Category Archives: Catholicism

The Artist is flexing: A brief note on the stained glass windows of Shanghai’s cathedral

Posted on by
10

The three leading reader questions received via the Shanghai Scrap contact form are:

  1. Can you get me into the Expo grounds? [What do I look like? A ticket broker? No.]
  2. Will you ship your large inventory of e-waste to me? [I don't have any e-waste (except for that Dell in the closet). So, no.]
  3. What is the status of the project to restore the stained glass windows of St. Ignatius Cathedral in Shanghai, and can you put me in touch with the artist?

Well. Long-time readers of this blog may recall a series of posts that I wrote back in late 2008 covering the installation of several dozen new stained glass windows into Shanghai’s century-old Catholic cathedral (here, here, and here, among others; my lengthiest treatment of this project in traditional media is this 2006 piece for the now defunct LA Times Sunday Magazine). As commissioned by Shanghai’s bishop Jin Luxian, these windows aren’t restorations of the windows destroyed during the Cultural Revolution, so much as they are an entirely new cycle of stained glass that merges Chinese characters, idioms, and artistic traditions with Western liturgical art and stained glass. The artist entrusted with this unprecedented commission is Wo Ye, Beijing born and bred, trained as a traditional Chinese painter and, later in life, trained in Catholic liturgical art in Italy and the United States. There’s really nobody else with her background, and training, anywhere, and that not only explains the commission, but why she is – best as anybody knows – the only woman or Chinese to ever get such a commission.

In any event, not long after completing that late 2008 series of windows, Wo Ye took a one year leave of absence from the project for personal reasons. Her leave – and the absence of visible progress on the cathedral’s windows – led many to wonder if the project was halted. It wasn’t, and it’s not. As proof: this morning I paid a visit to Wo Ye in her studio not far from People’s Square, where I found her as strong as ever (the photo, below, is meant to convey that), and getting ready to resume work in earnest:

With a little convincing, she submitted to an exclusive interview. Here it is:

Shanghai Scrap: Do you want to say anything about your upcoming plans for the cathedral windows? Designs, anything like that?

Wo Ye: [laughing] No!

Rumor has it that the second level nave windows are next. More when I have it.

Japan’s Benedictines

Posted on by

Typically, I don’t post links to articles that I write for my hometown media (back in Minnesota), lest I come off as the provincial rube that – frankly – I am. That, and I think interest is fairly limited for things Minnesotan among my readers – the vast, vast majority of whom have no interest in the Land of 10,000 Lakes. But once in a while an exception is in order, and so I hope interested readers will enjoy having a look at “In Japan, a Minnesota monastic community thrives,” my account of Trinity, a small Benedictine monastery in the mountains west of Tokyo with roots in St. John’s Abbey, a much, much larger Benedictine community in Collegeville, Minnesota (I’ve had some positive feedback from non-Minnesotans who read it via a link off my twitter feed – thus, this post). Below, the view just past the monastery’s driveway:

DSC00754

Quite a bit of thanks is due to the very kind, very hospitable brothers at Trinity. I had the privilege of spending a long weekend with them (and doing the reporting for this story) in the midst of a long, totally unrelated reporting trip in late May and early June.

Beijing this, Beijing that … Just who is this [Mister] Beijing, anyway?

Posted on by
10

I may be in the minority here, but in my experience there’s enough subtlety and disagreement in even the simplest of government policy decisions, in any country, to remove any incentive for blaming said policy decisions on a specific city. For example, whether or not you agree or disagree with Barack Obama’s fiscal stimulus program, you’re not very likely to say – much less, write – something like this:

“Washington views a multi-billion dollar fiscal stimulus as an essential part of any American economic recovery program.”

Why? Because Washington is a big place, where big disagreements take place and – as it happens – there are more than a few people in Washington who don’t agree with that statement. And that brings me to a question that’s troubled me for some time: namely, why do perfectly sane journalists who would never ascribe a policy – controversial or not -  to “Washington” (or “London,” “Rome,” “Tokyo” or “Seoul”) throw caution to the wind and insist upon referring to the Chinese government as “Beijing” – as if it were a monolithic entity ["Beijing is concerned about the declining value of the dollar;" "Beijing is concerned that the US won't have a pavilion at Expo 2010." etc etc etc], and not a government town riven by disagreements and factions? I’ve long been annoyed by this lazy practice (while occasionally resorting to it myself), but never quite so much as when I read Francesco Sisci’s absurd “China’s Catholic Moment” in the current issue of First Things (full disclosure: a publication that has been critical of me). Take, for example, this sentence:

Beijing views the Catholic Church as an unambiguously Western embodiment of Christianity, untainted by syncretic confusion and therefore indispensable to the Westernization of China.

