Antoni Gaudí began his life as a liberal Catalan nationalist. By the end, he lived as a hermit, sleeping at the construction site of the cathedral he was building, obsessed with the aesthetic glorification of God.
When Pope Leo XIV consecrated the Sagrada Família last week, the world was treated to the usual barrage of predictable reactions: While centrist media cheered, traditionalists found reasons to complain. The internet was once again flooded with "Deus Vult" memes. It seemed as if only few of those celebrating had much interest in what Gaudí had become by the end.
@DavidEngels12 makes a point
@EduardHabsburg will surely appreciate, namely that both camps are missing the same thing — one which Christianity itself has been quietly losing for five hundred years. For at least that long, Engels writes, Christianity has been shifting "its centre of gravity from interiority to exteriority." Progressives on one hand argue about social justice and environmental programmes, traditionalists on the other argue about rites and garments. The mystical and contemplative heart of the religion that built these cathedrals — the actual point of building cathedrals in the first place — has quietly disappeared from the arguments of both camps.
Millions still feel something when they lift their eyes toward those towers. The question is whether anything in our age still lets them follow that feeling.