Descent into Hell
10/29/2024
In August, I undertook the pre-semester ritual of updating my syllabi, in particular for my elective course on beauty and justice, which I taught for the first time last year. As I looked at the topics covered, I knew one in particular needed to be added: What do we do with the art of moral monsters? The question is perennial but has been subject to renewed attention following the revelations of the #MeToo era. The change to my syllabus, however, was prompted not by that wider social reckoning alone, but by the fact that this question has come to our own campus in the form of credible abuse allegations against Fr. Marko Rupnik, principal artist behind the mosaics and windows in the university’s Chapel of the Holy Spirit.
The investigations into allegations against Rupnik have been unfolding over the last several years, testing the strength of the Vatican’s anti-abuse measures. Rupnik has been credibly accused of sexual, psychological and spiritual abuse of as many as 20 of the 41 members of the Loyola community of sisters. In the summer of 2023, he was dismissed from the Jesuits and shortly thereafter accepted into priestly ministry in the Diocese of Koper in his native Slovenia. In October 2023, Pope Francis lifted the statute of limitations on the case and ordered that the Dicastery for the Doctrine of the Faith begin a judicial process, after detecting “serious problems in the handling of the Father Marko Rupnik case and lack of outreach to victims.” We await the outcome of that trial.
I gave my students this information about the allegations and response thus far, as well as two short articles: one arguing that we ought to separate the art from the artist, and the other detailing the decision by the Knights of Columbus to cover their own mosaics crafted by Rupnik and the Centro Aletti mosaic team with whom he works, at least until the conclusion of the DDF investigation. With these varying perspectives in mind, we headed to the Chapel of the Holy Spirit to have our discussion. Two points from our conversation stood out to me. First, the students struggled with the tension between the beauty of the artwork and the ugliness of the artist’s actions—most said the knowledge of Rupnik’s actions did not stop them from seeing the art as beautiful, but it disturbed them that such beauty could come from someone who caused so much harm. Second, they claimed that the question of what to do with the art has different stakes when the art is in a religious space than when it is in a museum or another public space.
There are intricate questions to be asked about just these two points, but implicit in both is a sense that there is a dynamic relationship between the viewer, the artwork and the artist. Such that when we discover abusive or otherwise morally villainous acts by the creator of an artwork that we have found formative, we feel a sense of betrayal, which may be intensified when the formative work of that art is explicitly spiritual or ethical. Because of this relational triad, the philosopher of art Berys Gaut suggests that the artist’s ethics may be a factor in our judgment of the work, but that “the test must be whether, in light of one’s knowledge of the artist’s attitudes outside his work, one can detect in the work traces of these attitudes.”
Do we find any traces of Rupnik’s abusiveness within the artwork? To this question, I have received various answers from students and colleagues. The main mosaic in the Chapel of the Holy Spirit centers on a depiction of the Harrowing of Hell, as Christ dramatically liberates Adam and Eve. When I look at the mosaic these days, I cannot help but recall the words of one of Rupnik’s alleged victims, who described the psychological, spiritual and sexual abuse she underwent at Rupnik’s hands as a “descent into hell.” For me, the triumph of the image sits in stark contrast to the “hell” the artist plunged these women into—a “hell” from which they have not yet emerged, and which the institutional reluctance to hold Rupnik accountable has deepened.
Religious spaces, as my students noted, are not the same as other public spaces, in the sense that they intentionally address themselves to the spiritual reality of the human being. This intensifies both the possible meaning and possible harm of the symbols and actions within these spaces. By choosing to cover their mosaics, at least for now, the Knights of Columbus have used Catholic symbolism in support of solidarity with Rupnik’s victims. We cover images in our churches at the end of Lent as part of our fasting and repentance, and covering these mosaics makes space for us to repent of the abuses carried out not only by Rupnik but thousands of clergy and laypeople. Thinking of Sacred Heart’s chapel, covering the image would also open up the symbolic meaning of the Harrowing of Hell—which begins first from the claim that after Jesus died, as his body was wrapped in burial cloth, “he descended into hell.” This act of covering might prompt us to reflect: What does it mean for Jesus to be with Rupnik’s victims in their metaphorical hell? How do we as church imitate this solidarity, recognizing that perhaps now is not the time for the triumph of Resurrection but the lament of Holy Saturday? Such a response, it seems to me, both centers the victims and acknowledges that we continue to work out the relationship between ourselves, the artwork and the artist.
Callie Tabor is an assistant professor in the Department of Catholic Studies at Sacred Heart University.