About the Art:
Calumny of Apelles
Sandro Botticelli
1494–95
Tempera on panel
62 cm × 91 cm 
Uffizi, Florence, Italy

"Calumny" is a synonym for slander. Botticelli made this painting based on the description of a painting by Apelles, a Greek painter of the Hellenistic period. Apelles' works have not survived, but Lucian recorded details of one in his On Calumny: “On the right of it sits Midas with very large ears, extending his hand to Slander while she is still at some distance from him. Near him, on one side, stand two women—Ignorance and Suspicion. On the other side, Slander is coming up, a woman beautiful beyond measure, but full of malignant passion and excitement, evincing as she does fury and wrath by carrying in her left hand a blazing torch and with the other dragging by the hair a young man who stretches out his hands to heaven and calls the gods to witness his innocence. She is conducted by a pale ugly man who has piercing eyes and looks as if he had wasted away in long illness; he represents envy. There are two women in attendance to Slander, one is Fraud and the other Conspiracy. They are followed by a woman dressed in deep mourning, with black clothes all in tatters—she is Repentance. At all events, she is turning back with tears in her eyes and casting a stealthy glance, full of shame, at Truth, who is slowly approaching.”
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Calumny_of_Apelles_(Botticelli)#/media/File:Sandro_Botticelli_021.jpg

About the Artist:
Sandro Botticelli (1445–1510) was an Early Renaissance Italian painter who belonged to the Florentine School, which was under the patronage of the statesman and ruler of the Florentine Republic, Lorenzo de’ Medici. Botticelli painted a wide range of religious subjects and a number of portraits. He and his workshop were espe­cially known for their Madonna and Child works, many in the round “tondo” shape. His most well-known works are The Birth of Venus and Primavera, both housed in the Uffizi Museum in Florence, Italy. The Medici's influence greatly increased Botticelli's notoriety and he was asked by the Papacy to paint parts of the Sistine Chapel, an honor only extended to some of the Renaissance's greatest artists, such as Perugino and Michelangelo. Despite his success as an altarpiece painter, Botticelli struggled to keep pace with the revolutionary changes taking place in art during this time and, with the arrival of Leonardo da Vinci and Michelangelo on the artistic landscape, Botticelli's work became less relevant and popular.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sandro_Botticelli

About the Music:
“Gradual of Eleanor of Brittany: Kyrie: Orbis Factor” from the album Sacred Music

The Lyrics:
Orbis factor rex aeterne, eleison
Kyrie eleison
Pietatis fons immense, eleison
Kyrie eleison
Noxas omnes nostras pelle, eleison
Kyrie eleison
Christe qui lux es mundi dator vitae, eleison
Christe eleison
Arte laesos daemonis intuere, eleison
Christe eleison
Conservans te credentes confirmansque, eleison
Christe eleison
Deum scimus unum atque trinum esse, eleison
Kyrie eleison
Patrem tuum teque flamen utrorumque, eleison
Kyrie eleison
Clemens nobis adsis paraclite ut vivamus in te, eleison
Kyrie eleison

Translation:
Maker of the world, King eternal, 
Have mercy upon us.
O immense source of pity, 
Have mercy upon us.
Drive off all our evils, 
Have mercy upon us.
Christ who art the light of the world and giver of life, 
Have mercy upon us.
Consider the wounds produced by the devil's art, 
Have mercy upon us.
Keeping and confirming thy believers, 
Have mercy upon us.
Thou and thy Father, an equal light, 
Have mercy upon us.
We know that God is one and three, 
Have mercy upon us.
Thou, merciful unto us, art present with the Holy Spirit that we might live in thee, 
Have mercy upon us.

About the Composer: 
Anonymous

About the Performers: 
Marcel Pérés and the Ensemble Organum

Marcel Pérés (b. 1956) is a French musicologist, composer, choral director, singer, and the founder of the early music group Ensemble Organum. He is an authority on Gregorian and pre-Gregorian chant. He was trained in organ and composition at the Nice Conservatoire, before continuing his studies in church music at the Royal School of Church Music and at several English cathedrals. In 1979, Pérés devoted his major efforts to the study and performance of various Medieval repertories, seeking in each to meld musicological, theoretical, and performative perspectives to give new life to the music of a particular place and time. In 1982, he founded the Ensemble Organum for these interpretive researches. Every year, Pérés and his singers approach a single Medieval repertory. They research the earliest manuscript and theoretical sources and then apply their historical research in an experimental performance. They seek to involve innovative vocal timbres, improvisatory and ornamentation practices, and highly localized acoustical theories to each new project.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Marcel_P%C3%A9r%C3%A8s

Ensemble Organum is a group that performs early music. The group was co-founded in 1982 by Marcel Pérés and is based in France. Its members have changed, but have included, at one time or another, Josep Cabré, Josep Benet, Gérard Lesne, Antoine Sicot, and Malcolm Bothwell. They have often collaborated with Lycourgos Angelopoulos and are influenced by Orthodox music. The group mainly focuses on the performance of music from the Middle Ages, including Beneventan, Old Roman, Gallican, Carolingian and Mozarabic chants. However, their repertoire includes Renaissance polyphony as well as more recent works. The ensemble was formerly based at Sénanque Abbey and Royaumont Abbey. Since 2001 it has shared facilities in the precinct of Moissac Abbey with the Centre itinérant de recherche sur les musiques anciennes (Centre for Itinerant Research of Medieval and Early Music).
http://www.organum-cirma.fr/organum-cirma/

About the Poet:
Francisco Xavier Alarcón (1954-2016) was a prolific Chicano poet, translator, educator, and writer for both adults and children. He was one of the few Chicano poets to have "gained recognition while writing mostly in Spanish" within the United States. Alarcón attended California State University, Long Beach, and earned his MA from Stanford University. Latino identity, mythology, the Nahuatl language, Mesoamerican history, and American culture are all portrayed in Alarcón’s writing. On a Fulbright Fellowship to Mexico City in 1982, Alarcón discovered and translated the writings of a Mexican priest who had transcribed native songs during the Inquisition in the 1600s. His collections of poetry for adults include Body in Flames/Cuerpo en llamas; De amor oscuro/Of Dark Love; Snake Poems: An Aztec Invocation, winner of the American Book Award from the Before Columbus Foundation; From the Other Side of Night/Del otro lado de la noche: New and Selected Poems; Ce Uno One: Poemas para el Nuevo Sol/Poems for the New Sun; Borderless Butterflies: Earth Haikus and Other Poems/Mariposas sin fronteras: Haikus terrenales y otros poemas ; and Canto hondo/Deep Song. Alarcón received the 1984 Chicano Literary Prize, the 1993 PEN Oakland Josephine Miles Award, and the Fred Cody Lifetime Achievement Award from the Bay Area Book Reviewers Association in 2002. He served as director of the Spanish for Native Speakers Program at the University of California at Davis, and taught for the California Poets in the Schools program.
https://www.poetryfoundation.org/poets/francisco-x-alarcon

About the Devotion Writer: 
Dr. Alina Beary
Assistant Professor of Philosophy
Torrey Honors Institute
Biola University

A native of Ufa, Russia, Alina Beary is a philosopher who is interested in virtue ethics, the deadly sins tradition, and the ways in which implicit biases affect our ability to develop virtue. She earned her doctorate degree from Baylor University, where her dissertation focused on Thomas Aquinas and contemporary virtue ethics. She and her husband, David, have been married for over 10 years and have twin daughters. They love good literature and enjoy camping and hiking in the national parks.