Holy Card Heaven: Solemnity:The Baptism of the Lord (Sun. Jan. 10, 2010)

Sunday, January 10, 2010

Solemnity:The Baptism of the Lord (Sun. Jan. 10, 2010)

"And Jesus when he was baptized, went up straightway our of the water, and lo the Heavens were open'd unto him, and he saw the Spirit of God descending on him like a Dove."
Matthew 3:13-16

Copper plate engraving
from an English Family Prayer Book, 1784

Welcome

One of our favorite holy cards says simply, "Heaven is the home of loving souls." In a way, an album of holy cards is like a little heaven; the truth that inspired the cards greets us anew with each tender image, and we feel at home. Little by little I hope to bring together a collection of this gentle faith art for the delight and comfort of any loving soul who happens by.

Ethereal messengers of God's Love and Light, the small engravings that gather here fly in day by day, some from collections still in albums, others from what I hope will eventually become an online home for many of them, the Nest of the Doves.

Little paper shrines that shelter the sacred, they are gathered here in the hope of sharing their beauty and meaning with another generation. To those who love them, they have much to give; like time spent in a restful garden, they are a feast for the eyes and a feast for the soul.

This gentle art can be used today to enter safely into the inner landscape allowing its imagery to guide the soul. Visual poetry employing symbol and metaphor as carriers of meaning, the path to which they invite us is always one in which God's own Love leads the way.

While some are from Italy, Germany, the Netherlands or other parts of Europe, Paris was perhaps the main place of publication. Dates are seldom available but most are from the mid 1800's to the close of that century. The depiction of persons is Eurocentric, but the symbols in the early holy cards are universal and inclusive: the image of the Heart as symbol for the incarnation of divine love, the image of the small bird as a symbol for the human soul eager but fragile and in constant need of God's love and care, the Living Water, the garden enclosed, the door that opens into Light... through visual poetry, the early holy cards continue to speak a language that reaches across the barriers of time and space and can be received by everyone.

Our favorite holy card illustrates the hope we hold as Christians that the door to heaven will be opened to the soul refined by love. It is the refinement of the soul by divine love that the art of the holy cards helps us to contemplate. The card has an engaving of the dove in flight into the mystery of Trinitarian love. The Uncreated Light overlaid by the symbol for the Holy Trinity is at the heart of the card. The writings of the early fathers, as well as those of the the Carmelite saints and Christian mystics throughout the ages - both in the Church in the east and the west - help us to approach the mystery of Trinitarian love not only as the theological underpinning of Christian belief but also as the action of the Spirit of Love in and through which we live and move and have our being.

Icons

The great windows into heaven, the icons of the Eastern Church, when venerated with love, offer the believer a way to be present to Presence. An integral part of the Divine Liturgy, they are venerated in the services of the Church, in monastic settings and in the icon corner of the home. Prayers are raised to heaven through them as they are gazed upon in the light of a living flame. Today they are interpreted in ways both ancient and new and are becoming a living part of our faith tradition in the west. See, for example, the beautiful icons written by the hand of Father David Reinders.

But the little holy cards were for a different purpose. Gifts from heart to heart, they infused with their beauty the meaning of the words and concepts they illustrated. Gestures of kindness, they brought people together through the faith they shared. In that tradition, please feel free to take any of images you find here for your personal use.

Liturgical Year

Beginning with the First Sunday in Advent, the cards will follow the seasons of the Liturgical Year in the Roman calendar. Each month will have a focus from the traditional Catholic devotion associated with the month - January: the Holy Name & the Child Jesus, February: the Holy Family, May: devotion to the Blessed Virgin, June: the Sacred Heart of Jesus, and so on. But within that framework, the major movable feasts & seasons, as well as some solemnities and feast days will be honored. Some days may have more than one card and a few cards may be repeated on more than one day during the year.

The labels allow you to bring together all images with the same element. For example, to click on the label Holy Spirit will bring together all posts with reference to the Holy Spirit in the image, the lace or the text.

You can also assemble all images edited by the same editor or publishing house, so, you see, I hope the collection will also be a kind of digital archive for people who are interested in the publishing history of the art form.

Some are examples of the development of color photo lithography, and a few are original paintings created in gouache, but most of the pieces in this collection are small steel engravings. Some are hand-colored. Few are signed.
To expand the range of subject matter, a few illustrations from antiquarian books are also included.

The images are scanned at 600dpi so that you can click on each one to see the artist's loving attention to detail. It is especially meaningful to be able to see the faces at a higher resolution. In many of the images, the sweetness of expression is at once joyful and serious, and, for a brief moment, we seem to draw close to the Presence of pure goodness, pure happiness.