The Temple

[Clayton & Bell]

For Thou, O Lord God, art the thing that I long for
Thou art my hope, even from my youth


For now we see in a mirror, dimly, but then we will see face to face.

Persecution

[Holman Hunt]

I'm a sentimental fellow. That may be part of the attraction for me to the Pre-Raphaelites and the Nazarenes, and heaven knows lots of other artists. Some sentiment is dreck, of course, and to many people it reeks of subjectivity.

The painting above was painted by Holman Hunt in 1850 and is entitled" A Converted Christian British Family Sheltering a Christian Missionary from the Persecution of the Druids".

I'm not joking.

In many ways it's a piece of illustration - a bad thing in art - I was taught in school. But there remains a richness to the painting that is palpable. For his many faults, and I am well aware of them, Hunt was a spectacular colorist, and if you take away your perception of each object and personage and merely view this as a composition of light and dark, color against color, shape against shape - it becomes something marvelous.

Christian have suffered persecution from the beginning, be they in Northern Ireland or Malaysia or Iran. But the painting (take away the priest's chasuble) could be of Muslims in Bosnia or Bahai's in Persia. Bad, stuff, persecution - whether it comes in the form of laws in Uganda and Nigeria, or in the attacks on synagogues in the south of France.

You would think we Christians would know better.

The Child

[Michelangelo Buonarotti]

I know, I've been a bad blogger. It's been a rough autumn and winter, with much work.

That said, I had the privilege of seeing this great work recently in the Church of Notre Dame in Bruges. The only sculpture of Michelangelo outside of Italy. This remarkable work was purchased by a Flemish merchant for his parish church where it remains to this day.

Our Lady fulfills her special rôle - mothering - the child she had born of the Holy Spirit. Her copy of the Old Testament in her right hand as she has just finished teaching the Divine Infant who clutches her left hand. He is about to get down from her lap, maybe he wants to play, but has a most serious demeanor. Like the Child, she too, is pensive - pondering those things in her heart that will cause it to be pierced, and yet those very things that would bring us salvation.

May God, in his Incarnation, bless you all this coming Christmastide.

Richard

Today, with so many others around the world, I am remembering those who have entered into rest prematurely in the great epidemic of our time. My partner and I have lost so many very dear friends - losses that will never go away until we are reunited with them by God's Grace. I'm remembering Richard especially as it is more than twenty years since he died - there is not a day that goes by when I do not think of how much he meant to me.

Richard was a gift to God's Holy Church. He loved the Church. He loved God. He gave so much of his life to working for the Church. He was beloved of so many. He was a blessing to everyone who ever met him. He was beautiful - inside and out. I will never forget him.

People like Richard are one reason I long for Heaven.

The King

[Jan Cornelisz van Oostanen]

Jesus said 'My Kingdom is Not of this World".

This is the King we celebrated in Sunday's liturgy. No earthly power has any power over Him - or us. Earthly power is utterly empty. No matter how we might be tempted, and tempted I am, to dress Him up in the finest robes and on the finest throne, He is content to wear the crown of thorns for eternity.

Apollo

That the Christian faith has taken upon it images from outside cultures is well known. One can see this especially in the Mexican Day of the Dead. The very person of Christ was often in the times of the Roman Empire "translated" into a sort of Apollo.

[Ravenna mosaic]


[Early Roman Christian]


[Velasquez]
This is Apollo visiting the Forge of Vulcan - looks on first sight like Christ doesn't it ?


[Walter Erlebacher]
Even in our own time the legacy of the early church's commandeering of the imagery of Apollo survives.

What does it mean when the Church takes such imagery and makes it her own?

At Sea

Discipleship is scary - out on the water. The fishing could be poor. The sea could rise in a furious storm. We could be adrift. The boat could hit a shoal.

We get cranky when things don't go our way. We start bickering about all the details, but so often we're missing the reason for daring to be Christian. It's about love - even of our (perceived) enemies.

Love one another.


It's worth every bit of pain.