Tag Archives: Florence

Martha Revisited

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We listen to scholars who study the bible. How about artists too? Here’s  the 13th century Tuscan artist, Giovanni di Milano, looking into Luke’s gospel about  Jesus with Martha and Mary at Bethany.

The artist adds some delightful details of his own to Luke’s account. He’s let his imagination roam. The table’s set for four people. That would be Jesus, Lazarus, Mary and Martha.

But, who are those others coming in the door?  Obviously, they’re Jesus’ disciples, led by Peter. One of them gestures towards Peter, as if saying, “He told us to come.”

Poor Martha in her apron holds up her hands, “What are we going to do?”

There will be no miracle, except the miracle of Martha’s hospitality.

More than four are going to be fed.

We need to read the gospels like this too.

Almighty ever-living God, your Son was welcomed in Martha’s house as a guest, grant, we pray, that through her intercession, serving Christ faithfully in our brothers and sisters, we may be received by you in the halls of heaven.Through our Lord Jesus Christ, your Son, who lives and reigns with you in the unity of the Holy Spirit, one God, for ever and ever.

Galileo Galilei

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The brilliant Italian scientist Galileo Galilei was one of the great figures of the 17th century. Born in Pisa, in Tuscany, Galileo studied, taught and lectured in Pisa and Padua as well as in Florence, where he and his family made their home. The father of experimental science, his work in astronomy drew criticism from the church of his time and made him a symbol of the conflict between faith and science.

 

He was a deeply religious man; Catholic to the core. Two of his daughters entered the convent outside Florence and one of them, Sister Maria Celeste, carried on a long, tender correspondence with her brilliant father.

Galileo believed that nature was a teacher along with the bible, and he wanted the church to accept the evidence that science provides, otherwise it could be called an enemy of truth and human progress. Like others then and now, he believed that the bible taught you how to go to heaven and not how the heavens go.

His story is beautifully and carefully told today in a recent book I’m reading now:

Galileo’s Daughter: A Historical Memoir of Science, Faith and Love, Dava Sobel,  New York 1999

There’s a television version:  Galileo: Battle for the Heavens, that you can find on Nova’s site on the internet.

I admire the author’s even-handed description of the relations between the scientist and the churchmen who condemned him for what they saw as his heretical ideas. “A tragic mutual incomprehension has been interpreted as the reflection of a fundamental opposition between science and faith, “ Pope John Paul said regretfully  in 1992.

I’m going in October on a pilgrimage through some of the Tuscan cities and Venice,  where Galileo achieved so much.  He was a believer and a scientist. May others follow him and may our church welcome the knowledge they bring to the human family.