Driving in Iceland

In August (and again in December, under much different circumstances) I was in Iceland. I rented a car with my friend Brian who was traveling with me, and with it we were able to see a fair bit of the country. Iceland is a bit in vogue as the darling of the tourist industry at the moment, but I can certainly see why after traveling there: it is unlike any other earthly place I can think of. One of the great pleasures of traveling through the country is the vast expanses of nothingness one encounters for much of the ride.

Toward Fjallsárlón glacier

Wide expanse of volcanic rock covered in lichens in southern Iceland

Driving toward Grundarfjorður on the Snæfellsnes Peninsula

Between Seltún and Reykjavík

North of Akranes

Also north of Akranes

On the Snæfellsnes Peninsula

The north face of Snæfellsjökull, one of Iceland's largest volcanoes

The road across Snæfellsjökull

Negotiating right-of-way

Our Nissan Note on Mars or Snæfellsjökull

We thought it imprudent to go too much further up this road

Heading toward Skaftafell in southeast Iceland

Southern Iceland in the afternoon mists

It is all the more astonishing in my view to think that this land has been inhabited by people continuously since the 900s AD. Our American minds tend to associate pristine scenery with our own myth of the wild west - an uncivilized uninhabited region awaiting our Manifest Destiny. Though Iceland was a cultural backwater for most of its history, it was still inhabited. I just finished reading Iceland's Bell by Icelandic author and Nobel Laureate Halldór Laxness (his Independent People was arguably my favorite book of 2014, perhaps narrowly edging out Les Mis and Kristin Lavransdatter). In events of the novel take place during the 17th Century, when the Danes had a political and economic death grip on Iceland. It was a challenge in reading the book to imagine these descendants of Vikings struggling mightily against the Danish Crown for some scrap of honor against the backdrop of such noble wonders of creation.

To buy peace at the expense of logic

"One of the most familiar weaknesses of the human mind is the wish to reconcile contrary principles and buy peace at the expense of logic. Hence there have always been and will always be men who, after submitting certain of their religious beliefs to some authority, will seek to exempt other beliefs from that same authority, and who will allow their minds to fluctuate erratically between obedience and liberty. But I am inclined to think that the number of such people will be smaller in democratic centuries than at other times, and that our progeny will tend increasingly to fall into one or the other of two categories: those who abandon Christianity entirely, and those who join the Roman Church."

--- from Democracy in America by Alexis de Tocqueville (1840)

Freshwater people

Kurt Vonnegut once declared that you were either a freshwater person or a saltwater person. He argued that those from the Midwest, surrounded as we are by the greatest reserves of freshwater on the planet are inherently freshwater people. I admit the ocean has always unsettled me. I still regard its repugnant taste, its boundlessness, and its mysterious depths with suspicion. The outward-looking nature of the ocean is disturbing. Lakes and rivers are finite and knowable. My ancestors clung to the Great Lakes and the St. Lawrence and the Seine and the Danube. They moved from the middle of Europe to the middle of America, buffered by thousands of miles of land from the vagaries of sea breezes and oceanic uncertainties. Chicago and Detroit and Milwaukee - though they engage in shipping - are not port cities. Not like New York. In New York, you never know what might show up. What might that saltwater bring? Not the certainty of life inherent in freshwater.

The floating red house

The other day, I finished reading The Skin by the Italian author/political chameleon Curzio Malaparte. The book is chilling, bizarre, and basically a-moral, but, more than any other book I've read it captures well the absurdity of war and its aftermath - in this case Naples under American "liberation". I would have never encountered the work of Malaparte had I not visited his home in Capri in September as part of a three-day architecture workshop. Below is an excerpt from my journal:

For the better part of this afternoon, Maria and I sat in the wood-paneled dining room at a heavy wooden table next to a little window that faced the sea. In the corner was a German stove - the kind you might find in a Munich bierhalle. On it were stacks of Malaparte's literary oeuvre in all of the languages of Babel. From where I sat, in the corner, I could see into the small foyer and out onto the front patio that blazed red in the afternoon sun. There was no relief in the typically azure sea beyond - the sun was at its zenith and the crests of the undulating waves were stark white. The sky was pale and dehydrated. The two became one flesh where the horizon should've been. The cat, Luna, had given up her pestering and was guarding the open front door. Outside of the window at my right, shady pine trees of the peculiar Mediterranean variety screened the view out toward the towering cliffs - cathedrals of a type that soar out of the water and continue to the heavens. But, like the mighty Cathedral of Rouen commanding the end of the narrow street, the cliffs stopped my view abruptly with a jumbled jaggedness of dry earth.

