Stand Alone Pages on 'Musings of an Old Curmudgeon'

29 October 2024

This Just In: Sacrilege at the Opera

My only question is what method God will choose to destroy our "civilisation" this time. This is beyond "edgy". It is downright anti-God blasphemy!

From Crisis

By Robert R. Reilly

We’ll start with the blasphemy of the year. There’s nothing quite like relaxing at the opera with abundant female nudity, fresh blood, (real) skin piercings, and actual lesbian sex acts. This used to be called porn, and one did not go to the opera for it. Paul Hindemith’s half-hour one-act opera Sancta Susanna (1922), which caused a scandal in its time, has been expanded into a three-hour profane extravaganza called Sancta. It supposedly offers a “radical vision of the Holy Mass.” Well, that’s been done before. It’s called a Black Mass. This one includes a nude woman nailed to a cross, to the music of Eminem. 

In one scene, according to German newspaper Süddeutsche Zeitung, a piece of a performer’s flesh is cut and “grilled medium rare,” to symbolize the Eucharist, or the body of Christ, which a nun then receives as “Communion.” There are other sacrilegious incidents that are too grotesque to relate. “At least 18 audience members required minor medical treatment after the October 5 and 6 performances of Sancta in Stuttgart, reporting nausea and dizziness,” according to opera spokesman Sebastian Ebling. Not to worry—Sancta continues to be sold out for its entire run.

The opera’s website tells us that “in Florentina Holzinger’s works in particular, natural nudity is a central means of expression.” I wonder what unnatural nudity is. A moment’s reflection answers the question. Natural nudity is the disclosure of a wife to her husband. Public nudity is unnatural. It violates the most basic need for privacy. Instead of the ironic “Sancta” Latin title, the opera should have been called Impius, or Impurus, especially in light of the live sex acts, which debase the “performers” and turn the audience members into voyeurs. 

Holzinger was raised in the Catholic Church and these puerilities are most likely her attempt to break free of its influence. All it demonstrates is how it continues to dominate her—as a positive does a negative. For instance, her depiction of the Eucharist as an act of cannibalism is sophomoric. Didn’t she ever pay attention in Scripture class? 

As usual, “shockers” like Sancta are a sign of spiritual and artistic bankruptcy. This work does not deserve a review, it deserves an exorcism.

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Comments are subject to deletion if they are not germane. I have no problem with a bit of colourful language, but blasphemy or depraved profanity will not be allowed. Attacks on the Catholic Faith will not be tolerated. Comments will be deleted that are republican (Yanks! Note the lower case 'r'!), attacks on the legitimacy of Pope Francis as the Vicar of Christ (I know he's a material heretic and a Protector of Perverts, and I definitely want him gone yesterday! However, he is Pope, and I pray for him every day.), the legitimacy of the House of Windsor or of the claims of the Elder Line of the House of France, or attacks on the legitimacy of any of the currently ruling Houses of Europe.