penned the famous words, “Beauty will save the world.”

I don’t think Prince Vladimir or Dostoevsky had in mind the kind of worldly beauty that today’s fashion and entertainment industries worship, or even the beauty of secular art and architecture. I think they were both swept off their feet by true spiritual beauty—in Vladimir’s case, the beauty of the Orthodox temple (church), adorned with icons.

SPIRITUAL BEAUTY
In his book Icons: Theology in Color, Eugene Trubetskoi said that the beauty of the icon is spiritual. “Our icon painters,” Trubetskoi said, “had seen the beauty that would save the world and immortalized it in colors.”

Here's a link to the full story:
http://www.firstthings.com/onthesquare/?p=928

"Integrity"

by Rod Dreher (http://blog.beliefnet.com/crunchycon/)

The other night, I spoke to my friend (and godfather) Vladimir Grigorenko, the iconographer at St. Seraphim Orthodox Cathedral here in Dallas. He told me in passing that an editor at Time magazine had contacted him some weeks back and asked him if he would create an icon for them. The subject was not Jesus Christ, nor the Virgin Mary, nor any saint.

The subject was Vladimir Putin.

Our Vladimir told them no, it was out of the question. Putin, in the place of Christ or a saint? That would be a travesty. His objection was not political, but theological. Vladimir told me the editor then asked for a recommendation of an iconographer who would be willing to take the commission. "I told him I would not recommend anybody take such a commission," Vladimir told me.

"Vladimir," I said, "do you understand what you've done? Time is probably going to name Putin their Person of the Year. If you took that commission, you would become world-famous. Your work would have been seen everywhere. You might have made a lot of money out of it."

"What is that?" he said, dismissively. It wouldn't be right to do such a thing, he continued, so there was never any question of fame or riches. Putin deserves to be the Person of the Year, he went on, because of his impact on Russia and the world, but Putin should not be depicted in anything resembling an icon.

I've been thinking since our conversation about the religious and artistic integrity in the stance he took. To talk to Vladimir about it is to realize that for him it wasn't any real temptation. The things of God are reserved for God. Period. Full stop. The end.

Well, I just found out that Time has indeed named Putin its Person of the Year. And they used on the cover a photograph of Putin. Time obviously abandoned its plan to render Putin as an Orthodox icon, and I hope it was because they could find no iconographer willing to go along with it. Still, think for a minute about the witness Vladimir Grigorenko gives by his refusal of fame and fortune for the sake of honoring God and sacred tradition. Could you do that? If you were an artist -- and not a wealthy one -- and were given the opportunity to draw the cover of the most important issue of one of the most important magazines in the world, would you be able to turn it down as instantly and as definitively as Vladimir did?

I hope and pray that I would have done so, but I know myself, and my own weaknesses, too well to say for sure. I think I would have reached the same conclusion he did, and that it wouldn't have taken very long to have done so, but I don't know that for sure. The world can be so alluring, the temptation to compromise comes in all kinds of ways, and the ability of we frail humans to rationalize is enormous.

And then a guy, an ordinary guy, a guy you go to church with, and goof around with, comes along and does something like that, and bam!, you realize what integrity really is. He makes it look easy. But see, this doesn't come from nowhere. Vladimir, who is 43, was raised in the Soviet Union by parents who were party members and atheists. After the fall of the USSR, he discovered Orthodox Christianity, and converted. He became an iconographer (my Dallas Morning News colleague Jeff Weiss profiled him seven years ago). Now he and his wife and kids live in Dallas, where he has spent the past few years creating the iconography for the inside of St. Seraphim Cathedral (click that link to see his work, or come by for evening vespers or Sunday morning liturgy; you really have to see the glory of God shining forth from these images in person). The Grigorenkos are deeply faithful to the church, in a steady, unobtrusive, humble way. Here's Vladimir's website, where you can see more of his iconography.

The thing I realized thinking this week on Vladimir's decision was that to get to the point where you can take a stand like that for God, at serious professional sacrifice to yourself, you have to die to yourself in countless little ways, every single day. If any of us are to find the strength and the courage to stand up for our beliefs in ways that cost us, we have to live the Christian life in a faithful, disciplined way, every day of the year.

Last night at dinner, Vladimir and I were discussing the challenge of raising faithful Christian children in our culture, and he said, "Listen, you can't just tell your children what to believe. You have to show them. You can't force them to believe what you believe, or hit them over the head with the faith. You have to live it out. In our family, the church is our life. You show that to your children, and leave the rest up to God."

This week, Vladimir showed his children what it means to be a Christian. And not only his children.