Stillness does extraordinary things. It forces you into the present, which must be why Zen meditation sets such store by it.

Masterpieces of sculpture that capture the human form, such as those currently at the National Gallery in The Sacred Made Real exhibition, similarly freeze a moment and time. To gaze at these images, such as the one pictured above - Saint Francis Borgia, by Juan Martínez Montanés - is to be exposed to extraordinary intensity. The intimacy you apparently share with the figure seems to break into something transcendent. It's not that you half expect them to move, though you do, so much as you half hope they might move, simply to break the spell.

Of course, there's a lot of pure spectacle in the religiosity they convey. As the philosopher Gianni Vattimo has put it, 'People are more interested in the religious show than they are in religious engagement.' I guess this kind of spirituality emerged in the 17th century because it was then that modernity started to compete with religion for people's souls. The hyperreal representation of human suffering and Christian commitment demands your attention. It won't let you go. It is hard, perhaps impossible, to resist some feeling for Jesus and his passion in gallery rooms populated by such images.

There is the risk of slipping into kitch too, the kind you find in religious tat shops stocked with plastic immaculate virgins and saints bearing stigmata. It's not, though, a danger at the exhibition. The work is too fine.

So if you're in London with a half hour to spare, I'd recommend it, regardless of your beliefs. At the very least, The Sacred Made Real offers a powerful moment of meditation on the human condition.