Appalling, what counts as ‘art’ in Pamplona

The threshold for what qualifies as “art” in Pamplona is apparently pretty low these days, if, that is, taking more than 240 consecrated Hosts and arranging them on the ground so as to spell out the Spanish word for ‘pederasty’ counts as “artistic”. Which, in Pamplona, it does. So, in Pamplona now, I suppose, any idiot who can write his name in the dirt with a stick would count as an “artist”, and that’s a pity. I have never given much thought to Pamplona, but if I had ever had been asked about it, I would have assumed better of an old city like Pamplona. Typical naive American, me.

As for matters Catholic occasioned by this sad event, I have no idea whether the Spanish “artist” Abel Azcona is a Catholic, but even if he were, the chances that the “artist” is automatically excommunicated for his blasphemous (CCC 2148) desecration of the Eucharist (1983 CIC 1367) are next to nil (for all sorts of reasons, but chiefly those set out in Canons 1323 and 1324—I have said many times, poenae latae sententiae delendae sunt). Of course, if the “artist” Azcona were tried in an ecclesiastical tribunal (these cases are now reserved to CDF), his chances of being convicted rise considerably. But that’s no more likely to happen here than it does anywhere else.

A group of Christian lawyers, however, is suing the Pamplona city council for abetting this vicious “art” and it can offer, it seems, a good case that the city council is actually complicit in a ‘hate crime’. Interesting theory. I wish them well. Who knows, perhaps success in a legal action might head off private people from, say, printing up 240 copies of the Pamplona municipal flag and arranging them on the ground so as to spell out some words of their own choosing. While “Señor, ten piedad de Pamplona” comes to my mind, others might want to express different sentiments. That approach could get nasty. I suggest a legal remedy.

That, and some personal reparation for the sacrilege that counts as “art” in Pamplona.