Obituary

How much longer will bulls lie in Montenegro?

How long will the scenes of the killing of children in their cradles, slaughter, burning, and there are cauldrons in which people are being roasted await us on the church walls... In all these highly graphic and suggestive events, the actors are clearly identified as hateful Turks, Communists and Montenegrins . They are responsible for all the evils of Montenegro and the modern world, as well as for all the troubles of Serbia itself, it is said very clearly and literally.

How long will history be lived (remembered, read) as horror, that is, exclusively as horror?

Although these days are marked by preliminary bizarreness in the upcoming presidential race, I believe that the details I am talking about are no less bizarre. And they disturb the fat, and on many levels. And they are not the only ones. We saw an alderman who beats when he sees two fingers raised and hears a Montenegrin song? Or the way the officials of this country behave at the border crossing. If there was society, the reaction to it would be much more concrete. Like deja vu, more and more convincing deja vu in the nineties. And for a moment, the spirit of the immortal also flashed irresistibly Balkan spy: police release for anthology.

But the zeitgeist we are talking about is also evidenced by the return/dominance of the necrophilic culture of memory. Do you remember when it all started? Lazarus replaced the coffin Tito's the relay. Many have forgotten that - it started with one coffin that traveled around "Serbian" lands, that is, the borders of the future Serbian state were marked with it. Younger people probably don't remember, but maybe they heard - Greater Serbia instead of SFRY, Slobo lead the project, Milo then hard against him... Yes, yes... Check.

Today, this kind of "spirituality" is also shown through the ill-fated Rožaj painting, the painful obituary.

What is the meaning of the paintings on the walls? In times of illiteracy, pictures and statues were a direct way to convey a message. From the Power, of course, every message is always from the Power. The real question is - to whom does the idea of ​​someone in the XNUMXst century using pictures on the walls that contain supposed episodes from long ago to shape their relationship to the past, present and future of their flock seem normal.

The need to fix history (exclusively) as a stage for endless conflict with the "enemy" is a dangerous game. And deeply impolite. And inhuman, in the end.

However, the most stupid is the popular explanation with "history" - that's what happened, says one of the church team members.

The fact that you believe that something happened does not mean that it has a place on the church wall, in fact it does not mean that it even happened. But don't let that anger you, history is full of such contradictions. By choosing of what happened you constitute a relationship to the past, and it's not the facts that matter, but your belief, your choice of side... That's why all manipulators adore history.

At graduation, in 1984, in the Titograd high school, we had a professor (theory of literature) who, believe it or not, uttered the following sentence: "True poetry teaches us to hate the enemy."

And no matter how much we mocked the professor, today it seems to me that his "pedagogy" and "interpretive approach" are much more present than you would think when you look at the year on the calendar. Isn't today's situation in Montenegro, in large part, a consequence of art, spirituality and religion whose real purpose was to teach people to hate?

A wonderful fresco The raven feeds the prophet Elijah (Monastery of Morača) was certainly not created to teach someone hatred. You can be equally sure of any other valuable fresco, from Mount Athos to Georgia. So why do these today's masters of churches do it differently? Are they clergymen or national warriors from some folk song. He can't do both. That's why the result is heavenly kitsch.

After all, the Ruzica church, as its very name gives it, is clearly found more in folk poetry than in Rožaje. I guess that's why all this is possible...