Rome-Linz (kath.net) When the Austrian Catholic news website kath.net inquired about the extremely controversial depiction of Mary, the Mother of God, giving birth—a polychrome statue commissioned with Church funding [see story here] and displayed in St. Mary’s Cathedral in Linz, Austria—Gerhard Cardinal Müller replied with a more general classification entitled “On the artistic depiction of the birth of Jesus from the Virgin Mary.”
Cdl. Müller is the former Bishop of Regensburg, Germany, Prefect Emeritus of the Congregation for the Doctrine of the Faith, and also a member of the “Supremo Tribunale” of the Apostolic Signatura, the highest ecclesiastical court.
On the artistic depiction of the birth of Jesus from the Virgin Mary
“Mary’s virginity, her giving birth, and the Lord’s death” are, according to Ignatius of Antioch, Bishop of Martyr (d. around 117 in Rome), “three secrets crying to be told, but wrought in God’s silence” (Letter to the Ephesians, 19.1).
The Christian doctrine of the faith is communicated through the word of proclamation and the sacramental liturgy. In comparison, artistic depiction is a secondary means, which must always be oriented to the truth of revelation and take correction from it. Only hesitantly, against the strong opposition of iconoclasm, did Christian pictorial art develop—until finally the legitimacy of venerating images and relics and its usefulness for popular piety were acknowledged by the Church’s Magisterium also.
The first pictorial representations of the Birth of Christ are focused entirely on the adoration of Christ, the incarnate Son of God, the Messiah and Savior of all humanity. Only with the dogma that Mary is the true Mother of God (Theotokos), proclaimed by the Council of Ephesus in 431, does Mary also come into view for the pious observer, but always in such a way that Mary directs us to Christ, her Son, the true God, who assumed our human nature from her body and her mind (her fiat in response to the angel’s message), and who by His suffering on the cross freed us forever from sin and death. Only in a much later era did an interest develop in Mary also as the prototype and example of every mother’s loving relation to her child. But in genuine Christian art, Marian devotion never drifts off into mere symbolism of an anthropological schema (“infant in arms”). Certainly, then, any exploitation of Mary in order to make an ideological statement against the supposedly narrow-minded patriarchy in the Church must be rejected.
The Church professes the revealed mystery of faith, that the only-begotten Son of the Father (in the Trinity) became man through the Holy Spirit and was born of the Virgin Mary. This includes the truth that Mary was and remained a virgin, before, in, and after the birth of Jesus.
The purpose of a pictorial representation of the revealed mystery of God’s true birth as man must be to strengthen observers in their faith in the Incarnation of the Son of God, so that they concentrate on Christ and adore Him as their God and Redeemer. The observer must not be enticed to indulge in erotic and sexual fantasies—both for moral-theological reasons of modesty and also for the central theological reason that this concerns a profession of faith in Christ personally, who is true God and true man, united in the Divine Person of the Eternal Son of the Father. In depicting “Jesus on the cross, stripped of His garments,” too, ecclesiastical authorities have always insisted that Jesus should not become the object of erotic fantasies, but rather that this glimpse of His sufferings and humiliation should convince us of the love of God, who “gave His only-begotten Son, that whoever believes in Him should not perish but have eternal life” (Jn 3:16).
A critique of the subversion of Christian art (a means of promoting piety) which transforms it into a billboard for feminist ideology while offending natural feelings of modesty, cannot be explained away with the accusation of prudery or countered in pseudo-theological terms as an emanation of an ultraconservative mindset. Luke, “the first painter of a Marian icon” (see Paul Badde, Die Lukas-Ikone: Roms verborgenes Weltwunder [The Lucan Icon: Rome’s hidden wonder of the world], Regensburg, 2024), does not describe the physiological course of the birthing event, but only narrates respectfully: In Bethlehem “the time came for [Mary] to be delivered, and she gave birth to her first-born son and wrapped him in swaddling cloths, and laid him in a manger…” (Lk 2:6-7).
And the “sign” (the image) for the birth of the Messiah, which the shepherds were to fulfill upon the announcement by the angel of the Lord, is that they will find in the manger the child who is wrapped in swaddling cloths.
The important thing here is finding in Jesus the Messiah, the Lord, the Redeemer of the whole world. If an artistic depiction of the birth of Jesus offends the faithful and causes a division in the Church (into self-styled progressives and the others, who are disdainfully called conservatives), then it has failed to be Christian and in particular sacred art, which is supposed to portray “the infinite beauty of God … by the work of human hands.”
