Mittwoch, 21 Oktober 2015

SIE MÖCHTEN EINER KÖNIG ZU HABEN

I'm not going to write about how we got here - the usual Lufthansa flight from SFO to München (although the replacement of a ill-functioning entertainment element for Arthur by a crew member while in the air was quite remarkable). Dinner with lots of meat and a quick walk and then bed was most of the day.

In the morning we are met by Günter who shares breakfast with us and lots of family news. It's always a delight to sit down with him and share what is going on in his family and in ours. We will be sharing lunch with all the family including Vera's boyfriend David, and Henri's girlfriend, Franziska (whom we have not met) on Sunday. That will certainly be fun.

The goal for the day was to visit Lenbachhaus, which is situated right next to the Propylaeum, der Sammlung, und der Glyptothek at Königsplatz. I attempted to get in the last time I was in München, but it was being renovated - opening the next day (my departure date). Arthur was able to go after Günter's birthday in Fall of 2014, so this was a repeat for him. The museum largely documents "Der Blaue Reiter" movement, a Bavarian artist's group that flourished from around 1911 to 1914. Of note were Paul Klee, Wsassily Kandinsky, Alexej van Jawlensky, Marianne von Werefkin, Franz Marc, August Macke, and Gabriele Münter. Especially interesting to me were paintings that were done by some of the group earlier in and around Murnau, Germany. It is here that my sister studied German in the 1908s, and that Arthur visited while studying German in 2014.

The brushwork and colors remind me of the work by Maurice Prendergast, who as an American, painted around the same period of time. Some of the paintings were almost jewel-like, with colors and textures that are hard to describe.

Later paintings in the collection were also quite interesting, with some artists unknown to me.  One could see, however the influence of Otto Dix or Max Beckmann in some of their work.

We had lunch at Ella Monaco, the museum's restaurant. Arthur had suckling pig with prunes and gnocchi, and I a vitello tonato - all quite good. We sat with a young woman from Hamburg, who was visiting her doctor, and going to museums. She gave us an interesting look at Germans from the south and those from the north and what distinguishes them. Her summation of the Bavarian political mindset was quite amusing, "Simply put, they want to have a king!" Sitting in view of some of the royal monuments that mark this part of München, it was quite understandable. 

Across the street at the Kunstbau, an unusual use of subterranean space allied with the UBahn, we went to a special exhibition of works by Klee, and Kandinsky. Like the Joan Miro Museum in Barcelona, it soon became a bit much. A good effort was made to show the relationship to other painters, especially to the work of the Bauhaus in Dessau, and of its fate under the Nazis. It was a wonderful collection with great ancillary materials. We had seen, however, one to many a Klee and went back to the restaurant for a dessert.

I do need to mention the central garden of Lenbachhaus, since they are a quiet but spectacular remove from the hustle and bustle that surround them. The fall colors were especially nice with one wall of various ivies simply looking stunning. Fountains, sculpture, and a rockery all add to the Italian feel of the house, and the preserved rooms are an experience of darkness and mystery - well worth it.

After attempting a look at the collection from 1945 on (not worth the time or wall space) we make our way back to central München. We pass the foundations of the Nazi Ehren Temple, which once were placed at the entrance to the Propylaeum, etc. and that were destroyed at the end of the war. The Nazi buildings on either side of these temples still survive.

New, since either of us was here last, is a new museum/center documenting National Socialism. It is in a handsome white building right behind the foundations of one of the Ehren Temple. We're able to do one floor completely. The documentation is dense, but interesting. Having just finished Despina Stratigakos' book, Hitler at Home, and it descriptions of the propaganda value of Hitler's apartment on Prinzregent Straße, and at the Berghof, I find some of the documentation even more interesting in that it augmented her arguments. I knew of Hitler's plan to build outrageous monuments in Berlin, but had no idea about a similar program for München. We are done, however, and will leave the rest for another day. I am still thinking about our lunch companion's comment about Bavarian's wanting a king. It was her summation of the native culture, and I observed the night before how in urban München, there are rural aspects, especially in eating and entertainment establishments. I think they got a king - a king who ultimately despised and ruined them. Now they get a chance to really observe his works. So I wonder, do they still want a king?

