Pilgrimage Following in the Footsteps of Newman - London, Oxford, Birmingham and Rome; October 2025

This October marks the 180th anniversary of the conversion to Catholicism of St. John Henry Newman. Here is an opportunity to mark the occasion with a pilgrimage led by Father Peter Stravinskas, editor of The Catholic Response and president of the Catholic Education Foundation, and Dr. Robert Royal, editor of The Catholic Thing. It runs from October 5th to 19th, beginning in London, where Newman was born, and ending in Rome. During the English leg of the pilgrimage, in addition to London, there will be visits to Littlemore near Oxford, the University Church in Oxford, Maryvale, and the Birmingham Oratory.  

It is planned as a holistic experience that embraces the spiritual, historical, theological, and literary aspects of the great Cardinal’s life and work. To reflect this multifaceted approach, Pontifex University is offering three credits at the Master’s level in either theology or education for an additional fee of $450.

Cost: Double occupancy round-trip from Newark, NJ (EWR): $7,320.
Single occupancy: +$2,300.

To Register:
www.The-Catholic-Journey.com/1025Newman

For questions, contact Father Peter Stravinskas:
Phone: (215) 327-5754
Email: fstravinskas@hotmail.com

More information contact The Catholic Journey at:
Phone: (201) 523 - 6148
Email: info@the-catholic-journey.com

The interior of the Birmingham Oratory

An Art School For Catholics - Showcasing Work by Apprentices of Stabat Mater Studios

Students Getting an Authentic Traditional On-the-Job Apprentice Training

The excellent Stabat Mater Studio—an art school I recommend for a soup-to-nuts training in naturalistic art styles—opened its doors this September, and a mixture of full-time core students and part-timers began their intensive instruction in the fundamentals of drawing with executive director Robert Puschautz, and art fellow AnneMarie Johnson.

One key factor distinguishing the Stabat Mater Studio from other classical art programs is that it is a working studio with an openly Catholic ethos, which offers students on-the-job training by participating in actual commissions given to master artists.

A recent project was for St. Joseph’s church in Mason, Texas. Stabat Mater Foundation was in charge of the stenciling portion of this historic church's renovation under the guidance of Studio Io. After the stenciling was finished on-site, the whole studio, teachers and students, came together to complete the Tree of Life mural behind the crucifix, which was then attached to a board behind the altar.

“One of our goals is to share an integrated approach to art with students. We are not just making pretty pictures for walls but trying to create work that reflects the cosmological order of the universe. That means creating a harmony between the architecture, the artwork and objects that go into the church and the mission and function of that liturgical space.” - Robert Puschautz.

You can read about their intensive integrated training program here. It is a uniquely well-rounded program rooted in rigorous academic method training but certainly not limited to it. 

A couple of features particularly caught my eye: 

First, they include training in sacred geometry, harmony, and proportion, which is unique to this school. 

Second, they shepherd the students from being able to draw and paint accurately what they see - which is hard enough - to creating original paintings that draw on the imagination of the artists, and the memory of what they have observed in the past. This final stage is so often missing in the ateliers that have sprung up around the country, leaving artists at a disadvantage, because they can only reproduce scenes they create in the studio. This is why so many naturalistic paintings being commissioned look like static Victorian tableaus in which the girl next door is dressed up as the Virgin Mary. 

Also, Pontifex University is proud to partner with Stabat Mater atelier. Through our online courses in art theory, created for the Master of Sacred Arts program, we offer intellectual formation and deep inculturation that accompanies the training in artistic skills that the Stabat Mater atelier offers. 

Contact Studio Io for church renovation commissions and Stabat Mater Foundation for artistic and decorative commissions.

The Mathematics of Beauty - Teaching Principles for Today, and Work Submitted by a Student

It is a surprise to many people today that such a thing even exists - a field of mathematics that can be incorporated by visual artists into the creation of beautiful works of art. In fact, it does exist, and in the West, architectural design, for example, incorporated its principles from the time of the ancient Greeks up to the Second World War. As NLM readers will be aware, I have been posting articles demonstrating how different buildings look as a result of this. It is effectively the study of the mathematics of pattern.

