From the Introduction to the Reformed Tradition:
The Reformed tradition, according to the typology of H. Richard Niebuhr, belongs among the converters of culture. Neither rejecting culture nor identifying with culture, it has sought to transform culture. This relationship to culture is based upon the conviction that culture, as art of the creation of God, is good and therefore is convertible. It is also based upon the conviction that culture is fallen or disordered and therefore needs transformation. History provides abundant evidence that the Reformed community has been energetic in the pursuit of the transformation of culture, particularly in the ethical and political area (pg. 198)
From the beginning the Reformation tradition rejected paintings and sculpture as means of Christian education and as aids to worship. As humanists the reformers had confidence in the power of words, and as observers of history they saw or believed they saw the theological illiteracy and corruption that reliance on images had produced. Images and paintings cannot communicate faith (pg. 201).
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