Holy Card Heaven

Sunday, September 2, 2012

The Divine Shepherdess Pannier, Paris Pl. 20-004

Saturday, September 1, 2012

SHE HAS SHARED MY SORROWS
Imitate her
if you want to
share my glory.
Bouasse Lebel

Link to Carmelite Feast Day:
St. Teresa of the Sacred Heart

Friday, August 31, 2012

Mary leads us to Jesus, her Divine Son.

Bouasse Lebel, Paris

Gregory of Nyssa: Dead to Sin and Alive to the Spirit

from Mark Armitage: Enlarging the Heart

Thursday, August 30, 2012

In order not to go astray,

let us take Mary as our guide.

Wednesday, August 29, 2012

The pure simplicity of the soul is my joy and delight.

Bouasse Lebel 826

Isaiah the Solitary: The Remembrance of God and Praying with Sweetness of Heart
from: Mark Armitage: Enlarging the Heart

Tuesday, August 28, 2012

Sweet Heart of Mary,
be my salvation.
Serz

Monday, August 27, 2012

THE GOOD ACTIONS OF A CHILD OF MARY

form a crown most precious

FOR THE HEART OF THIS GOOD MOTHER

Bouasse Lebel 1288

Sunday, August 26, 2012

St. Teresa's Transverberation: Feast Day, August 26

Transverberation of the Heart of St. Teresa of Jesus

Friday, August 24, 2012

The Tempest

O, you of little faith,
why do you fear when
I am with you?

Thursday, August 23, 2012

Mary, make us worthy to be called your children.

Wednesday, August 22, 2012

Queenship of Mary, August 22

from small album:
Queen of Heaven and Earth

Tuesday, August 21, 2012

Your Heart, O Holy Mother, will always be favorable to the repentant sinner.

Saintin

Monday, August 20, 2012

Blesssed forever
be the Sacred Heart of Jesus Christ and that of the Most Holy Virgin.

Sunday, August 19, 2012

House of Gold,
Arc of the Covenant,
pray for us.

May my heart, O Mary, like that of yours, become, through one Holy Communion, the true House of God.

Turgis

I am the Good Shepherd. John 10:14

von Serz, Nurnberg

Saturday, August 18, 2012

Humbly I pray
in the Heart of Mary

Untitled: Christ, the Good Shepherd

Saintin, Paris

Friday, August 17, 2012

TREASURES

OF THE HEART OF MARY

Consider the beauties of Mary's heart, and see if you will ever be able to refuse her your love.

Aubry

Wednesday, August 15, 2012

Feast of The Assumption, August 15

The Assumption and the World
by Bishop Fulton J. Sheen

Tuesday, August 14, 2012

Holy Heart of Mary,

Refuge of Sinners,

pray for us.

Monday, August 13, 2012

Simple, Sweet, Modest...

Mary recognizes her doves.

Sunday, August 12, 2012

All my happiness is there.

Vve. Bouasse Lebel

Saturday, August 11, 2012

Holy heart of Mary, united inseparably to the Heart of Jesus, pray for us.

Friday, August 10, 2012

Holy Heart of Mary,

Temple of the Divinity, pray for us.

Bouasse Lebel

Thursday, August 9, 2012

The Boat is Afloat

Listen now and be docile...

I will show you the way to go.

Wednesday, August 8, 2012

I rest in peace in the heart of Mary.

St. Dominic: Feast Day, August 8

St. Dominic
receives the Most Holy Rosary Bouasse Lebel 3396

Tuesday, August 7, 2012

I see and retrace the virtues of Mary. Vve. Bouasse Lebel

Monday, August 6, 2012

Transfiguration: Solemnity, August 6

They saw Moses and Elijah speaking with Jesus. (Matt 17:1-9)
Felix, Paris

St. Gregory Palamas' Homily on The Transfiguration

Anastasius of Sinai sermon on the Transfiguration: Here in Our Hearts, Christ Makes His Abode, Sayinf: "Today Salvation has Come to this House"

small album ~
Transfiguration of Christ

Sunday, August 5, 2012

Both the Heart of Jesus and the Heart of Mary enlighten the heart and warm with their love the souls who place their hope in God.

Friday, August 3, 2012

Thursday, August 2, 2012

FLOWERS OF THE EARTH
I breathed the fragrance of their virtue, and drew them to myself to form the heart of my Mother.
Bouasse Lebel 103

from small album~
Most Holy Virgin

Wednesday, August 1, 2012

St. Alphonsus Liguori, Doctor of the Church: August 1

St. Alphonsus Liguori
Marian & Morality Doctor
Founder of the Redemptorists

St. Alphonsus Liguori

WELCOME TO HOLY CARD HEAVEN

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. 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.

You can click on an image to enlarge it and 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.

The blessing I ask for any who come this way is again taken from a favorite holy card: "May a tender Friendship surround you always, and may all your days be a smile of heaven."
Fr. François Fénelon

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.

About the Cards in this Collection

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.

Scheduling of the Cards and the Small Albums

Holy Card Heaven enters its seventh year on the first Sunday in Advent, 2015. Day by day the cards will continue to be moved into the new church year depending for their placement on the dates of the movable feasts and seasons. This way no cards need get lost in the distant past, new cards can be added, and we can appreciate the collection a little differently with each passing year.
Small Albums, each with a different topic, will change from month to month and will be linked in the top right column.