The following is taken from "Encounter" - Theological publication of the Regional Seminary of St John Vianney and the Uganda Martyrs

Architects, artists, stained glass craftswomen/men, sculptors, musicians all have an essential role to play in creating worship spaces that lift up our hearts and minds to God.  

This is the absolute conviction of our present pope Benedict XVI as it was of his predecessor.   Culture, in all its forms, can and should lead us into the mystery that is God.

It is interesting then that three seminarians: Roger Graham (Kingstown), Hugh Logan (St George’s) and Robert Christo (Port of Spain) have each chosen an area of culture to research in their BA (Theology) dissertation.

So I thought it would be good to offer a brief insight into the areas and level of research they have undertaken. I asked them three simple questions: 
•  What did you do?
• What did you find most interesting in researching your dissertation?
• What did you find most enjoyable about doing your dissertation.

Roger Graham

Roger Graham’s dissertation is entitled The Theology of the Missionaries of the Poor’s Music: The relationship between their music and their ministry.

Roger Graham

In answer to the first question Roger explained that he had analysed the hymns and publications of the Jamaican based Missionaries of the Poor.

He “identified various themes that occurred repeatedly in the hymns and writings of Fr Ho Lung and others: Christ, Mary, Discipleship etc” and he “compared the treatment of these same themes in other hymns”.

He wanted to see if the nature of the Missionaries’ ministry with the poor shaped the hymns they composed.

Asked to name what he found most interesting he talked about how he had found a definite interaction between hymns and experience.  The Missionaries work with and amongst the poverty-stricken in Jamaica had led them “to think of particular names of God in very different ways to other collections of hymns.”

Roger enjoyed “exploring how the cultural and social dynamics shaping their experience led to a new and deeper encounter with God”.

Hugh Logan

Hugh Logan explored the power of story-telling in his dissertation entitled Stories from the Grenadines: Engaging the Moral Imagination in Contemporary Christian Education. Over the last two years or so Hugh has been “visiting different story tellers in the islands of the Grenadines, collecting and recording their stories.”

Hugh Logan

From the 32 he has amassed he chose six to analyze at greater depth. His analysis “aimed to identify the moral issues and value systems embedded in the stories.”

Hugh became quite animated as he talked about what had been most interesting: “seeing the story tellers perform, watching them telling the same story in different ways to meet the needs of a different audience or location, realising that stories are always alive and developing.” 

Clearly Hugh had great enjoyment in hearing and in fact in telling stories himself. But something else gave him great pleasure. “In my analysis I came to see that even quite simple stories were in fact exploring complex moral dilemmas at very deep levels and therefore could be important tools in evangelising and catechesis.

Robert Christo

Robert Christo decided to explore something that has been part of his life for many years, his involvement with Peter Minshall’s mas camp. Emblazoned on the cover of the dissertation Interpreting the Mas Portrayals of Peter Minshall as Food for Religious Imagination is a splendid picture of Minshall’s first mas queen. 

Robert had interviewed many of Minshall’s associates – costume designers, dancers, musicians. He had even found time by “interviewing him in the gym” to talk to the “Mas Maestro” himself.  Robert’s whole study has led him into a deep interest in “how the body can mediate the glory and mystery of God.”

Robert Christo

This is very different from how many look on mas, but as he points out, properly understood it is very much akin to John Paul II’s Theology of the Body.

It is exciting to see we can never limit God’s revelation – “we can learn theology from theologians and we can learn theology from artist’s like Minshall”.

So that brings us full circle. I began by saying that  “Architects, artists, stained glass craftswomen/men, sculptors, musicians all have an essential role to play in creating worship spaces that lift up our hearts and minds to God.”

But as each one of these studies shows we need to extend our notion of culture so that we can fully appreciate Caribbean artistry in its many forms and the potential of each form to lead us further into the mystery that is God.

These studies invite us to bring a “contemplative attitude” to all that is good and wholesome in the cultures of the Caribbean people’s.  Allegedly, Minshall’s mother said to him when he was a child – “you will either be an artist or a priest.”

These dissertations challenge us to recognise God’s revelation through both artist and priest.