Got that? Beijing views the Catholic Church as indispensable to the Westernization of China. All of it. Continue reading →

Angry property owners agree: Shanghai Film Group President “tarnishes” the Party

Posted on by
6

Back in January, I twice blogged about the tragic destruction of Shanghai’s 135-year-old carmelite convent (here and here). Located on the grounds of the old Shanghai Film Studios lot in the midst of the bustling and expensive Xujiahui neighborhood, there was really no hope for this historic property. Outside of a few blogs, nobody in Shanghai – least of all, the convent’s high-rise neighbors – made much of an issue about losing another piece of Shanghai’s rapidly disappearing architectural past. And nobody from the Shanghai Film Group (China’s oldest and largest production company), owner and (re)developer of the property, ever found himself in the position of having to justify the demolition or the redevelopment plans.

But then, right around Chinese New Year, folks living in the neighboring residential high-rise complex, noticed that Shanghai Film Group’s publicly posted plans for the redevelopment would damage their property values: the quaint lane between the respective developments is slated to become a two-way thoroughfare, and the old Film Studio lot is being prepped for high-rise office space that will block out its neighbor’s sunlight. So, in late February, angry residents of this neighboring high-rise hung multistory banners from the side of their buildings with messages like: “Shanghai Film Group Environmental Assessment Fake. Lying to the Government Hurts the People,” and “Central Government Asks People to Harmonize. Why Do You Want To Be Against the Central Government?” No surprise, nothing much happened: the banners came down and the redevelopment continued apace.

But the neighbors are tenacious, and so, last night, under darkness, new protest banners were unfurled. Click individual images for enlargements (translations below) of the photos that I took at 7:30 AM, today. While reading, keep in mind two things: first, Ren Zhonglun is a deputy to the National People’s Congress, the powerful President of the Shanghai Film Group (official photo, here), and the producer and executive producer of several films, most notably Ang Lee’s Lust, Caution; and second, these banners hang from high-rise buildings on one of Shanghai’s busiest thoroughfares in the heart of one of the city’s busiest neighborhoods. They’ll be seen by tens if not hundreds of thousands of people during their presumably brief lifespans.

Left to right: A: “Public lands to construct corporate high-rises, Shanghai Film Studio you are rapacious!”; B: “Deputy to the National People’s Congress Ren Zhonglun dupes the government and the people, tarnishing the image of the Party”; C: “(If) not busy cutting streamers, it is important that Ren Zhonglun come out and resolve the issue.” Continue reading →

A couple of thoughts on Bp. John Tong, Diplomat

Posted on by
1

Earlier this week the new Catholic bishop of Hong Kong, John Tong, commented that – unlike his outspoken predecessor – he would not be joining the Ti@nm@n Square vigils in Hong Kong this year. In response a few commentators are now suggesting that Tong – unlike his predecessor – will be a less political bishop. Perhaps so, but I think it more accurate to suggest that Tong will be a more diplomatic bishop than Zen, especially in dealing with the CCP and China’s religious authories. In fact, this has long been his reputation among those who follow Chinese Catholic affairs. A nice example of his subtle and discrete character and diplomacy can be found in my August 2007 profile of Shanghai’s bp Jin Luxian. The story opens in 1985, when Jin was under extreme pressure to accept an illicit ordination to be an auxiliary bishop of Shanghai from the Chinese religious authorities:

Few inside or outside of Shanghai believed that it was possible for Jin to remain a faithful Catholic-at least, a Roman Catholic-if he accepted the ordination. Yet Jin believed that to reject the appointment would not only place the seminary at risk but also open the Shanghai hierarchy to a priest more inclined toward the CPA and the Communist Party. Reluctantly, he accepted, and he says that on the day of the ordination, he was in need of “consolation.”

It arrived from an unlikely source: With Pope John Paul’s knowledge and tacit approval, Laurence Murphy, a past president of Seton Hall University and an informal intermediary and adviser to the Vatican on the Chinese Church, and Father John Tong, now the auxiliary bishop of Hong Kong, attended the ceremony. Continue reading →