Posted on 03/25/2012 9:26:19 AM PDT by Steelfish
Britons Are Ignorant of Christianity And The Classics, Says Sister Wendy
Sister Wendy, the nun-turned-television-presenter, has warned that modern-day ignorance about Christianity and the Classics has left people unable to appreciate much of Western art.
She says she regrets the public's lack of understanding of the Gospel stories, and adds that as a consequence they cannot grasp the meaning of much of the canon of European painting.
Sister Wendy Beckett, who presented a popular series on art during the 1990s, says: "In the past everybody knew these stories, although they didn't necessarily live the spirit of them.
"Everybody used to know the Greek myths and most people had a smattering of Latin, now they don't."
She adds that the widespread lack of knowledge meant art historians were forced to fill in basic gaps, without which many paintings – such as those portraying the annunciation of Christ's birth to the young Mary, or Christ washing the disciples' feet on the eve of his execution – lose the central part of their meaning.
She points out that this phenomenon has coincided with a huge increase in the number of people attending art galleries, and says she fears that their experience is poorer because of their lack of religious understanding.
"This country has been built on the Christian faith – it's our heritage, whether people believe it or not. They have a right to know what happened and it does sadden me [that they don't]," she says. Sister Wendy speaks about the issue in an Arena television documentary, extracts of which were shown for the first time at the Oxford Literary Festival yesterday.
The BBC programme shows how she now uses the great religious paintings to retell the Gospel stories, in the hope of reacquainting her audience with their true meaning.
(Excerpt) Read more at telegraph.co.uk ...
I learned of the depth of my ignorance and the inadequacy of my public school education when the U.S. Navy gave me an extended stay in Italy. I walked into the Cathedral of Monreale outside of Palermo and all the beautiful mosaics were like hieroglyphics. I’ve spent the last 25 years trying to make up for the 13 years wasted at the hands of the single payer education nightmare.
There is a credible theory that socialist John Dewey and his educrat followers wanted an illiterate population that would be easier to control.
I’m not familiar with the theory you mention, but would be happy to read anything you could link about it.
Although it’s clear that a vast segment of our population is poorly educated and has limited skills in logic and rational argument, it is also demonstrably true that a far larger number of our fellow citizens have basic reading and numeracy skills than during Dewey’s time.
I think we’re witnessing a regression to the mean more than anything else.
I recommend the CS Lewis book, On Stories: And Other Essays on Literature, Lewis make a clear case for the timeless myth and fairy tale.
“By confining your child to blameless stories of child life in which nothing at all alarming ever happened, you would fail to banish the terrors, and would succeed in banishing all that can ennoble them or make them endurable. For in the fairy tales, side by side with the terrible figures, we find the immemorial comforters and protectors, the radiant ones; and the terrible figures are not merely terrible, but sublime. It would be nice if no little boy in bed, hearing or thinking he hears, a sound, were ever at all frightened. But if he is going to be frightened, I think it better that he should think of giants and dragons than merely of burglars. And I think St. George, or any bright champion in armour, is a better comfort than the idea of police.”
– “On Three Ways of Writing for Children”
Britain’s once-great army is disappearing into nothingness, led by cowardly, politically correct officers — with the military budget slashed to pay for socialized medicine.
Once Britannia ruled the waves. Now it can barely police Moslem neighborhoods in London.
Yes, I agree, Americans are being deprived of our history and culture and everything Christian.
Disclaimer: Opinions posted on Free Republic are those of the individual posters and do not necessarily represent the opinion of Free Republic or its management. All materials posted herein are protected by copyright law and the exemption for fair use of copyrighted works.