Padrão dos Descobrimentos. Monument to the Portuguese maritime discoveries in Lisbon. This monument commemorates 500 years since the death of Prince Henry the Navigator and honors 15th and 16th century Portuguese explorers.
The quest for the sublime enters into our daily lives because it makes of us men of great desires.* It awakens in us demands that need to be satisfied. Hence, we can affirm that sublime ideals are among the most practical things that exist. On the platform of these ideals, we are moved to set our dreams in motion.
Vision of the Victory of the Battle of Lepanto. Painting by Lazzaro Baldi 1673, located in Ghislieri College of Pavia, where St. Pope Pius V taught theology, altered by nobility.org.
By “dream,” we mean the process by which we idealize our goals in society. For this to happen, two things are necessary: men must first unite together to form a consensus around higher values. Secondly, inside this new consensus, they must conceive new ways of expressing and manifesting these higher values in daily life.
* Cf. Praise of the Prophet Daniel (Dn 9:23).
John Horvat, Return to Order: From a Frenzied Economy to an Organic Christian Society—Where We’ve Been, How We Got Here, and Where We Need to Go (York, Penn.: York Press, 2013), 323.
