The Agony and the Ecstasy

By Brother Luke

Some of you may remember Irving Stone’s novel The Agony and the Ecstasy that was turned into a famous movie starring Charlton Heston. It was the story of Michelangelo, with particular reference to the painting of the Sistine Chapel and all the controversy and glory surrounding it. Hence the title. When we walk into churches here and around the world, the overwhelming beauty that is designed to transport us to heaven was seldom achieved without struggle and controversy. Yet, most of those struggles of the past are lost to us unless they are brought back to life by a great novelist like Irving Stone or a gifted docent guiding us on a tour of the church. We also experienced some of that same agony and ecstasy early in the new millennium, although on a much more modest scale than Michelangelo in painting the Sistine Chapel.

Our main worship area is our Holy Wisdom Temple. In Greek the name is Aghia Sophia. This is the name of the cathedral in Constantinople, which was built by Emperor Justinian in 532. Our Holy Wisdom Temple was built in the 1980s and consecrated by Metropolitan Theodosius at Mid-Pentecost in 1983. But at that time the only interior decoration in the temple was the large Holy Wisdom icon in the altar area on the wall behind the synthronon. Some additional appointments were added over the next 15 years, including the altar rail with double-sided icons and analoi for the kissing icons at the church entrance and in the nave on each side of the solea. But the final interior icon plan and wall paneling was not begun until late 1999. At that time the entire interior of the temple had to be cleaned and painted. Several hues of gold paint were selected, and some non-figure designs were added. Then came the black oak wood paneling for the walls and pillars.

By late 2000 some of the icons on the upper level of the nave were being painted and installed by an iconographer from Holy Trinity Monastery in Jordanville, New York. The style was reminiscent of the Byzantine church in Ravenna, Italy, with a “parade of figures” on the upper walls of both sides of the nave. As with many church decoration projects, the issue that stirs up controversy is not the arrangement of the icons but the subjects. We were no different than many other churches in making decisions based on the collective wisdom of the community, which desired to have the charism of the community represented in the choice of icon subjects. We were looking for examples of holiness not only in the distant past but also closer to our times. We wanted to find individuals who were icons of values we hold dear and seek to share. We looked for individuals who advanced the development and renewal of liturgy, others who dedicated themselves to helping the disadvantaged in our times, leaders who believed in ecumenism. We wanted women and married persons to be included. We crafted a concept of sanctity born of a belief in inclusivity and not restricted to those individuals already recognized officially.

However, by selecting some individuals for portrayal who were outside the usual boundaries of traditional Orthodox consciousness, critical voices were raised against us from within Orthodox circles and even within our church administration. At this point we felt we had to stand firm behind the decisions the community had made. But we also wanted to do so in a positive way. Needless to say, correspondence and meetings ensued, which, as the saying goes, included “frank exchanges of views.” In the midst of that dialogue, I gave a Sunday reflection in April 2002 attempting to summarize our position. [Click here Sanctity article] Finally we reached a point where during a visit to New Skete by Metropolitan Herman the issue was laid to rest when he stated that even though he might have preferred a different decision on the choice of images for our walls, he did not have any intention of requiring that the community’s decision be overturned.

At that point we exhaled a collective sigh of relief. We had negotiated a treacherous passage through dangerous waters and emerged feeling affirmed and believing that we were now closer to our church than we had ever been before. Serendipitously, a good friend of the community, Fr. Michael Plekon, published a book that same year entitled Living Icons: Persons of Faith in the Eastern Church. Were we actually moving into the mainstream? Hard to say, but Fr. Michael would continue to work in this field and to publish two additional books expanding on his original theme: Hidden Holiness (2009), and Saints as They Really Are: Voices of Holiness in Our Time (2012). All three of these books will take you into the world of sanctity with a fresh understanding of how God’s grace flows through all people throughout all of history.