"This morning I said Mass, through no fault of my own, in a white chasuble which had, on the back, a picture of a lighted candle up against a design of a Gothic rose window. Now already on the altar two large candles were burning with bright flames perfectly and unobtrusively fulfilling their symbolic function. What possible sense could be made by a picture of a candle on a celebrant's back? We have no rose window in our chapel. But certainly the fact that we have none does not mean that we need one, still less that the need can be partially fulfilled by a picture of one- and, of all places, on the chasuble! An added note of absurdity came from the fact that the candle was realistically presented with a notch melted out of one side!"
Pg #266-267
Commentary [Love of Thomas Merton]:
There's a reason why I love Thomas Merton. This last piece is one of them. I never truly thought about the importance of religious symbolism [or lack theirof] in Catholic Churches and art. What surprised me was how much his argument made sense. If a candle by a rose window signifies nothing in particular in the church in which Thomas Merton celebrates- or nothing in particular at all- then truly, what is the point? He really got me thinking. Then he started talking about the sensationalism found in stained-glass windows and that really got my blood boiling. I was ready to put Disputed Questions down, but thought it better to stick it through. The reason why I was mad was because I knew everything he was saying was true, I had simply not accepted those truths yet and made them my own.
The title of the section this passage appears in is called Absurdity in Sacred Art, by the way.
In case you're curious.....
that robe-looking thing is a chasuble.
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