Quick Hits: Getting away from pathological activism and pathological art

By Thomas V. Mirus ( bio - articles - email ) | Sep 01, 2017 | In Quick Hits

• At his Bad Catholic blog, Marc Barnes recently commented on the self-indulgence and counter-productivity of Antifa’s methods of confronting white nationalists: “If justice is ‘fun,’ you’re probably not practicing justice. If works of justice fulfill elemental passions within you, then your works of justice probably don’t proceed according to reason and universal politics.” In another insightful piece, Barnes comments on the difference between identity groups and true communities, and why the State encourages the former and discourages the latter.
• In the UK’s Spectator, a young Catholic from Scotland reflects on her first year attending NYU, in which she had to navigate the bizarre world of postmodernism and political correctness (for example, she was nicknamed “cultural fascist” because of her view that some art is objectively good and other art is objectively bad). I was tickled by her reference to the disused convent in Hell’s Kitchen which became her haven for discussing campus-banned topics: I know exactly the place she’s talking about.
• When you see a title like The Mental Disorders That Gave Us Modern Architecture, you can’t not click. My question is, if Le Corbusier and Ludwig Mies van der Rohe can’t be entirely blamed for the ugliness they created, why did everyone else go along with it?
• By contrast, it’s always good to return to Michael O’Brien’s letter to writers and artists, which contains valuable counsel for the young on how to pursue an artistic vocation in the spirit of Christ, not of the world, in the spirit of poverty and humility.
• And for those in the NYC area, this fall, the Parish of St. Vincent Ferrer is offering a parish study led by Fr. Innocent Smith, O.P.: The Arts as Paths to God: Secular and Sacred Art and the Spiritual Life.