Recently we completed a project for one of our cherished liturgical consultants, Monsignor James P. Moroney, Rector of St. John Seminary in Brighton, MA. Below, in his own words, Monsignor describes the meaningful journey we took together to convert Giotto's two-dimensional fresco of the Virgin and Child into a three-dimensional grave monument for his father's cemetery plot.
A leading expert in Western iconographic church design, Monsignor Moroney meticulously reviews all of our church projects to ensure they align with the USCCB’s guidelines on art and architecture—standards he helped to shape.
The reflection below captures the depth of his vision and the care that guided every step of the transformation:
"Like a mother, the Church walks with each of us on our earthly pilgrimage and when we die 'she commits to the earth, in hope, the seed of the body that will rise in glory.' (Congregation for the Doctrine of the Faith, 'Instruction Ad resurgendum cum Christo,' October 25, 2016)
A little over two
years ago, as I walked from my father's grave, this profound truth was tangible
as I dusted the dirt from my hands.
When I returned to the grave that afternoon, the freshly
interred earth was covered with flowers, a beautiful reminder that the seed we
had planted would be cultivated by the Lord and some day rise up before him
when he returns in glory.
But soon the flowers faded, the grass grew back and, on some
days, it was hard to remember where my father was buried. In fact, I'm sure that on a couple of
occasions I may have prayed over the grave of his neighbor to the left or the
right, having never had much of a cemeterial 'geo-sense.'
So, in consultation with my mother and sister, I set out to
erect a memorial gravestone on my father’s grave, for the benefit of those of
us who would someday rest here beside him in joyful hope. It would not be about us (although dates of
coming and going would be allowed) but would serve as a lasting testament of
the faith that would live on after our lips and our lives had gone silent.
Thus began a long survey of favorite images of the Paschal Mystery,
of suffering, crucifixion and empty tombs drawn from our long Christian
iconographic tradition. The search soon
turned to the Nativity, the moment in which 'for us men and our
salvation' the Lord was incarnate of the Virgin Mary. It seemed somehow appropriate that a
reflection on birth might lead us to the sure and certain hope of eternal life
in the city of the dead known as Saint John's Cemetery.
Mary has ever been a friend of the dying and those who mourn
them. She is the proto-mourner, standing
with the beloved disciple at the foot of the cross. Thus some of our earliest and most venerable
prayers for the dying seek her intercession, like the Ave, begging her
intercession 'now and at the hour of our death.' Another such ancient prayer is preserved
still in a hymn from the Roman Liturgy:
'Maria, Mater gratiae, Mater misericordiae, tu me ab
hoste protege et hora mortis suscipe.'
'Mary, Mother of Grace, Mother of mercy, Shield me from
the enemy and receive me at the hour of my death.'
Which brings us back to the Birth of the Christ, who has
wonderfully restored the dignity of human nature by humbling himself to share
in our humanity and thus restored even for the dead the hope of sharing in his
divinity. (cf. Roman Missal, Collect for
Christmas Day)
Perhaps this vision of the Nativity of Christ has nowhere
been more beautifully depicted than by the brilliant Giotto Di Berdone when
ornamenting the Chapel of Our Lady of the Annunciation in memory of the
deceased Padua banker, Enrico Scrovegni. There, in 1305, he created a fresco of the Nativity like none before it.
While incorporating all the traditional elements of
Byzantine tradition and the Golden Legend, he gave a lively sense to the story
of the birth of Christ, framed not by a cave, but in a rustic stable, as each
of the figures appeared as real people, with character, personality and
emotion. At the center of this scene
lies the Virgin in garment of red (symbol of her humanity), and covered by a
cloak of sky blue, symbol of the divinity she carried in her womb.
According to the ancient apocrypha, the Christ child, newly
washed and wrapped in swaddling cloths, is about handed to his Blessed Mother
by the mid-wife. It is this moment that Giotto has captured with power and
depth of feeling. With the deepest
tenderness, the most blessed among women receives her Lord, accepts the
swaddled infant Jesus into her embrace.
It is as if she receives this gift on behalf of a fallen humanity, and
in her receiving the child, gives us the first taste of the eternal life he
will bring.
Indeed, her receiving of the Christ is an imitation of the
reception each of us so desires at the moment of our death, hoping that we will
be received into the tender embrace of the son of Mary, when he returns to
judge the living and the dead.
But how to turn a two-dimensional fresco into a three-dimensional
funeral monument!? So I turned to the
good offices of Rohn Design. There, Rolf
commissioned their master carver, Edmund Rabanser, who personally visited
Padua once again to make a careful study of the Giotto fresco.
Over several months, Edmund carefully crafted a scale model
of the fresco in three dimensions. The
full-round sculpture imagined the draping of the fabric of the Virgin's mantle,
as well as innumerable other details needed for a three-dimensional rendering
of a two-dimensional fresco.
Sadly, this beautiful wooden model was one of the last works
to be completed by Edmund Rabanser, who died in May of 2016.
His work, however, was then taken up by highly skilled stone
carvers in Carrara, Italy, where the wooden statue would become the model for
an almost five-foot sculpture in white Carrara marble, mounted on four slabs of
pink marble into which is carved my parents’ names.
Just below the reproduction of Giotto's Virgin and Child is
the ancient prayer described above. It
is the prayer of my father, who body waits in the ground beneath in hope of the
coming of the Lord, and it will be the prayer of each one of us, as we are
planted like seeds, awaiting in sure and certain hope the resurrection won for
us by the Paschal dying and rising of her Son:
'Maria, Mater gratiae, Mater misericordiae, tu me ab
hoste protege et hora mortis suscipe.'"
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| Rohn Artist Victoria Christina colors and antiques the original woodcarving |
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