I had begun to feel more and more unsettled the longer I sat on that dark wooden bench. I got up several times to have a glass of water from the adjacent sparkling silver kitchen. But, every time I sat down, the twirling of my stomach would return. Looking out the window at the otherwise magnificent scenery was akin to looking at a flat, foreshortened tableau, not unlike a painting from the early Renaissance or a Chinese mountain print. The psychological problem, I later decided, was that I could not see the horizon nor the sky but was able to see very far laterally. It was as if I was constantly looking through binoculars at the cliffs. The only other time I've had this experience was when I was once on a cruise ship - as we sailed past that variety of mountain that plunges itself into the sea. That's what my body and mind were expecting. They thought - I thought - that I should be sailing along the coast of Capri, sitting in a German cabin enclosed in a floating red cloud. When the afternoon of work was done and it was time to go upstairs for espresso and orange cake, I stared at the horizon from the main room. The sky was purple and the sea was gray. I had missed that dear boundary between boundless expanses.

I have not had this experience since. It was visceral, physical, and extremely odd. It is one of the many reasons that extraordinary house will stay burned in my memories.

Here, you can see the house perched on its promontory, with the cliffs beyond. The dining room is on the other side.

Here, you can see the narrowness of the house on its little sliver of rock.

The pre-revolutionists

I don't think we give enough thought to the pre-revolutionists, suckers as we are for the drama of the guillotine and the shots heard round the world. But, revolutions - like humans - are not born ex nihilo but have intellectual genealogies replete with venerated progenitors and strange uncles alike. I think often of the Second Vatican Council. There are those who fault it almost exclusively for all manner of changes and insurrections that occurred during and immediately after its promulgation. Are we not equally as curious about the teachers in the seminaries that taught the prelates that wrought the changes? Political upheavals are often easier to chart, but again it is curious to dwell on what the germ was that grew into massive change. We trace the Communist slaughter of Tsarist Russia back almost directly to Marx, but Marx was not created with those ideas in his head, nor was Marx Russian. And what had predisposed the proletariat to believe in Lenin's Marxism in such numbers? These, to me, are the interesting questions, and the ones that those with eyes to see might find interesting when looking at our own times.

Description

Do you ever think about yourself in the third person? I often catch myself thinking about how some situation might be written about in a book. I think it's interesting to ponder how the description of a scene and the act of committing it to words changes the coloration of the experience in the mind.

I catch myself thinking of the past few weeks: of French being badly and loudly spoken in the small basement of a brick house, of the temporary loss of a bluish-gray scarf, of the worn out and curling soles of shoes bought in September, of the color of Earl Grey when it refuses to dislodge itself from the bottom of a teacup, of a symphonic car alarm that sounds down the street at the onset of twilight - the antithesis of the cock-crow, of garbage men yelling to one another as their truck moves in fits and starts down the hill like a loud mechanized crustacean stumbling down the windswept dune, of the smell of tomato sauce at midnight on dirty dishes, of the circling of helicopters at night in the black sky that is really quite pink, of a large moon rising between ancient trees at the top of a hill, and of many other sensory delights that we must sift through each day, only to discard most of them in the eternal oblivion of that part of the brain whose job is forgetfulness.

The skin

"Oh, that's nothing," I said. "Hunger, air raids, shootings, concentration camps are trifles - all trifles, trivialities, ancient history. We've known these things for centuries in Europe. We're used to them by now. These aren't the things that have brought us to our present pass."

"What has brought you to it, then?" said General Guillaume in a slightly hoarse voice.

"Skin."

"Skin? What skin?" said General Guillaume.

"Skin," I replied in a low voice. "Our skin, this confounded skin. You've no idea what a man will do, what deeds of heroism and infamy he can accomplish, to save his skin. This -- this loathsome skin, do you see? (And as I spoke I grasped the skin on the back of my hand between two fingers, and kept pulling it about.) "Once upon a time men endured hunger, torture, the most terrible sufferings, they killed and were killed, they suffered and made others suffer, to save their souls, to save their own souls and the souls of others. The would rise to every form of greatness and stoop to every form of infamy to save their souls - not only their own souls, but the souls of others too. Today they suffer and make others suffer, they kill and are killed, they do wonderful things and dreadful things, not to save their souls, but to save their skins, and their skins alone. Nothing else counts. Men are heroes for the sake of a very paltry thing today! An ugly thing. The human skin is ugly. Look! It is loathsome! And to think that the world is full of heroes who are ready to sacrifice their lives for such a thing as this!"