And Vatican II concludes from this very same description of the nature of sacred art: “the Church has, with good reason, always reserved to herself the right to pass judgment upon the arts, deciding which of the works of artists are in accordance with faith, piety, and cherished traditional laws, and thereby fitted for sacred use” (Constitution on the Sacred Liturgy, 122).
(Editor’s note: This essay was translated for CWR by Michael J. Miller.)
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The article is closed to non-subscribers. I managed to locate a few photos of the statue, albeit all of them taken from an angle so that a leg of a woman covers the area between her legs – so it appears that a photographer thought it would be indecent to take a frontal view. A question arises, if it is indecent on a photo then how can it be decent in reality?
I wonder if many normal women would like to position themselves in a public place before giving birth, exposing themselves waist down while other passers-by would stare at them?
I recall some African statues of females giving birth (probably some fertility totems). They are highly stylized, totally naked and also depict a head of a baby literally coming out. Sometimes there is another figure helping a woman. Those depictions, because of the stylization and a presence of a baby, are totally devoid of sexual overtones – unlike the sculpture in question. Paradoxically, its photos which show a pregnant woman exposing her private parts to the world have (perverse) sexual overtones, of “a sex with a pregnant woman” i.e. something mostly forbidden (in archetypical conscience). And so, the statue obviously has nothing to do with the Virgin Mary.
I checked the artist’s website, it says “Esther Strauß (born in 1986) is an Austrian performance artist and writer.” Meaning, the person is not a visual artist i.e. one who herself paints, draws, creates sculptures etc. This is why the sculpture was only her “idea” which had to be executed by someone else. The author is “a conceptualist” who makes installations. So, that was her “installation” in the church – something that must have no place in the Church because liturgical art is the product of the Liturgy (Mass), of the Church itself.
Hence, I have no questions for the author and the executor of that stature who obviously have no idea what Christian art is (i.e. an art that transcends, a symbolic realism). I only have a question for those in the Church who commissioned it. Why do you commission Christian art to those who have no idea what it is? What is this in you that pushes you to do so?
PS I do not like beheading the statue. I would simply take it out, remove a halo (because it is not the Virgin Mary) and put it in a very public place
Thank you, Anna. Wise thoughts.
I never understood the current fashion of women giving birth in front of husbands and family members. My midwife said she was uncomfortable with families who insisted on video taping deliveries as though it was a performance.
Maybe the artist comes from that same
culture?
After this “beheading “and the pachamama episode it looks like there are some brave Austrians who unlike their shepherds take blasphemy seriously enough to do something about it. Good for them and God bless them.
I do not see any problem with a woman who wants to hold her husband’s hand while giving birth to their child. However, I have never heard about making a video of the process. This is strange indeed. To my mind, it signals “no boundaries” and a narcissistic spectrum again which are indeed the features of the current culture when everything, even the most intimate, must be recorded and put onto FB or whatever else. Those endless “selfies” betray a narcissistic self-involvement and exhibitionism as well – one must be really self-involved to participate in topics like “What kind of nail polish are you wearing today?” By the way, this common narcissism is very contagious.
As for the author of a concept of the statue in question, it is deeper. I checked her portfolio and found something that brought to my mind ‘The Roots of Human Aggression’ by Erich Fromm. Fromm maintained that thick narcissism is necessary necrophiliac, not meaning a necrophiliac in a literal sense, as a full-blown disorder but as “a love for death” and “a hatred for a life”. I discovered among the works of the author a photo of her smeared in dirt with a statement “I visit the grave of my grandfather in my home village and excavate it with my bare hands. I take the earth to my room and undress. Then I wash myself with the earth, which is grandfather’s home since 1993”; there were also nude photos of her smeared in dirt (I presume of the same origin) etc. It is not nudes as such which are troubling but a combination of death and covert eroticism. One of those nudes reminded me of the statue.
And so, I suspect the author in fact depicted herself as the statue in question. Her explanations of the meaning of that state clearly show that she did not care about whom she wanted to depict but she used the Virgin Mary to “enflesh” her ideas and herself. By the way, the statue has something of Thanatos, to me. Giving a birth is about giving a life and an artist can depict this in a way of triumph of a life. Not here.
