Second, our society is one which attempts to define everything in relative terms. Absolutes, not only in the Church, but in such places as the Declaration of Independence and the Constitution, are no longer popular ideas. The phrase “Beauty is in the eye of the beholder” has been used to deny the idea that there could be such a thing as true beauty.
The third reason is one of atrophy. As artists and architects were no longer asked to design and appoint beautiful Churches, the skills to do so well have become harder to find. Many feeble attempts at beauty by the untrained have missed the mark, allowing the quest for beauty to be dismissed as unachievable and unrewarding.
So to address each in turn:
Beauty is the single aspect of God which can be expressed physically within the earthly realm. It is critical to the setting of the Mass. God is present at the Mass, in the Eucharist. The church stands as the dwelling place of the Lord on Earth, and a “reflects the Church dwelling in Heaven” (Built of Living Stones, #17). Beauty is not merely Man’s arrogance or a waste of resources which could be directed to the poor. Beautiful settings, artwork, music, and liturgy are appropriate and necessary aspects of God’s everlasting mystical presence before Mankind.
As far as the relativity argument is concerned, if everything is indeed relative, there are no absolutes, and not only does beauty not exist, but there is little purpose for God, either. One would never use the phrase “Truth is in the eye of the beholder”. (Then again, one might, but that is beyond the scope of this article.)
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And the final point is one of supply and demand. If the marketplace, which is a crude way of lumping together all those who commission liturgical art and architecture, is demanding mediocrity, then that is what will be produced. Artists, architects, and craftsmen are always willing to go beyond, but need the encouragement, training, and resources to allow them to do so.
The wonderful news is that within the last decade there has been a strong resurgence in the appreciation, use, and creation of beauty within the Church. The desire for beautiful churches, artwork, music, and vestments is growing stronger every day. This can be attributed to the understanding that beauty is truly a means of perceiving and understanding the nature of God.