The Satin Slipper

A special performance of the play by Paul Claudel

Directed by Peter Dobbins and Produced by Storm Theatre in Association with Blackfriars Repertory Theatre

Claudel passionately desires the world, not as Christians, but only as pagans before him did. And still Claudel is passionate for the world because he is Christian. No Christian philosopher, theologian or mystic before him has experienced the horizon of the world so powerfully. [...] The entire globe is not only outwardly the stage; that world is the stage necessarily and interiorly as well. Every time two human beings love each other, the fate of the world is at stake. Love only makes sense within this horizon [...] Claudel knows that this is a religious problem and that the question of horizon can only be resolved in God. He also knows further that in this resolution, achieved through death, the undiminished fullness of the earth must pass away. This double knowledge determines Claudel's Catholicism. For only Catholicism guarantees both simultaneously. No earthly value can be disdained out of arrogance or resentment. Every good is necessary to the Catholic; he cannot permit himself the smallest "no" where he stands before an earthly good. Even sin, guilt and evil [...] even there the Catholic has to utter his loving "yes." [...] He bears the "yes" as well as the "no" of the world before God and seeks to affirm both in expectation of final transfiguration by God.

from "Afterword to the Satin Slipper" by Hans Urs von Balthasar

About this Event

Date: Friday, February 5, 2010
Time: 7:30pm
Location: THE THEATRE OF THE CHURCH OF NOTRE DAME
114th Street and Morningside Park (1 block from Columbia University) Take the #1 train to 116 St., then walk 2 blocks south and 2 blocks east
Tickets: $25

CROSSROADS NIGHT FRIDAY 2/5
Visit www.smarttix.com and receive a $5.00 DISCOUNT when you use special code SPAIN

About the Director

Peter Dobbins
Artistic Director of the Storm Theater

Review

Read the review from First Things

Invitation

Download the Invitation here