Visit of the Passionist Tri-Centennial Jubilee Icon to St. Joseph Monastery
This beautiful icon was commissioned by the Passionist Fathers as a part of our celebration of the 300th anniversary of the year our Founder, St. Paul of the Cross, received the charism to found our Congregation. It has been travelling all over the world, and will be at our monastery in Whitesville for three hours on Jan. 30! Please come join us as we venerate this holy image and the relics of St. Paul of the Cross!
7:00 AM - Enthronement of the Icon and Holy Mass
followed by time for private veneration of the Icon and the Relic of St. Paul of the Cross
8:30-9:30 AM - Prayer Service Celebrating the Legacy of St. Paul of the Cross
The Process of “Writing” an Icon Is a Mystical Process
article by Fr. Anton Lässer, CP
The iconographer, with prayer and fasting, embarks on an inner journey toward Christ and the saints. The Holy Spirit, so to speak, leads him by the hand and reveals how the saints and God must be represented in the icon. In this way, those who contemplate the icon allow themselves to be guided by a spiritual dynamic that helps them to penetrate areas that are hidden to the simple eye. Even the Greek iconographer, Loukas Seroglou, who was entrusted with the execution of the icon of the Jubilee of the 300th Anniversary of the Passionist Congregation, allowed himself to be inspired by this dynamic.
“The icon is a representation, in Byzantine style, of the Virgin Mary and St Paul of the Cross at the foot of the Crucified. This central section has two doors that, when opened, show St. Gabriel of the Sorrowful Virgin, St. Gemma Galgani, Blessed Bro. Isidore de Loor and the ecumenical missionary, Blessed Dominic Barberi (of the Mother of God).”
The icon was designed in the shape of a triptych, a form traditionally reserved for sacred art, and which contains an image of the mystery of the divine Trinity.
In the center, in the main space, the last station of the Passion of Christ is presented—Jesus’ death on the cross. At the foot of the Cross is Mary, the Mother of Jesus, and St. Paul of the Cross. Mary stands with her arms raised, arms that want to embrace her son, but that do not seem to reach Him. She is there until the very end. Mary allows herself to be led without resistance by God’s will and plan. Her hands reveal an indescribable pain. In one hand he has the cloth ready to clean the face of her dead Son at the moment of his deposition from the Cross. In place of John, the beloved disciple, is the Founder of the Passionists, St. Paul of the Cross. His pose expresses sadness, helplessness and a great devotion to God’s will. The icon is dedicated to him. He places his right hand on his heart, the place where the Passionist Habit bears the symbol of crucified love.
Above, there are two images under the cross, under the extended arms of Christ-- two angels. They lament and weep before the Passion of the Son of God. Christ’s head is inclined toward one side and his arms extend unequally. It seems that, even at the moment of death, there is an inner dialogue with his Mother, as if He wanted to console her. The trunk of the cross penetrates into the ground, into the underworld, where Satan, the ancient serpent, awaits the moment of his defeat.
Above the cross is the symbol of the Passionists, surrounded by the hand of God, which blesses, and the symbols of creation and recreation-- the sun and the moon, the angel of final judgment and water as the current of the life of the Holy Spirit, represented in the form of a dove. The two saints and Blesseds located in the doors are under the shadow of the angels who bear the instruments of the Passion of Christ-- the reed of hyssop and the spear, symbols of Christ’s thirst for the soul of man and the opening of his pierced heart, which thus becomes the origin of the sacraments of the Church.
On the left is Saint Gemma, the great mystique of the love of the Cross, who represents the entire female component of the Passionist Congregation, and Blessed Isidore, with a heart wounded by love. On the right, St. Gabriel Possenti, with the skull, symbol of the mortality of a human life without God and the lighted candle, symbolizing the relativity of every human dispute. Beneath him is Blessed Dominic Barberi with an open book and two pens. God speaks through the heart and through the intellect. The greater Christ’s love, the deeper the penetration and understanding of the Scriptures. On one side of the table is the hourglass, as an appeal to constant vigilance: “Watch therefore, because you know neither the day nor the time when the Son of Man will come.”
