NEWLY finished icons of Saints Mary Magdalene, Peter, Mary Mother of God, John the Baptist, Paul and Mary of the Cross now light the way to the heart of the prayer life of Queensland’s Holy Spirit Provincial Seminary.
Brisbane Archbishop Mark Coleridge blessed the six new icons hanging inside the seminary’s oratory at the end of vespers last Friday, April 12.
The icons flank the walls that lead to the tabernacle inside the oratory and take inspiration from the Eastern Christian tradition of the icon screen inside eastern churches, icon writer Sister of Mary Morning Star Josephine Marie said.
She said it felt like a journey had finished for her, now that the icons were installed, and “at the same time, a journey is starting because now they’re where they’ve always meant to be”.
“I love that they’re now in place for the seminarians,” she said.
“It’s been such a communal journey and today it has felt like a communal joy.”
Sr Josephine Marie spent the last six months at the seminary, as an artist-in-residence, as she completed the icons.
She also ran some workshops teaching the seminarians about icons and how to pray with them.
Seminary rector Fr Neil Muir said Sr Josephine Marie’s icons were a magnificent addition to the seminary.
He said it was especially important to have them in the oratory, where the seminary worships on a daily basis.
In his homily, Archbishop Coleridge said where other Abrahamic faiths rejected the practice of creating images of the divine, Christianity could hardly be more different.
“Christianity… is an iconic religion and essentially so, because it takes its cue from the incarnation – the God who becomes icon,” he said.
“The Word Made Flesh is the original icon of God.”
He thanked Sr Josephine Marie for writing the icons and said “we do not just see remarkable human beings, we see the presence of God and with that presence they glow”.
