John W. Dixon, Jr., Art as a Means of Thinking and of Grace

Giotto belongs to us as well as to the people of the fourteenth century. Under his guidance, we can learn much of what he had learned; the rightful criticism of Christian art makes available to us many insights that can transform our understanding.

The Christian criticism of art requires us to do something further: to learn from him and from others how it was done in their time, with their intellectual and moral equipment, their form of craft. So taught we can work as best we can toward making the Christ present, toward making art worthy of being one of the sacramentals.

"The Way itself has come to us." Giotto has made a painting that is among the sacramentals. His painting requires the work of thought in grasping, interpreting, the event as he has done, which means having the ability to grasp and interpret the painting. The painting also requires that we participate in the event.

This is the true work of the mission of the Church – not merely to instruct the faithful about a Jesus who lived only in the past, but to make possible the presence of Jesus among us.