Conditions and characteristics of sacred art

Sacred art incorporates a series of characteristics that are necessary to recognize and deeply understand. For example, a painting may provoke a religious feeling, but it may not be appropriate to celebrate Holy Mass in front of it. If the elements that make up the artistic work, even if dominated by a religious feeling, are not spiritualized to a sufficient degree, too much attention is focused on a sensitive, purely aesthetic element, without elevating itself to a spiritual plane, which helps someone to place themselves before God. It should not, therefore, be treated as sacred art, but rather within the more general scope of religious art.

Sacred art, in short, not only must serve the Liturgy and respect specifically liturgical ends - whilst remaining faithful to its natural requirements as art -, but it must also express and promote these ends in its own way, directing it towards that purpose. the aesthetic pleasure that, by its nature, art itself is responsible for producing. Therefore, if the artist, in addition to being authentically so, is not vitally permeated with general religiosity and at the same time with liturgical religiosity, he will not be able to produce an authentic work of sacred art.

A series of consequences can be deduced from this. Sacred art must be understandable, that is, it must serve as a teaching, because it is a "theology in images". It must represent the truths of faith, not in an arbitrary way, but by expounding Christian dogma with the greatest possible fidelity and with authentically pious feelings.