St Matthew in the City is in illustrious company. Each time its priests Glynn Cardy and Clay Nelson commission a billboard they join a long line of popes and cardinals that have used provocative art to shift our thinking.
Using images to shift established thought patterns is always a fragile endeavour as no-one, not even a powerful pope, can control how the images will eventually appear or how any of us will receive them.
Although it might seem surprising now, Michelangelo’s work raised hackles. His most controversial work was The Last Judgement that now sits resplendent within the Sistine Chapel, the Vatican’s inner sanctum where cardinals eyeball it each time they gather to elect a new pope.
Along with the accusations of heresy, the most famous complaint about The Last Judgement was from the Vatican’s Master of Ceremonies, Biagio da Cesena, who said “it was mostly disgraceful that in so sacred a place there should have been depicted all those nude figures, exposing themselves so shamefully, and that it was no work for a papal chapel but rather for the public baths and taverns.”
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‘St Matts billboard upholds Catholic tradition‘.
Image: TVNZ
Sande Ramage is an Anglican priest and blogger.