The starting point for the study is a beautiful object and consensus that it is beautiful - the cosmos or musical harmony, for example. Then there is a psychological study by which the “scientist” analyses the underlying mathematical order that people seem to be responding to.

The real test of the truth of whatever theories arise from this study is not so much the coherence of the theory proposed - human reason is weak and liable to make errors (as any authentic natural scientist who still holds to the established scientific method will attest). No matter how elegant the theoretical justification appears to be, how sound the axioms, or how watertight the logic, we cannot be sure that this alone is a measure of its truth. No, the test is that when it is applied in some new way, it works repeatedly. So in the field of the mathematics of beauty, when artifacts are created that incorporate the mathematical principles, people find it beautiful.

Beauty is a property that is difficult to test, given that there are many factors that contribute to the beauty of an object, and that we cannot be sure whose powers to judge what is beautiful are well formed. The best test that we have therefore, is not the opinion of the few, but rather general opinion over generations, what we might call “common taste”, drawing an analogy with common sense. The usual term for this common taste is tradition. This is why if want to create a beautiful culture, we look to tradition to guide us in the present. The strongest argument for the truth of the theories of the mathematics of beauty is the fact that generations of people have marveled at its beauty. The test of time increases the chances that we are not simply following the vagaries of contemporary fashion, which is not such a reliable guide.

If we want to train someone to be able to contribute to the culture beautifully, in any regard (not just art) then that training ought to include, I suggest, the study of the theory of the mathematics of beauty, and the study (including guided imitation) of a canon of traditional forms for which there is a general consensus that they are beautiful.

For any creative process, therefore, tradition is the rudder of the past that steers the barque of his present activity of creativity, while God is force that motions it forward through inspirational ideas of what it will be in the future, once created.

Resistance to the idea that mathematics can have anything with creativity runs deep today. The Romantic mindset runs deep even in conservatively minded artists and architects who wish to reestablish the forms of the past. In my experience of discussing such matters with many of them, even these architects who have studied and are looking to recreated classical forms as part of the training, will resist the idea that there is anything mathematical that they need to learn. Even artists who are studying the academic method of classical naturalism will assume that their intuition is enough.

The answer is that intuition has a part to play, but a musical composer needs the theory before he can create a new and beautiful piece of music. Even Mozart and Beethoven, prodigies that they were, had music lessons and were taught some theory by their fathers.

Pontifex University’s Mathematics of Beauty course, which is part of the Master of Sacred Arts program as a whole requires a study of the theory by looking at the work of figures such as Pythagoras, Plato, Aristotle, Boethius, Augustine Bonaventure, Aquinas, and recent summaries of the theories such as those by Rudolph Wittkower and Benedict XVI. This includes both the study of traditional harmony and proportion, and a philosophical examination of the nature of number itself, focusing on it's capacity to communicate both magnitude and symbolic meaning. There is conventional written examination of their understanding of these principles.

The practical element of this course requires the student to submit a portfolio of work that incorporates the mathematics into traditional geometric construction and patterns. Beginning with very basic principles of creating the primary geometric shapes from first principles - with only a pair of compasses and a straight edge - the student then has to create an Islamic-style patterned tile as might have been used in the Cathedral at Monreale in Sicily, for example. Then I ask the student to create a complex piece of opus sectile work based upon opus sectile and cosmati patterns of the Romanesque and early gothic periods respectively, such as might be found in the churches of Rome of the period.

The following are some submissions from student Daniela Diz who gave me permission to feature her excellent work here.  First the musical scales of the discipline, basic geometric construction:

Then the geometric construction described by Plato called 'quadrature'. The student constructs a square and then creates another with, first, half the area, and second, twice the area. 

There is a practical application to this historically. The ratio of the length of the side of the smaller square to the larger is 1:√2, while the ratio of the areas is 1:2. This is seen as a way of creating the geometric mean between between the two extremes of 1 and 2, represented as 1:√2::√2:2. If the smaller square is placed inside the larger so that the sides are parallel, then this becomes an example of a template for the dimensions of a cloistered walkway into a church by which, symbolically, we walk along the path of virtue, the temperate mean between the extremes of excess and deficiency.

Next we have a design based upon an Islamic tiled pattern. Islamic patterned art developed originally from that of Byzantine artists in conquered lands from the 7th century onwards and became quickly an art form in its own right. Over centuries, those Islamic patterns then became the basis for those used by Christians. Examples are common in Spain and perhaps some of the most famous examples are in the Norman churches of Sicily such as in Monreale.

Inlaid marble work from Monreale Cathedral, Sicily, 12th century AD

Finally here is an example of a chain of circles known as a 'guilloche'. The etymology of the word is uncertain. The students was asked to choose between this and similar design based on circles called a quincunx and then choose how to decorate it based upon existing tile patterns.

A Charming Film About Icon Painter Aidan Hart, His Work, and His Connection to the Bethlehem Icon Centre

Here is a beautiful short video about icon painter Aidan Hart. The video was made when he was visiting the Bethlehem Icon Center run by Ian Knowles. The Bethlehem Icon Centre is a partner institution of www.Pontifex.University, where the Master of Sacred Arts course provides the theoretical basis to understanding images in the Catholic tradition, including icons. (Video by Joubert and Marija Joubert, courtesy of the Bethlehem Icon Center.)

Aidan has been a great influence on me. I first met him about 30 years ago, when I was trying to learn to paint in egg tempera from tubes. In a casual conversation with a friend in London, I was describing my difficulties with the medium. He said to me that he knew someone who used that medium and gave me the address of a priest called Fr Athanasius Ledwich. At this point, I wasn’t even Christian, although I was starting to search for a better way of life, so there was no mention of icons or sacred art, and I wasn’t even thinking along these lines.

Encouraged by my friend, I wrote to Fr Athanasius asking for help in painting technique. I wondered if I could visit him, even if it was just to stand to look over his shoulder for an afternoon so that I could watch him using the medium. A week later I had a letter from Brother Aidan Hart. As it turned out, Fr Ledwich had never painted an icon in his life and passed the letter on to someone who had (my friend was, in fact, a casual acquaintance who barely knew Fr Athanasius). In his letter, Br Aidan invited me to stay with him for a weekend. I telephoned him, and we arranged that he would pick me up at Birmingham New Street station forecourt.

“How will I know you?” I asked him.

“I'm over six feet tall and look like a monk,” he said. “You’ll recognize me.”

Just to show how little I knew of this world, I remember standing at the gate to platform 7, the appointed meeting point and looking around. Then in the distance, I saw this tall man walking towards me, with a long beard, black robes and a cylindrical hat.

“Oh my God,” I thought. “It’s Rasputin.”

Nevertheless, I instantly connected with him and liked him. He was so generous in teaching me all that I could possibly learn that weekend. It was also my introduction to icons and the Eastern Rite.

He was a Rassaphore monk at that point - he talks about this phase of his life in the video. I remember him telling me much later that when he was a hermit, surprisingly, his life was much busier than later on when he was a working artist with a family. People used to flock to see him, even though he was in an isolated spot in rural Shropshire. I think he told me that in the last year he was living in the hermitage, 3,000 people visited.

In the video, Aidan also talks of his connection with Ian Knowles, the directory of the Bethlehem Icon Centre. I met Ian - I’m thinking perhaps 15 years ago now- at an icon painting workshop run by Aidan in Shropshire. It was obvious then that he was a talented artist.

One of the great advantages of learning to paint with Aidan, I always thought, is that he always explained not only what to do, but why we do it, and how through his own analysis of traditional icons he had worked out what to do. Aidan was self-taught and so he always generously taught us his approach to this. This meant that we came out of his classes able to propel ourselves, to some degree at least, without constant supervision. It was these methods that became the starting point for my effort at articulating some general principles for Christian art education, which I described later in my book, the Way of Beauty and built into a course called A Study of Artistic Method for Patrons and Artists, which is a 3-credit elective in Pontifex University’s Master of Sacred Arts program.

Aidan describes these methods in his excellent book The Techniques of Icon and Wall Painting.