Day Twelve - Searching for Context

Day Twelve – Searching for Context

The day begins overcast, but glory (as my sisters would call it when they were kids) is seeping through. The time here at TIberias has been quite nice and I now understand why Israeli families like to come up here – mild weather, beautiful scenery, and water. We will leave this, however to go inland – to Nazareth and Cana.

Our first stop is at “Mary’s Well”, or as the guide called it on my first tour here, “an ancient water source.” That it most certainly was, and we can speculate on whether or not Mary would have used it. The well sits deep within the Greek Orthodox Church, where we literally walk into the Divine Liturgy just to go down to the well. I guess that this happens all the time and I guess that they don’t mind (at least I hope so.)  One goes down a flight of stars into a hallway that leads to the ancient water source, I mean, well. Lining the walls are some beautiful Byzantine tiles. I looked forward to seeing them again.

I think that many pilgrims (or should I say, many tour guides) miss the layered context of the sites that they want to see. The true place is often set in the architecture of faith. It’s like the incisions of crosses in the Church of the Holy Sepulcher, or the footsteps worn into the steps at Canterbury, or these beautiful cedars, dating from the Byzantine period, here at the Church of the Annunciation. One of the collateral moments of beauty comes when we leave the lower levels of the well, and climb back into the light of the Greek Orthodox church. I am reminded of the reminiscences of Basil Spence Pennington when he visits Mt. Athos. He tells how the monks would twist up the chandeliers of the church and at the Sanctus in the Divine Liturgy let them go, so that their spinning granted a sort of other-worldly vision. Or, as the Lutheran Liturgy says, “give us a foretaste of the feast to come.”

Next we visit the Anglican church in Nazareth, Christ Church. We are not the only tour group there. The former Bishop of Oxford is leading one group and there is another group from Sarnia, Ontario, Canada. A good half of the congregation is English-speaking Anglicans, and the other half is Arabic-speaking Anglicans. It makes for a veritable Pentecost – and we are all speaking in tongues. After the Eucharist we are treated to tea and cakes and a great deal of hospitality. We meet a man who lives in Nazareth and in Arlington Virginia, he is an epidemiologist, and a pleasant host. The Anglican Communion has retained some the better parts of its imperial past – namely the familiarity and interest that all of its constituent parts seem to have in one another. Arthur leaves all his Jordanian Dinar in the offering plate. “It’s in their diocese,” he explains.

The big story in town is the interpretation of the Annunciation at the Church of the Annunciation built and managed (like all Holy Land sites) by the Franciscans. Like the Church at Kefer-Nahum, this church is also built over a ruin – namely the house/place where the annunciation is said to have happened.  It is preserved in the lower level of the church.

Again the tour ignores the context of faith that is built around the site – beautiful Byzantine mosaic floors, and remaining walls painted in faith. You have to look, and you can find this stuff. It’s humbling. The church above is a bit overdone, with Madonnae contributed from many nations. (The one from the US is absolutely hideous.) The Stations of the Cross are very interesting, porcelain somewhat in the style of Paterino. All in all, it’s just too much stuff.

One interesting place that survives my “taste test” is the plaza that surrounds the Baptistery, and is elevated over the remains of the ancient town. It is pure seventies modernism, but reads very well – elegant and inviting. It surrounds the pilgrims with the story and invites them to walk into it.

We go across the street to a little church that is the “house of Joseph” Here is preserved an ancient mikveh, which was later used by Christians as a Baptistery. I guess that Joseph needs his due as well. What is interesting to me is that it is not so much the “house of Joseph, as it is an ancient site of faith used in the Christian context.

Our last stop is in Cana, and yes, there is a church, and yes, there is a water jar, and yes there are the surrounding shops filled with olive wood, icons, thuribles with bells (I want one), and wine – naturally. We go back to TIberias with as much context as we can handle, and the Spirit comes to visit as we put our heads down for a nap.

Post Scriptum

I forgot a very important moment. While in the Church at Cana, and at all the significant places at which we stopped, there was a reading from the Scriptures and a prayer. Here at Cana, Andrew Nunn asked that Arthur and I read the account of the Wedding at Cana.

