Going to Byzantium: Art and Spirituality Converge in the Met's Dazzling Exhibit of Byzantine Art

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One of the largest, most demanding exhibitions I have ever seen, the Metropolitan Museum of Art's "Byzantium: Faith and Power (1261-1557)," is also the quietest. On a recent Sunday afternoon, the galleries were as silent as any church.

Why the hush? Certainly it was stimulated by the art, all of it religious in origin and style. It's not appropriate to tell jokes in front of an icon of the Dormition (the laying-out of the deceased Mary) or the Anastasis (the harrowing of Hell, Christ pulling Adam and Eve from death). Chatting about where you should lunch before a 14th-century mosaic icon holding a hundred fragments of saints is also not acceptable, even in New York. (Unfortunately, the museum doesn't list which saints' remains are included; perhaps no one knows.) As viewers reflect on the more than 350 icons, altar linens, vestments, jewelry, ceramics, coins, frescoes, manuscripts and reliquaries on view, a stunned amazement seems to deepen into intent, even devout, concentration. "Byzantium" feels like an immersion into a part of your own faith and family you previously knew little about.

"Did you learn about any of this in school?" one woman, obviously brought up Catholic, whispered to a friend. "I don't even remember hearing 'Byzantium' at Holy Cross," was the answer. Their experience isn't atypical. In 13 years of Catholic education, I can recall only one teacher who censured student essays for their "Byzantine complexity" and …