NASHVILLE, Tenn. — Robin Jensen likes to tell a story about the great
Russian ballerina Anna Pavlova, who was once asked after a performance
“what it meant.”
“Pavlova said, ‘My God man, if I could explain what it meant, I
wouldn‘t have gone to the trouble to dance it,‘” said Jensen, the Luce
Chancellor‘s Professor of the History of Christian Art and Worship at
Vanderbilt University Divinity School.
“When people confront any kind of art, they have to get used to a truth
that isn‘t there in front of them, all spelled out clearly.”
Jensen will elaborate on the potential of arts in Christian worship at
two events, a community breakfast on Thursday, March 3, and an all-day
forum on Saturday, April 9.
“We are ‘Word‘ people,” Jensen said. “We preach The Word, we say The
Word, we pray The Word. √ñ We‘re people of language. But if that‘s all
we do, then we are missing out on much of God‘s glory and creation.”
The breakfast, titled “The Holiness of Beauty: Knowing and Praising God
Through the Arts,” is open to the community and will be held from 7:30
a.m. to 8:30 a.m. in the refectory of Vanderbilt University Divinity
School. The cost is $10.
The Ministry Today forum is titled “The Image of the Invisible God: A
Visual Theology for Orthodox Protestants” and is designed for clergy,
congregational worship committee members and other interested laity. It
will run from 9 a.m. to 3 p.m. in Room G-23 of Vanderbilt University
Divinity School at 411 21st Ave. S. The cost is $50.
Pre-registration is required for either seminar. To register, call 615-343-3994 or go to www.vanderbilt.edu/divinity online.
Until the 16th century, the church was a patron of the arts, Jensen said.
“From that time on, many artists had to work outside of the church. It
was rejected because it was thought that art is idolatrous or
distracting or seductive or a waste of good money. You could be feeding
poor people, so why are you hanging beautiful draperies or a painting?”
But rejecting the arts is like rejecting the beauty of God, Jensen believes.
“One of the ways we know God is through beauty,” she said. “Images have
a great deal of power. Advertisers know that. Pornography works that
way.
“I think we can counter those images with more healing images. We need
delight, we need devotional objects, we need loving, attractive things
that shape our knowledge of the world.”
Media contact: Jim Patterson, (615) 322-NEWS
jim.patterson@vanderbilt.edu