Why the mystery? Faithless prelates, bored with having to pretend to have religion, never tire trying to execute fantasies of superior enlightenment by outdoing each other with stupid symbols of their pride. And they have an unlimited audience of wiling prideling laypersons never tiring of finding ways to applaud their pride community.
A word we never hear spoken in today’s culture- MODESTY. With respect to what this image purports to depict, it’s got be classified as “immodest” and does not belong in a Catholic Church.
Secondly, sacred images belong in a Catholic Church only to the degree that the image prompts the viewer to enter into a prayerful encounter with God. Anything else belongs in an art gallery or museum because its purpose is not sacred.
“Any exploitation of Mary in order to make an ideological statement against the supposedly narrow-minded patriarchy in the Church must be rejected” (Card Müller).
Müller’s perception of artist Esther Strauss’ statue as an ideological product is adept, the trite message probably something like, Look! We’re all human. It is not a theme for adoration. Johann Hintermaier, episcopal vicar for art and culture, outraged over the attack speaks to his artistic deficiency.
The destructive attack on this sculpture is a reminder of the young Austrian Catholic who, scandalized, traveled to Rome to kidnap and drown the notorious idol Pachamama. Unfortunately, she is idolized by Pope Francis and was rescued from the Tiber.
We can compare the attack to that made on Michelangelo’s Pieta. That is a true work of art that elicits spiritual love and reverence. Perhaps the Esther Strauss sculpture was attacked and damaged by another irate young Catholic Austrian.
An article in National Catholic Reporter shows the offending sculpture. I couldn’t help but attend to the monstrous Herculean muscles of the poor “woman’s” legs. The sculpture not only despises piety, it offends nature.
If any woman’s lower extremities have been so engorged by such abnormal anatomy, extraordinary usage, or steroidal supplement, she has yet to be known. This work of ‘sacred’ art is a caricature, a cartoon, a desecration of all that is normally naturally human. It suggests the supernatural only in a massively, gargantuanly ugly, unholy way.
NCR quotes Artist Strauss: “Most portraits of the Virgin Mary were made by men and have therefore often served patriarchal interests,” she said, adding that “Mary gets her body back” in her artwork.
If Strauss’s Mary here reclaims her body from earlier patriarchal misconceptions, Strauss’s Mary here redefines both herself and patriarchy. According to Strauss’ artistic vision, Mary’s perpetually virginal maternity is a cross-robing man with an abdominal tumor and no sense of modesty, splaying his legs for all the world to see and to stomach.
Women in Our Blessed Mother’s era were smarter about having babies and knew that the position assumed in that blasephemous statue is probably the least conducive to assist delivery.
The Swiss Catholic artist Alexandre Cingria wrote a wonderful treatise in 1917, “La Decadence de l’art sacre,” in which he points out that the banal and the ugly are two key tools of Satan’s to push people away from the Church and God. Bad art is not just bad art when depicting something sacred: it is diabolical.
The diocese of Linz offers more info on its website. This statue was part of a DonnaStage exhibition. The diocese explains: “The DonnaStage series of events turns St. Mary’s Cathedral and the new Cathedral Center into a place of negotiation for contemporary questions about women’s roles, images of the family and gender equality.”
Now we’re clear on the inclusive charity according to the Catholic Diocese of Linz.
It seems that the Divine and the Miraculous confront demonic secularism and proclaim that God could not do something that defies secular imagination. At His Resurrection moves though a locked door to visit his Apostles. This might be a hint as to the birth of the baby Jesus. There is a difference between an artist and a propagandist.
https://dsdoconnor.com/wp-content/uploads/2016/11/the-blessed-virgin-mary-in-the-kingdom-of-the-divine-will.pdf –
Nativity as narrated by Bl.Mother herself – on day 21 , page 119 above,as an event which depicts the Prefall glory that God had intended for every human birth as well – as mysterious as pouring out of light …
Those with darkened minds and hearts having lost the Light of holiness of the occasion might see same only with carnal eyes, thus giving birth to productions / statues that convey sort of aversion and repulsion …
Tried to locate the faith background of the artist – to verify if the above statue may be more of a recall of the death agony of Rachel on occasion of birth of Benjamin …
True that our Lord as well as our Mother has taken deep unto themselves the sorrow and grief of every thought , word and deed of the childern unto themselves to convert same as occasions for His holiness and love – in redoing it all during His Sacred humanity …good to know that it includes the uncouth rage of some of those who manifest same in their comments here at CWR – pretending to be like St.Athanasius , yet seeming to have mostly the fallen side of arrogance , its fruit of dullness , thus prevented from grasping truth conveyed in good will through words / comments of others ..
