In late summer of 2005, my wife Cindy and I went on vacation to southern Arizona. It is a world of natural wonder and beauty. And there is a man-made wonder there; a church of all things, in the Arizona desert. Just before you arrive in the town of Sedona, a sign points you to The Chapel of the Holy Cross. Margarite Staude, a wealthy patron of the arts, talented artist, and woman of deep faith was the catalyst behind the Chapel. She picked the site, lobbied the state to grant a construction permit, hired the architectural and construction firms, and in the end paid every penny for its construction: $300,000 in 1956, a project that would cost 20 times that much today. She said, “Though Catholic in faith, as a work of art the Chapel has a universal appeal. Its doors will ever be open to one and all, regardless of creed, that God may come to life in the souls of all men and women and be a living reality.”
Today, if you visit, you will be treated to one of the most unique buildings in North America and one of the most beautiful views in all the world. You can pray, sit in silence, light a ruby red candle for a loved one, or take in the architecture and the vista (of course you can visit the gift store in the basement). The sanctuary itself is simple. A massive, clear window behind the altar. Flat, backless pews with stone walls and a polished tile floor. Cornelia Sussman wrote, “The Chapel of the Holy Cross is small and yet conveys a feeling of immensity. One looks out through the enormous window and thinks: The builders had no need for stained glass. God has stained the scene in this window with colors man can never reproduce. And dominating the view from the window, a great white cross stands in front of the altar.”
When Sussman wrote those words, sometime in the 1960s, one thing was different about the Chapel than today. On that great white cross was a sculpture of the Crucified Jesus; a Christus, a crucifix. And in contrast to the scenery, it was not beautiful. Some quotations from the Chapel’s guest book in its first year: “The Chapel is stunning. The Crucifix is absolutely hideous. . .The Crucifix denies the resurrection as Christ’s body was never in such decay. . .The building is magnificent in concept and execution, but the sculpture is grotesque. . .The view around is beautiful but within the Chapel, the Cross is atrocious.”
The crucifix was known as “Christ of the Atomic Age,” an ugly, twisted piece of wood of which the artist drew inspiration from the victims of Hiroshima and Nagasaki. It was 1956 after all, only a decade past those atomic bombs which killed so many, and the nuclear arms race was spinning out of control, while unknowingly at the time, moving quickly toward the Cuban Missile Crisis. The artist who fashioned it, Keith Monroe, had this to say about his work: “A piece such as this should have many meanings. It is intended that way, but the viewer should in fact, be horrified by it. It must have that effect. The opening in the body, a great wound, Christ’s and the world’s. The blackness of the interior, the extreme tension of the figure and the strain and agony of the whole piece – pain – the pain Christ felt as a victim and as a conscience for the men who could do such violence to their Lord. And the open mouth, a protest, a call to end his suffering – and the suffering of all humanity.”
So the stark, ugliness of the “Atomic Christ” was purposeful – juxtaposed against the beauty of the Chapel and the Arizona landscape. It was intended to shock, to offend. For the cross is no piece of shiny jewelry. It is not a decoration, or a superstitious memento: No more than an electric chair, or a hangman’s noose, or a poisoned, needled syringe could be.. It is a ghastly, frightful instrument of death. It is offensive, the site of the worst atrocity, almost more than we can take. The man of sorrows, “acquainted with grief,” as Isaiah said, so despised, so disfigured that we “hide our faces from him.”
For more than twenty years the “Christ of the Atomic Age” hung on his Sedona cross, glaring down at worshipers. But in the 1970s, this little Arizona town was “discovered” by tourists. They came by the thousands to take in the beauty, to sit among the red rocks, and yes, to sit on the pews of the Chapel. It’s then that Keith Monroe’s sculpture became such a distraction, such a horrid embarrassment. It offended the tourists. It troubled the local Chamber of Commerce, now so concerned with building their brand and polishing the town’s image. Something had to be done. Finally, tired of all the controversy and negativity, sometime in 1977, Margarite Staude – the Chapel’s builder and patron – drove from her home in Los Angeles to Sedona with her handyman and a tall ladder. Privately, the Christus was taken down. The handyman then sawed off its arms, its legs, and the head, and scattered the pieces somewhere in the Arizona desert on the way back to Los Angeles, never to be recovered.
So what will you find if you visit the Chapel of the Holy Cross today? An astounding display of modern architecture; a magnificent fusion of man-made and natural beauty; a basement gift shop that sells hundreds of thousands of dollars worth of trinkets and knickknacks to visitors and online shoppers; and you’ll find plenty of tourists and their rental cars. But you will not find a congregation or any regular Christian worship services. Not even on Holy Days: The Chapel is closed on Christmas, Good Friday, and Easter. And why not? Because Jesus is no longer there. The place is slick, clean, and sanitized, offering nothing that would offend the sensibilities, the eager tourists with their dollars to spend, or the fine-tuned, well-oiled gift shop in the basement. But let me not be too hard on them. We all push the suffering Jesus away from us if we can. It stings, bites, and cuts. The cross is a stumbling block, an offense, utter foolishness. Yet, to push the suffering Jesus away, to disassemble and scatter his Passion to the wind, is to turn away from the very love and power of God.
I give Cornelia Sussman the last word, her words from 50 years ago when the “Christ of the Atomic Age” still hung in the Sedona Chapel: “Nailed to this cross, a blackened, tormented Christ looks down through hollow eyes. One kneels. One crosses oneself. One dares not look up at this strange and terrible figure. But it is impossible to distract the mind from the traumatized Christ, stretched on the rack. One casts brief, hurried glances upward. Is this what we have done? Lord, have you been carrying this cross back and forth over a burning earth where no cool stream remains to relieve the pain? Is that the atomic burn that nothing can ease, that burns and swells and blackens? ‘What an atrocious cross!’ a visitor who has gone hastily outside remarks. It’s atrocious!’ Indeed. Yet, it is a statue of Love; Love physically ruined. It is Love tortured, burned, blackened, and ravaged.”