On Beauty and Justice
Understanding the relationship between beauty and justice is vital for the healing and restoration of our world.
Beauty has been described as the manifestation of various elements in right relationship. What we perceive as beautiful is often a balance of symmetry and uniqueness, familiarity and novelty. Justice, like beauty is also the result of right relationships. It is the fair and appropriate treatment of all. Merriam Webster defines justice as “the quality of being fair.” This word “fair” can also mean “to be beautiful,” like a fair maiden or the fairest of them all as spoken in Snow White. Justice is beautiful and beauty fosters justice.
Writer and Activist, Dorothy Day, said that her intentional relationships with the poor and her determination to find beauty contributed to her pursuit of justice. Day believed that providing images of good things such as vines and grapes, a mother and children, countered the “troubledness and bitterness of the world.” In acknowledging the ugliness of poverty, Day believed people could create the kind of humility needed in reversing the systems that sustain such brokenness. The hospitality Day and other members of the Catholic Worker movement offered was always tagged with some aspect of beauty, no matter how simple. It made a difference in the lives and the morale of those they ministered to. Through novels, nature, art and music, Day found solace in human vulnerability and ugliness, a sense of beauty rose from the forsaken.
In our present day it could be easy to conclude from the various crisis’ taking place around the world, the injustice and political unrest, the rampant poverty and environmental threats, diseases and displacements that art and beauty are mere luxury. It could make some feel that to focus on art and beauty in the midst of a global pandemic is insensitive or short sighted. However, I want to suggest that it is precisely because of these desperate situations that the artist is called upon to beautify the world with art and engage these issues from a vantage point of hope. The desperate situation in our world calls for the artist to emerge as a prophetic voice for change.
I’m reminded of the example of Iraqi cellist Karim Wasfi who countered the tragedy of war by playing music at the sites of car bomb explosions and smoldering buildings in the background of his concertos. Wasfi said, "The other side chose to turn every element, every aspect of life in Iraq into a battle and into a war zone. I chose to turn every corner of Iraq into a spot for civility, beauty and compassion."
We are called to be the architects of hope and counter the destruction of life with the opposite spirit, in beauty and creativity. Let poetry be our protest. Let generosity, humility and kindness lead the revolution.
If you enjoyed this blog you may also like to The Artist As Protest Against Despair on the Makers and Mystic’s podcast.
Stephen Roach
Stephen Roach is host of the Makers and Mystics podcast and founder of The Breath & the Clay creative arts movement, an international community of artists and creatives. Stephen travels as a keynote speaker and creative coach, conducting workshops and live events centred on the exploration of creativity and the spiritual life. He is the author of four volumes of poetry, an illustrated children’s book titled Satchel Willoughby & The Realm of Lost Things and his recent guide, Five Creativity Killers and How To Avoid Them. Alongside of speaking and writing, Stephen is a multi-instrumentalist with a background in ethnomusicology and composing for film and television.
His band Songs of Water has toured internationally and contributed music to the works of recording artists Ricky Skaggs, Josh Garrels, Jonathan and Melissa Helser and many others. Songs of Water’s music is now licensed exclusively through Musicbed.