In this concluding post in this series we give consideration to Robert Shaw’s thoughts on where does Religion meet the Arts?

I suspect that in the long run – if there is a long run – the arts will be seen to be the lode-star of [human] humanity – even more than religious or political structures – for some of the reasons I listed earlier, and for three more which lean upon me now.

In the first place, it is clear that a commitment to the creative process starts the human animal on an endless, thorny and lonesome road of self-discovery, away from the comforts, blurred objectives and compromises of institutions. “Forty days and forty nights” is a Biblical metaphor for what is really a lifetime of wilderness and solitude.

In the second place, the Arts are concerned not with the consumption, sale or other exploitation of earth’s material wonders – not even with their recycling – but with their reincarnation. They propose not a mounting monopoly of a medium of exchange, but the sweet, quiet exchange of truth and beauty themselves.

And in the third place, in a time and a society whose values are geared to the biggest, the fastest and mostest, whose gaze is fixed desperately upon the future – as far at least as the next election or life after death or prosperity, whichever should happen to come first – the Arts offer an historical perspective. For their concern is with originality – mean, that which has origins.

For, finally, the simple truth is that every [human] is an artist – whether [they want] it or not.

The only question is whether [they are] enough of an artist to fulfill [their] humanity – and to fill full [their] short mortality.

The understandings of the spirit are not easily come by. It takes a creative mind to respond to a creator’s mind. It takes a holy spirit to receive the Holy Spirit – and “just as I am” is not nearly good enough.

There’s no freeway to Truth. There’s no easy on, easy-off approach to Beauty (Blocker, 361-364).

The Robert Shaw Reader. Robert Blocker, editor. New Haven: Yale University Press, 2004.