Thank God that He allows same for us to invoke His mercy unto all such, to bring the grace of helping even generations , to be set free from similar afflictions !
May the above tempest too be sipped up as such an occasion to allow The Spirit to bring forth fruits to fill oceans, in reciting the Chaplet of Mercy for places threatned by the hurricane Beryl heading towards Texas coast !Mercy !
I used the link provided above to see the original article which has a single side view photo of this “art”. It is DISGUSTING. And most certainly it has no place in a church. Mary’s gown is hiked up over her hips and one can imagine the view given from the front. That a person viewing the statue could “chose their own view”, that is, chose NOT to view it from the front of the statue has no bearing at all on it’s TOTAL inappropriateness to be in any Catholic church. I have heard it said that Jesus was naked during the crucifixion, but I dare say nobody would think that would be a respectful way to depict him on the altar of every church.
Concepts of “natural” and ideas of “reflecting reality” do not automatically make things appropriate for all situations. “Natural function” is not a justification for public viewing. Bodily elimination is natural as well, yet bathrooms have doors because no one wants to see that enacted out for the world to view. Sex is natural too (at least, most of it) yet again it is an act most often done in private, which is why in cases when it becomes more public,or demeaned as a function, as in pornography for example, it is roundly condemned.
How exactly does this cheap and ugly statue reflect respect for Mary? If anything I would imagine it as an invasion of privacy in the most graphic way, in a way most certainly done to diminish her.
As for “women getting their bodies back”, dont get me started. As a woman myself I find it disturbing that so many young women have a need to cheapen their sexuality by engaging in random multiple relationships, and seem to believe this is a way of declaring their body is their own. If you lack a sense of self, sleeping around will not solve the problem.In fact it will worsen it. So please lets not pretend that this junk statue is some kind of landmark for womens rights.
As for whatever priest allowed this statue to be placed in his church, its time for him to face the consequences of his decision. His Bishop should get off his backside and demand it be removed,immediately, and the pastor should be disciplined.The disrespect and scandal attached to this statue cannot be overstated. Most certainly, I would never feel at home in a church which PROMOTES such blatant disrespect for Mary under the guise of “art”. DISGUSTING.
Disgusting pretty much sums it up LJ. I agree. That and blasphemous.
Our Blessed Mother never lost her virginity. A broken hymen was considered loss of virginity. Mother Angelica had an enlightening from God saying that Jesus was not born in the natural way, He came from her womb as He entered through closed doors after His Resurrection. Do you really think our Blessed Mother and her Son would approve of this?
That goes way back before Mother Angelica, all the way back to Ezekiel 44.
That Jesus was born “like light passing through glass” was a common opinion in the Middle Ages. It’s dramatized in the Visions of St. Bridget, for instance.
How long before some really progressive church installs a sculpture of SS. Joachim and Anne procreating the Virgin in honor of the Immaculate Conception? Surely only a “backwardist” prude could object.
After Trent, new standards of taste and modesty were enforced on church art, one casualty being the popular Late Medieval/Renaissance depictions of the naked Christchild displaying his genitalia. I’m surprised no one has cited this subject in defense of that appalling Austrian statue. (The motive behind the motifs was entirely different!)
Yes, Jesus was born ‘as light passing through light ‘ according to visionaries
In every way this makes sense
Both, conception and birth show his divinity.
The famous paintings of naked baby Jesus show that he is also true’man’.
I find the sculpture a sacrilege. Strauss is a no talent individual in seek of publicity. My question is who in the Church commissioned, approved and paid for it with Church funds?. Rome excommunicates Vigano goes after Stickland, and gives communion to politicians that want to make abortion the center promise of their election. Something is seriously evil.
I think there is much misunderstanding of the doctrine of Our Lady’s perpetual virginity and a painless”labor”She remained a virgin as in not having relations and in the integrity of her feminine genital structure. She did not experience the pain of childbirth because the sin of Adam and Eve did not include her.It took me some time to understand it as well.Not surprising that so many Catholics reject Eucharistic Doctrines may also scoff at Marian Doctrines, Holy Mary, Mother of God, pray for us, sinners…