--- from The Skin by Curzio Malaparte (1949)

L'église française

Pascal-Emmanuel Gobry wrote a provocative article in The Week here in which he ponders whether France is undergoing the beginnings of a Christian, and specifically, Catholic revival. On the whole, the article augments feelings and suspicions that I felt living in France for a brief time this past year. For all of our own problems that need our attention, American Catholics still tend to look with a rather unabashed smugness mixed with pity when we gaze across the Atlantic at our European coreligionists. "Well, at least we're not Europe" we are wont to say. On the face of things, I understand the sentiment. Across the continent, church attendance numbers dwell in depths that a US bishop would find flabbergasting if they occurred in his diocese. And, the overt and sometimes militant secularism of the European Union (and many French politicians) would make the ACLU blush.

And yet... Europe is under a spiritual malaise. Everyone with two eyes and a brain can deduce as much. The emptiness of consumerism and sexual libertinism have yielded only rotten fruit: an aging population that limps along with the tired economy in tow. These days, "the sick man of Europe" is Europe itself. The recent tragedies in Paris and elsewhere underscore another salient point: there is another force jockeying for the soul of Europe, and it ain't as pretty as Chartres, that's for sure.

So, before going to France, I was expecting a windswept religious landscape. My previous travels in Germanic Europe yielded such an impression, to be honest. Yet, France was different. I attended mass in Paris every Sunday I was there, and so did everyone else in Paris, it seemed. A few examples:

The nave of St. Germain L'Auxerrois

St. Germain l'Auxerrois: This historic church, which faces the Louvre in the heart of the 1st Arrondissement, was my usual church of preference. Many of my ancestors worshiped here, so I felt it only appropriate that I should honor their memory by doing the same. I typically attended the 9:45 Extraordinary Form Mass (i.e. the pre-Vatican II traditional Latin Mass). The congregation often numbered around 250 people. There were people of all ages and descriptions. Yet, this was not a tourist parish by any means. These were Parisians. The community was not as tight-knit as your average American parish, but it was obvious there was a vibrancy there. The priest was of middle age and, to the best of my French, seemed very orthodox in his preaching. He had one sermon that I found particularly interesting - he enumerated the goodness of God's plan for the family and explained how gay marriage and divorce damage our ability to truly love one another. Have you ever heard that from an American Catholic pulpit? I haven't. And, despite the parish offering the traditional mass, it is not what I would call a particularly conservative or traditional parish.

St. Cécile-St. Eugene: This parish is the heart of the Parisian traditionalist community. It was what you would expect in that regard: reverent liturgy, solid preaching, traditional devotions, etc. And it was packed. Always. Little mantilla'd old ladies and young professionals alike filled the pews. Yes it is probably an outlier, but an encouraging one nonetheless.

St. Laurent: I lived across from this small Gothic church at the heart of the 10th Arrondissement. The neighborhood is working class with a decent immigrant population and a certain hipster element. This church offered a mass that was what I would call the equivalent of your average American mass: some organ, some guitar, some incense, the exclusive use of the vernacular, et cetera. Again, the church was packed. The congregation was much more diverse than the other two churches, but I certainly would not call it an immigrant parish. I sat beside a young couple who looked like they had left the hipster capital of Brooklyn and somehow had gotten lost in northeast Paris. In the pew in front of me was a middle-aged man with his two young daughters. Beside them was an older woman. Behind me were two women of central African descent. The priest was quite young and preached about sacrifice and rejection of worldly comforts for the sake of the kingdom. In France? Where worldly comforts are part of the national identity? C'est possible?!

Three anecdotes do not a trend make, but three anecdotes that bucked my preconceptions so intensely do give one pause. One can speculate on causes and possible effects of this situation, but there are a few things that an American audience should understand when looking at French religiosity and society in general - things I was quite clueless about. The first and most important is that the Church in France has been through everything, sometimes twice. At the beginning of the last century, the State literally seized all of the Church's property throughout the country. Schools were closed, convents sold off, etc. This was in 1907. Today, in 2015, the government still owns every church property in the country. This is but one example. The atrocities committed against Catholics during the Revolution in the 18th Century and the Commune in the 19th would fill volumes. The result, in my opinion, has been that those who wish to remain Catholic are truly committed. They have nothing to gain from it socially or politically (occasionally, quite the opposite has been true historically). 

The other thing to keep in mind, on the more political side of things is that what James Joyce said of the Church is true in France: "Here comes everybody." The political landscape in France is far more fragmentary than it is in the US. You have a devoted Communist Party. You have not one but three monarchist movements of varying popularity. You have socialists, social democrats, nationalists, and everyone in between. Into this milieu, a vocal or vibrant Catholicism does not seem out of place - it is just one more movement standing by its principles. The Church is not pressured into political correctness because in France, by and large, there is no political correctness.

