So happy you are being drawn by Christ to love His holy mother (no one loves her as much as our Lord!). The blessed Theotokos is what brought me out of limitations of Protestantism and the resulting misogyny that exists in a worldview void of sacramental reality and the Holy Mother. May you be comforted and drawn deeper into the mystery of the incarnation through the intercession of your Mother and Mother Church. ❤️🔥
Oh my goodness Ewan, there is so much here I hardly know where to begin.
So let's begin where we meet:
I teach a little Orthodox Classical Education school in British Columbia, Canada. We have this term been using Paul's "Wild Saints" series for our Grammar and Rhetoric classes...
But some of my students- who have considerable artistic aptitude- have been completely captivated by the "pictures" I show with each story...
That is,
your work.
So thank you; you have inspired a number of tiny hands, unintentionally and as a surprise to the teacher, through your commitment to beauty.
My students cant believe you carved these images (which I show as the colour prints)! They want to know so much more...
But, this post evokes much more than that in me.
I will save my stories about the Mother of God for later, after holding her gifts a bit, received this morning and in this post.
Beauty will indeed save the world, I am increasingly certain of it.
Hi Mark, what a lovely comment to read! Thank you for your kind words. I am also very pleased to hear that tiny hands are learning the stories of the Wild Saints! How fortunate they are. If only I was in Canada, they sound like they would be great fun to create art with.
Beautiful read and I’m enriched by the icons and theology of my Catholic and orthodox brothers and sisters. That said even as Mary was rightly ‘blessed above all women’ I believe her virginity was real but not her sinlessness. The ‘blessed’ honor was to be the mother of the very savior she needed salvation from as everyone else. I think the immaculate conception is unfounded in the text and unnecessary to justify her special place in salvation history.
I don’t judge my orthodox friends about praying to saints I’m just not sure why I would when I have constant access to talk directly to our glorious Lord himself.
So happy you are being drawn by Christ to love His holy mother (no one loves her as much as our Lord!). The blessed Theotokos is what brought me out of limitations of Protestantism and the resulting misogyny that exists in a worldview void of sacramental reality and the Holy Mother. May you be comforted and drawn deeper into the mystery of the incarnation through the intercession of your Mother and Mother Church. ❤️🔥
Love your carving!! Really beautiful!
Oh my goodness Ewan, there is so much here I hardly know where to begin.
So let's begin where we meet:
I teach a little Orthodox Classical Education school in British Columbia, Canada. We have this term been using Paul's "Wild Saints" series for our Grammar and Rhetoric classes...
But some of my students- who have considerable artistic aptitude- have been completely captivated by the "pictures" I show with each story...
That is,
your work.
So thank you; you have inspired a number of tiny hands, unintentionally and as a surprise to the teacher, through your commitment to beauty.
My students cant believe you carved these images (which I show as the colour prints)! They want to know so much more...
But, this post evokes much more than that in me.
I will save my stories about the Mother of God for later, after holding her gifts a bit, received this morning and in this post.
Beauty will indeed save the world, I am increasingly certain of it.
in Christ's warm and gentle love;
-mark basil
Hi Mark, what a lovely comment to read! Thank you for your kind words. I am also very pleased to hear that tiny hands are learning the stories of the Wild Saints! How fortunate they are. If only I was in Canada, they sound like they would be great fun to create art with.
we'll have to get you over as an 'artist in residence' sometime ;-)
-mb
Beautiful read and I’m enriched by the icons and theology of my Catholic and orthodox brothers and sisters. That said even as Mary was rightly ‘blessed above all women’ I believe her virginity was real but not her sinlessness. The ‘blessed’ honor was to be the mother of the very savior she needed salvation from as everyone else. I think the immaculate conception is unfounded in the text and unnecessary to justify her special place in salvation history.
I don’t judge my orthodox friends about praying to saints I’m just not sure why I would when I have constant access to talk directly to our glorious Lord himself.
St. John Chryssostom agreed that she was not sinless.
There's a deep anthropological insight that is to be found in sitting with the Orthodox meaning of her innocence and all-purity.
I wont just "blurt it out loud" here, but it's profound.
Just rest with her a bit; she loves all the degenerates equally.
with warmth, brother;
-mb