It was a very moving moment.

Day Eleven - On Our Journey and Pilgrimage to Galilee

Day Eleven – The Soil

In his book, Beginning to Pray, Archbishop Anthony Bloom wrote this about the earth:

“Humility is the situation of the earth. The earth is always there, always taken for granted, never remembered, always trodden on by everyone, somewhere we cast and pour out all the refuse, all we don’t need. It’s there, silent and accepting everything and in a miraculous way making out of all the refuse new richness in spite of corruption, transforming corruption itself into a power of life and a new possibility of creativeness, open to the sunshine, open to the rain, ready to receive any seed we sow and capable of bringing thirtyfold, sixtyfold, a hundredfold out of every seed.”

My mother was born in Alma, Kansas, a small market town located in the eastern hills of Kansas just before the break into the wide expanse of the prairie some 24 miles to the west. We used to go there when I was a kid, and as we approached the town, driving through the rich soil of the farmlands that surrounded Alma, one thought always came to mind. It was this – this was the soil that birthed my mother, and in a sense, me as well. It was from this soil and others like it that I came into being.

That same thought came to me as we began our pilgrimage to the northern tier at the top of the Sea of Galilee.  We drove north from TIberias through Magdala (I had hoped we would stop their at least honor the Apostle Mary – but we did not), and then past Tabgha to Kefer-Nahum, or Capernaum.

If there was a soil from which Christianity had sprung it was most certainly the soil of this place. As we glanced around the countryside we could see that it was well watered and lush – the perfect image. Somewhere I have a photograph of me at the age of 30 standing in this same synagogue marveling at its beauty. It was the soil of thought for so much of my subsequent ministry. The synagogue is not from the time of Jesus, but much later, and it is not the main attraction but rather the house of Peter that rests under buildings and churches that were built on top of it. The current structure, Franciscan, literally hangs over the site, with a huge hole in the floor so that pilgrims can peer down into the house. If Bishop Spong is correct, it was the soil of Peter that nurtured the Easter message of hope. So we do him honor here, with readings and prayers. There is, however, more, and here I need to make a comment. Many of the sites that we have visited and will visit have a specious quality about them. They trouble me, for I think they hide the mystery. A fellow pilgrim gives me food for thought. "Think of them as you do the stations of the cross," she says. She is right - we are not honoring exactitude or even reality, but rather the significance and essence of the holy places.

The next two sites are “The Primacy of Peter” and “Mensa Christi”. While standing on the shore of Galilee, I notice someone casting nets – how perfect. For it is in such a work-a-day place that Peter has the revelation about the true nature of Jesus, and it is on the rock at the base of the altar in the church next door, that Christ prepares a breakfast for his followers, and reveals himself to them. I need to be reminded of the ordinariness of it all.

At Tabgha we visit the stunning Benedictine monastery with its wonderful mosaics. You can just glimpse the bread and fishes at the foot of the altar in the picture below. The other mosaics portray wildlife and the struggle to live, birds and centipedes, all strive bring life out of the soil of the earth.

At the lakeside on the monastery grounds we celebrate a concelebrated mass, and I am privileged to lead it. The gracious Benedictines provide proper vessels and elements for our Eucharist.

Lunch is at the convent located by the Mount of the Beatitudes Church, a product of Mussolini’s megalomania – but none-the-less handsome in its own way. It reminds me of the church that he had built on the grounds of the EUR in Rome, the Church of Saints Peter and Paul. It’s a post-modern building before there even was such a thing or concept. Take a Palladian chapel and strip it of all ornamentation, preserving the mass of the building and you have a sense of these churches. I remember being here forty years ago when we had a prayer service in the church accompanied by the song of the birds.

One of the readings during our pilgrimage, from Ezekiel, talks of streams of water coming out of the temple, and forming a river that flows out to the nations. Perhaps that is what the artist had in mind when he or she did the floors of The Church of the Beatitudes.

We go on to Ein Gev and grab a boat to cross the Sea of Galilee. In the midst, the skipper shuts down the engines, and we drift in silence – a silence that invites us to sleep in the stern of the boat as Jesus did. Earlier, Arthur commented on the absence of motor noise. Now the silence is deafening and welcome.