By James Patrick Reid, The Catholic Thing - Yet sin has made a mess of things. Often the goodness of creation seems hidden or marred; or it shines through only occasionally, offering fleeting glimpses. The world is not, in general, “picture perfect.” One of the functions of art is to provide loci to which we can turn to experience the shining through of goodness, of beauty, whether the locus be a symphony, a poem, a painting, or some other work.