NewWorld

Culture

Led to the Mystery
Debates still rage as to the genuineness of Graham Greene’s conversion to Catholicism, but after reading this novel, we cannot doubt the central place the Christian problem occupies in the imaginations of both Greene and his fictional (albeit autobiographical) protagonist, Maurice Bendrix. The book starts out with a sort of mystery: why did Bendrix’s lover Sarah leave him? This leads to a greater Mystery–one that interrupts, disrupts and overhauls the lives of all of the characters with His presence. Bendrix is not a man of faith; he is, rather, a thoroughly modern skeptic who finds himself challenged by what appears to be evidence of Providence in his life and in the world, despite his best efforts to avoid it. Greene’s genius lies in his portrayal of apparently normal people who are challenged by love and the tension between the divine and the human. The scandal of Christianity’s all-too-human-ness is clearly apparent in the love story that unfolds in the novel, but Greene is more than aware of the necessity of a God who became flesh, rather than the “vapour” that Sarah says she would have invented if she were making up a God. The end of the novel unexpectedly suggests reasons for the inexplicable as it reminds us of the objectivity of the sacraments and the hope that we, too, can live as saints despite our unworthiness.
(Rebecca Vitz Cherico)

Solitude and Desire
“I look all the time.” In rendering America’s diners, movie theaters, country byways, and landscapes, Edward Hopper (1882-1967) painted the paradox of man’s solitude and desire with his mastery of light. His Southern Baptist upbringing had urged moral discipline, delayed gratification, hard work, and frugality as the path to well being. Yet his yearnings sent him down other roads as he grew into adulthood. Hopper’s close friend Gene Du Bois, the art critic famous for his paintings of social realism, wrote of the young artist, “The best man we had in school…, but not free enough [to be an artist]. Too much Anglo-Saxon reserve. And he does not like it a bit…. Should be married. But can’t imagine to what kind of a woman. The hunger of that man.” Indeed, his lifetime marriage in 1924 to another artist, Josephine, was dramatic, marked by possessiveness and violence. He refused to let others see her paintings; she insisted on being his only female model. Together they drove thousands of miles of America’s roads in their standard Dodge.
In Railroad Sunset, which Hopper painted in 1929 from his road trip memories, the sun is setting as the prosperity and simplicity of the early part of the century bids farewell. Hopper’s Depression period paintings shifted to couples alienated from one another. In his 1942 masterpiece Nighthawks, we peer into a late-night diner scene illumined by intense fluorescent light. The couple sits at the counter, lost in their own thoughts. The only free person in the painting is the waiter, who stares straight ahead and automatically attends to his counter. Another gentleman, his back to the viewer, avoids the anxiety of the outside world. The scene emits deep loneliness in the midst of the war effort as these individuals advance toward the bright light of nothingness.
Many of Hopper’s paintings are on permanent display at the Whitney Museum of American Art (www.whitney.org).
(Theresa Famolaro)

Millions
Directed by Danny Boyle
Fox Searchlight Productions
PG-13 / 97 min.
Most kids idolize sports stars, but 9-year-old Damian’s obsession is saints. He memorizes facts about their lives in exhaustive detail. These holy men and women often drop in on Damian to say hello. Walking in a field, a robed figure appears and the boy greets him, “St. Francis! 1181 to 1226!” At first, it’s hard to know what to make of Millions, directed by Danny Boyle (Trainspotting, 28 Days) and based on the book by Frank Cottrell Boyce (Welcome to Sarajevo). Is the film poking fun at Christian tradition or paying it bizarre homage? While Damian is mocked for his visions, his faith is his strength. In the end, his greater humanity is so evident that others are forced to acknowledge it. Is this a metaphor for the situation in the West? As Europe turns from its Judeo-Christian roots, the film seems to suggest there is more at stake than a religious heritage–including the meaning of what it means to be human. One note of caution: though publicized as a family film, it contains a couple of suggestive scenes and emotionally intense action. See it first before showing it to your kids. (John Touhey)

Like the Grass of the Field
The Biblical comparisons contained in Brahms’ requiem are so beautiful to read again: Man is like the grass of the field that is there in the morning and in the evening has withered and died. Just as we are in the great garden of the world. What are we before God? Not even the whole of man’s genius can answer this question, not even Brahms’ music can answer it; rather it intensifies the question and makes the contradiction even more dramatic. It is every man’s problem. I still remember the philosophy teacher at the Berchet High School, at the end of the funeral of a Greek teacher who had died in the classroom in the course of a lesson. He shook his head and, atheist as he was, called out very tensely, Eh, yes, death is the origin of all philosophies! “Death is the origin of all philosophies!” meaning that this problem is the origin of every true thought, of every true concern, every human feeling. It is what qualifies all humanity. There is no humanity that is not qualified by this dramatic wound.
(From the comments of Fr. Luigi Giussani published in the CD insert)