A retraction- sort of
Seems a owe a certain lady in Rome an apology.
While blogging on Pope Benedict's election, I mentioned a crucifix I spotted on the FOX News feed from St. Peter's Square- a crucifix on which Mary seemed to be the crucified figure, with the Christ child clinging to her robes.
Well, the Des Moines Register ran a picture of the lady and her crucifix in this morning's paper, and I was wrong. The crucified figure is Jesus after all- but Jesus wearing, not a crown of thorns, but the kind of garish royal crown the Blessed Virgin is often portrayed with in Roman Catholic iconography. The BVM herself is the secondary figure I took for the Christ Child. She is wearing an identical crown, but standing at the foot of the cross to the Lord's right.
Now, one might still reasonably ask what business Mary has being any part of a crucifix. And what's with those crowns? Sadly, Mary is seen in Catholic theology as "co-redemptrix" with Jesus, a kind of secondary savior. The sword which passed through her heart when her Son was crucified is seen as having salvific value, somehow.
A good Lutheran crucifix will always make it clear that Jesus is not having a good time! Indeed, those comic opera crowns the Lord and His mother are wearing are rather jarring in context. But the idea of the cross as the "throne" from which Christ reigns is, again, a frequent theme in Catholic iconography. Those "crucifixes" featuring Christ the King, His arms raised in triumphant benediction rather than extended in agony (essentially striking the same pose as "Touchdown Jesus" at Notre Dame Stadium) , are all too frequently found in Lutheran churches, too; Grace, at 28th and Karlov in Chicago, where I was baptized and confirmed, is unfortunately a case in point. This confusing mixture of the theology of the cross and the theology of glory sort of contradicts the whole point of the crucifix, from a thoughtfully Lutheran point of view. But Catholic piety, again, embraces the iconography of the cross as throne, and often portrays the Crucifed, not as suffering, but as already triumphant and reigning.
So I still don't think much of that crucifix. Insofar as it implies that Mary is somehow co-redemptrix, it remains idolatrous and blasphemous. And those elaborate, regal crowns could not possibly be more out of place.
But it does not, in fact, portray Mary as the figure on the cross- or at least as the crucifed figure; she merely stands at its foot, superimposed upon it. So it's a little less blatantly idolatrous and a little less shockingly blasphemous than what I thought I saw when I first caught a glimpse of that brazen (in both senses of the word) abomination that woman in St. Peter's Square. was lifting above her head.
While blogging on Pope Benedict's election, I mentioned a crucifix I spotted on the FOX News feed from St. Peter's Square- a crucifix on which Mary seemed to be the crucified figure, with the Christ child clinging to her robes.
Well, the Des Moines Register ran a picture of the lady and her crucifix in this morning's paper, and I was wrong. The crucified figure is Jesus after all- but Jesus wearing, not a crown of thorns, but the kind of garish royal crown the Blessed Virgin is often portrayed with in Roman Catholic iconography. The BVM herself is the secondary figure I took for the Christ Child. She is wearing an identical crown, but standing at the foot of the cross to the Lord's right.
Now, one might still reasonably ask what business Mary has being any part of a crucifix. And what's with those crowns? Sadly, Mary is seen in Catholic theology as "co-redemptrix" with Jesus, a kind of secondary savior. The sword which passed through her heart when her Son was crucified is seen as having salvific value, somehow.
A good Lutheran crucifix will always make it clear that Jesus is not having a good time! Indeed, those comic opera crowns the Lord and His mother are wearing are rather jarring in context. But the idea of the cross as the "throne" from which Christ reigns is, again, a frequent theme in Catholic iconography. Those "crucifixes" featuring Christ the King, His arms raised in triumphant benediction rather than extended in agony (essentially striking the same pose as "Touchdown Jesus" at Notre Dame Stadium) , are all too frequently found in Lutheran churches, too; Grace, at 28th and Karlov in Chicago, where I was baptized and confirmed, is unfortunately a case in point. This confusing mixture of the theology of the cross and the theology of glory sort of contradicts the whole point of the crucifix, from a thoughtfully Lutheran point of view. But Catholic piety, again, embraces the iconography of the cross as throne, and often portrays the Crucifed, not as suffering, but as already triumphant and reigning.
So I still don't think much of that crucifix. Insofar as it implies that Mary is somehow co-redemptrix, it remains idolatrous and blasphemous. And those elaborate, regal crowns could not possibly be more out of place.
But it does not, in fact, portray Mary as the figure on the cross- or at least as the crucifed figure; she merely stands at its foot, superimposed upon it. So it's a little less blatantly idolatrous and a little less shockingly blasphemous than what I thought I saw when I first caught a glimpse of that brazen (in both senses of the word) abomination that woman in St. Peter's Square. was lifting above her head.
Comments
Very glad you didn't see a _Virgo Crucifixa_, though...