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Entry: Let's Sit Out World War IV Link: http://www.takimag.com/site/article/lets_sit_out_world_war_iv#8730 Post contents: PS, actually THIS icon by Rublev is my favourite one, his icon of the Holy Trinity. I think it's an especially good image for ALL of us Christians (Catholic, Orthodox, Protestant) to contemplate. Because, it depicts perfect friendship (philos) and harmony between the three persons of the Holy Trinity - and that is a good model for us besieged and beleagured Christians of various sects to follow today. In that icon, the Divine Person on the left is God the Father (that's why he has a Church behind him, symbol of his authority); and the Person at the right is the Holy Spirit (no temporal image above HIS head); and the Person in the CENTRE is Christ, and the tree behind him represents: A. The family tree of Jesse and David etc, Jesus' family lineage; B. The tree on which Christ was crucified, which was God's solution to C. The tree in the Garden of Eden. And all three of those Persons of the Holy Trinity are painted in perfect geometric balance, and they all point and look toward the Cup of Christ's blood. Now, this might sound heretical to some of the Catholics AND Protestants among us, but after I lived in Russia for a while, I imagined the following: 1. The Roman Catholic Church is like Holy Thursday and Good Friday: God on a temporal pilgrimage. I am inclined to equate this with Jesus, "God the Son." 2. Protestantism is like Easter Sunday, the EMPTY cross, outside of Time. I am inclined to equate this with God the Father. 3. Orthodox (perhaps especially Russian) Christianity is like Holy Saturday, God in Hell, offering inexhaustible mercy to the Damned. I equate this with the Holy Spirit. And I believe Christianity is a coat of many colours, badly in need of mending, and that all three of the major factions of Christianity need reconciliation in these times while we face - and (we will) resist and ultimately defeat - the enemies of Christendom. But we cannot do so unless we all stick together, and create friendship among one another like the Holy Trinity does in this icon: http://www.cameronlawrence.com/images/posts/rublev_trinity.jpg Sent at: 2008 08 29