Catholic News 2
RIO DE JANEIRO (AP) -- Three American Olympic swimmers planned to meet with Brazilian law enforcement Thursday to discuss a reported robbery targeting 12-time medalist Ryan Lochte and his teammates, a U.S. Olympic Committee official said....
New York City, N.Y., Aug 18, 2016 / 12:01 am (CNA/EWTN News).- It’s a bit of church news you’re not likely to have forgotten.Four years ago in the little town of Borja, Spain, there was a case of thought-to-be vandalism that turned out to be an unfortunate attempt at art restoration.Cecilia Giminez, an elderly Spanish woman, created a well-intentioned but regrettably executed restoration of Ecce Homo (or ‘Behold the Man’), a fresco painting of Jesus before he is nailed to the cross.The original painting, found in the Catholic Church of Our Lady of Mercy in Borja, showed Jesus in a robe with the crown of thorns on his head, glancing heavenward in agony, which had begun to wear over time. However, after Giminez’s touch-up, the painting looked almost inhuman - more like a monkey or a werewolf, with shapeless and fuzzy features.But it wasn’t all bad. The original painting was not thought to be highly valuable, although it was a prized possession of th...
New York City, N.Y., Aug 18, 2016 / 12:01 am (CNA/EWTN News).- It’s a bit of church news you’re not likely to have forgotten.
Four years ago in the little town of Borja, Spain, there was a case of thought-to-be vandalism that turned out to be an unfortunate attempt at art restoration.
Cecilia Giminez, an elderly Spanish woman, created a well-intentioned but regrettably executed restoration of Ecce Homo (or ‘Behold the Man’), a fresco painting of Jesus before he is nailed to the cross.
The original painting, found in the Catholic Church of Our Lady of Mercy in Borja, showed Jesus in a robe with the crown of thorns on his head, glancing heavenward in agony, which had begun to wear over time. However, after Giminez’s touch-up, the painting looked almost inhuman - more like a monkey or a werewolf, with shapeless and fuzzy features.
But it wasn’t all bad. The original painting was not thought to be highly valuable, although it was a prized possession of the community. And the small, struggling town of Borja also benefited economically from the sudden international attention to the painting, thanks to countless memes and skits about the newly refreshed fresco, including the unforgettable sketch featuring Kate McKinnon on Saturday Night Live.
Now, a comedic opera memorializing the painting’s story is set to debut at Our Lady of Mercy in Borja next year, five years after the hilarious mishap.
Americans Andrew Flack, and Paul Fowler, a composer, made this opera their pet project ever since the fresco flop in 2012, the New York Times reports.
The opera will feature the story of Gimenez’s restoration, as well as the positive effect it had on the town. The style of the opera will be, well, a little bit of everything - “a Gregorian chant, a Spanish fandango, a Renaissance motet, a jota from Zaragoza, a classical chorus, an aria from the Zarzuela, a Flamenco tango, an indie-rock hook and a Swedish-house baseline,” Fowler told the New York Times.
Fowler and Flack gave a stage reading of their opera in the United States in 2014, and fundraised enough money this year to translate it from Spanish to English.
The opera is part of a larger effort to maintain the fresco’s status as a tourist attraction. Earlier this year, an interpretive art center was also unveiled at the site of the fresco, where visitors can paint their own versions of “Ecce Homo.”
KABUL, Afghanistan (AP) -- Soheila Hashemi has hardly slept since a suicide bomber targeted a rally in the Afghan capital last month, killing more than 80 people and wounding scores in the deadliest attack in Kabul since the war with the Taliban began 15 years ago....
MILWAUKEE (AP) -- Dominique Heaggan attended grade school in Milwaukee and joined the city's police force as a teenage aide through a program that aims to recruit young people into law enforcement, including minorities....
DENHAM SPRINGS, La. (AP) -- Keisha Taylor, a 37-year-old mother of four, has spent three nights in two different shelters since her family fled the flooding at their Baton Rouge apartment complex. And she doesn't know how many more nights they will be sleeping on cots inside the downtown arena where hundreds sought shelter....
TOKYO (AP) -- The defection of a North Korean senior diplomat in London poses a major problem for Pyongyang on a number of fronts - not least of which is how to publicly respond....
SAN BERNARDINO, Calif. (AP) -- A ferocious wildfire had swallowed up many homes as it spread across 40 square miles of mountain and desert east of Los Angeles. Exactly how many, however, and to whom they belonged, remained uncertain....
WASHINGTON (AP) -- THE ISSUE: The rich keep getting richer while more Americans are getting left behind financially....
WASHINGTON (AP) -- Weary Republican leaders are accepting Donald Trump's latest staff shake-up, hopeful that a new leadership team can reverse the New York businessman's struggles even as some worry it's too little too late....
BEIRUT (AP) -- Syrian opposition activists have released haunting footage showing a young boy rescued from the rubble in the aftermath of a devastating airstrike in Aleppo....