Realists will charm in at this point to say that mass attendance and seminary enrollment is still abysmal. I make no argument with that. But, I will say that the commitment of those who remain Catholic in France could change the country. We need only think of some of the fairly recent French saints to see how a few people restored - if briefly - the spirituality of their nation: John Vianney, Therese of Lisieux, Catherine Laboure, etc. Europe is not hopeless, and neither is France.

Theory

Much steam has been blown up the skirt of the architectural establishment by a recent survey by the Royal Institute of British Architects that claims that architecture students are not "well-prepared" for work upon graduation. The survey then cites a majority opinion that "theory" occupies too much curricular space while practical skills are not given enough weight.

This article is but one facet of conversations and thoughts I've been having on this topic for some time. Should architecture morph back to a vocational-style education like it once was? Certainly the apprenticeship model has its values. However, it seems unlikely that the educational-industrial complex would give in to this mentorship-based model easily. The rest of the debate has centered simply on the rather utilitarian demand that "students need to know how a building goes together." This is typically coupled with a complaint that recent grads aren't proficient enough at the software du jour. The trend that results has been one that has happened much more quickly in other fields: the morphing of curricula whose goal is education into curricula whose goal is skill-centric.

Though I am skeptical of this trend generally, I am particularly troubled by its application with apparent vigor to architecture. I read once on the popular photography site "Humans of New York" that the person interviewed for the photo said "You cannot escape the architect. Every other art you can avoid or at least marginalize if you wish." This has, obviously, stuck with me. Our works are permanent fixtures in our places of habitation. Our profession is one that has a striking responsibility to the public of today and the future. We are not mere artists, we are professionals who provide what amounts to a public service - whether the particular commission is public or not. No one can escape the architect - that's a pretty lofty responsibility that we must shoulder as a profession.

My point here is that architectural theory and architectural history are perhaps more needed today than ever before. We, as a profession, must have a cogent philosophy about design. We must be knowledgeable about principles and trends that have proven successful (and unsuccessful) in the past. We must confront how our work will impact the public. We must consider what our aesthetic choices communicate. We must have at least a view of what it all means. Nihilism does not work when the object of our profession is the creation of something - something that the public may not be able to "escape" for many generations. Our popular culture may tell us that nothing really matters, but this is no philosophical basis on which to conceive great architecture. The architect, the good architect, must be convinced that what he is doing matters. If it matters only to himself, he may be an egoist, but at least he is, at minimum, considering someone. Obviously, the good architect would be more wide-reaching in his viewpoint.

In reality, most students of architecture will not design a building until mid-career - if even then. The slow processes of construction demand a late-blooming profession. Architectural academia is essentially educating students for their mid-to-late career. Much "practical" information is learned quickly in the workplace environment. There is a learning curve, but that is to be expected. I think it is short-sighted and a disservice to the nobility of the profession for firms to demand mastery of a panoply of fairly-easily-learned skills upon graduation. I believe education should instead promote the development of the full person - including reflection upon the individual and his place in the world. Yes, philosophy is impractical, but that is what makes it important. No person acts un-philosophically. That is, we each operate according to our over-arching beliefs. Discovery and development of these beliefs is one of the manifold purposes of education, and should not be jettisoned in favor of mere utility.

At this juncture, I will descend from my digital soapbox.

Candlemas

In my time praying [parts of] the Divine Office, I have found it spiritually rewarding in many ways, not least of which has been my sharpened sensitivity to the liturgical year. The Little Chapter for Daytime Prayer during Ordinary Time - "Owe no man anything but to love one another. He who loves his neighbor hath fulfilled the Law" - has often leaped to mind at opportune moments of frustration or anger. Certainly it expresses well the theological implications of Ordinary Time; that of the continued work of the Holy Spirit in the life of the Church. Similarly, I have become quite attached to the antiphons in honor of Our Lady that close the recitation of Night Prayer. The Salve Regina is predominant throughout most of the year and is probably the best known. The Regina Caeli is used during Easter, the Ave Regina Caelorum during Lent and pre-Lent, and the Alma Redemptoris Mater from the beginning of Advent until today. Today is the Feast of the Presentation of the Lord in the Temple (once known as Candlemas), which commemorates the 40th day since Christmas and marks the end of the portion of the liturgical year that deals with the mysteries of God's incarnation and self-revelation. We have come to the pre-Lenten season that is traditionally called Septuagesima which is Latin for seventieth as it is approximately seventy days til Easter. In the older form of the Roman Rite, the Alleluia is suppressed and purple vestments are worn in preparation for the beginning of Lent in a few weeks. Since I do not often attend a traditional parish, I will not notice these changes during Sunday Mass, but, since the Office has changed the antiphon to the Ave Regina Caelorum I will be reminded each evening that the joy of Christmas has transitioned toward the sorrows of Lent. So, then, for one last time this liturgical year, the Alma Redemptoris Mater: