Some people find God after falling off a horse‚ but most Christians approach faith on a day-to-day basis through a cocktail made up of God’s grace‚ prayer‚ the cultivation of virtues and sacraments‚ and also‚ to some extent‚ human affections. Although sentiment is neither essential nor constant in our relationship with God‚ often‚ in moments of spiritual drought‚ we comfort ourselves remembering days when our human heart experienced God’s love‚ in that famous shrine of the Virgin‚ in that inspired homily from the village priest‚ in a Good Friday procession‚ in the solitude of that hermitage where you went to weep in front of the tabernacle.  And‚ beyond grace‚ if anything moves the affections of man‚ if anything can lead our feelings toward God‚ it is the aesthetics. There is an official liturgy‚ to avoid abuses and doctrinal errors‚ to guarantee respect for the Holy Sacrament‚ but also so that we learn to approach God‚ not only with the soul‚ but also with the senses. Beauty is paramount. St. John Paul II wrote about it in his 1999 Letter to Artists: In perceiving that all he had created was good‚ God saw that it was beautiful as well. The link between good and beautiful stirs fruitful reflection. In a certain sense‚ beauty is the visible form of the good‚ just as the good is the metaphysical condition of beauty. If the aesthetic and the emotional were not important‚ they would not have been a priority target of the enemies of God in postmodern times. From within the Catholic Church itself‚ hundreds of people have sought to destroy the beauty of the rite‚ art‚ and religious architecture for the sake of a supposed renewal: They tried to do away with the liturgy for being too old fashioned and to attract young people (who never came); they strove to change the classical religious architecture for the architectural ugliness of the 20th century (and were surprised that this did nothing to fill the churches either); it is as stupid as if‚ to fill a church with atheists‚ some priest chooses to innovate and preach in his homilies that God does not exist.  READ MORE by Itxu Díaz: Wokies Claim Michelangelo’s Sistine Chapel Creations Exemplify ‘White Fragility’ Those who defended the building of new churches in industrial-style architecture — we should really call it “Soviet architecture” — used the same failed reasoning as those enlightened adepts of liberation theology. Fin-de-siècle relativism‚ which also wreaked havoc within the Church‚ was used as an argument for not rejecting the new religious ugliness: They figured that a church built like a concrete sports hall‚ diaphanous‚ with the tabernacle hidden behind some stone off to the side‚ was as equally a valid artistic manifestation as the imposing Gothic‚ Baroque‚ or Renaissance church‚ accepting the same relativist theory that also destroyed secular art giving way to the intricate jungle of horrors that is today contemporary art. And forgetting almost by accident all the valuable Thomistic philosophy of beauty‚ which orbits around a central idea: Beauty is the splendor of truth.  Otherwise‚ whatever is born ugly dies much uglier and loses all its attractiveness (if it every managed to muster any) as soon as the novelty wears off. Thus‚ the churches built at the end of the 20th century to the new canons of urban ugliness are today remnants from a time when the current crisis of the Church was only just beginning. Today almost no one doubts that it is necessary to create a beautiful environment that moves hearts to worship God: with inspiring architecture‚ deeply religious art‚ and even respect for the liturgy‚ which is generally under ever less abuse from the revolutionary priests from the ’70s and ’80s.  Of course‚ other aesthetic evils remain associated to our faith. Churches that neglect the liturgical vestments of the priest‚ monasteries devoid of monks‚ existing exclusively as tourist attractions‚ or the using of churches for activities completely unrelated to prayer and adoration. By the way‚ in my parish‚ yesterday‚ next to a beautiful image of the Immaculate Conception‚ the parish priest hung a horrible‚ huge poster vindicating the importance of recycling plastic; I admit that it moved me to prayer … but for God’s forgiveness for the priest.  Privately‚ older priests in the most traditionally Catholic countries in the West speak of their sadness at their inability to attract young people. The truth is that certain parishes‚ certain religious movements‚ do manage to attract them. And they are not exactly the most groundbreaking‚ revolutionary‚ noisy‚ modern Catholic movements. So I sometimes take the trouble to explain to those sad priests‚ with as much charity and fraternal love as I can‚ that all the aesthetic transformation attempted by the Church in recent decades has failed for one reason only: Young people‚ whatever the media may say‚ are still attracted today by the same things they have always been attracted by‚ righteousness‚ truth and beauty. Which is incidentally also the path that leads to God.  We should all read more of Colombian writer Nicolás Gómez Dávila‚ who expresses in one line what others of us need pages to say: “If we want something to last‚ let’s make it beautiful‚ not efficient.” Translated by Joel Dalmau. Buy Itxu Díaz’s new book‚ I Will Not Eat Crickets: An Angry Satirist Declares War on the Globalist Elite‚ here today! The post We Built Ugly Churches and Still Do Not Attract Young People: How Is This Possible? appeared first on The American Spectator | USA News and Politics.