Archive for May 30th, 2023
St. Patrick R.C. Church
Tuesday
– photo by Mitch Waxman
A few blocks away from St. Stanislaus Kostka Roman Catholic Church, which Our Lady of the Pentacle and myself got to visit on a walking tour of Pittsburgh’s Strip District offered by the ‘Doors Open Pittsburgh’ organization, is another church called St. Patrick’s. It has an interesting history, one which is detailed at this site.
I was struck, while our guide was describing the place to us, by the accoutrements. Sculpture and stained glass were everywhere, as were several oil paintings of important former Vicars and Priests. The Pieta pictured above was particularly well sculpted, in my opinion.
– photo by Mitch Waxman
I once did a comic that involved the Angels, using Sammael/Lucifer and Michael to fight back an analogous form of Cthulhu, but I interpreted them through a superheroic and pop cultural lens. I’m thinking that’s the Archangel Michael pictured above, as interpreted in the form of stained glass. Patrick is one of the Saints I’ve never seen rendered up like a medieval soldier with wings, which is conventionally how you see Gabriel or Metatron or Michael represented, instead it’s mostly bishop or monk robes for him. The rendering above is a bit more ‘Bible compliant’ than most of the Catholic art related to the Sons of Fire (men are the Sons of Clay), with the multiple sets of wings set into a roundish shape. Read the Book of Ezekiel if you want to know more about that description of God’s Squad.
If this Angel business is a topic that you have any sort of scholarly interest in, there’s an amazing set of books by a fellow named Jeffrey Burton Russell which explores the development of Christian philosophy from prehistoric times into the modern era. The conceit used is eminently Zoroastrian in nature – as in you cannot perceive the light without studying the shadows – so Russell focused in on what individual cultures during the various eras described as being tempting evil to discern what heights they aspired to instead. Russell’s bibliography includes ‘Satan: The Early Christian Tradition (1981),’ ‘Lucifer: The Devil in the Middle Ages (1984),’ ‘Mephistopheles: The Devil in the Modern World (1986)’ and others. Fully footnoted in both Latin and Greek, I would mention. Great stuff.
– photo by Mitch Waxman
The stairs at the bottom of the shot above are a ‘Scala Sancta’ or Holy Stairs, which congregants are meant to ascend only on their knees. This is the ‘sacred space’ chapel area, which is remarkable for its unadorned and plain nature. Normally, Catholic spaces I’ve visited in the United States are more like St. Stanislaus Kostka – ornate and somewhat baroque with paintings and sculptures everywhere. This sort of chapel reminds me of small village churches I’ve seen in Europe.
Back tomorrow.
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