Interfaith, Inter-religious Icons as Visionary Contributions to our Work

Even though I grew up in a Mormon community in semi-rural Utah, my mother’s love of art exposed me at an early age to religious Icons. I did not find them in churches but in books and found them beautiful and moving perhaps because I sensed the divinity behind them, not because I knew anything of Saints and the role of iconography in religion. As I grew older I saw Icons from many cultures and religions particularly Buddhism and Hinduism. Several years ago while at a Contemplative Aging retreat at Mepkin Abbey I had a conversation with Sister Annie, a Franciscan Nun, about St. Francis which lead to a discussion of the work of a colleague of hers Sister Kathleen Warren, who had produced a Movie and book called In the Footprints of Francis and the Sultan: A Model for Peacemaking which lead me down a fabulous rabbit hole, but that’s another story. Although I'll provide this link to a flyer I produced for the workshop I presented on the film. The cover for the movie was an exceedingly luminous Icon of St. Francis and Sultan Malik al-Kamil. I used that Icon to illuminate Rev. James King’s evocation of St. Francis’ prayer at the end of his article in the last issue of CommUnity. The artist is Brother Robert Lorentz and these green texts are links to his Robert Lentz website and Trinity Stores where some of his work is on sale.

Brother Robert has certainly stretched the bounds of western iconography. Here is a quote from him “The majority of my critics are uncomfortable with the way I move back and forth between the cultures in which I have had to live since childhood. They want tidy, black-and-white worlds that I have never known. From childhood I have had to deal with a Technicolor world in which I was never quite sure why there were so many fences. Byzantine icons stay safely behind Byzantine walls and look out at the rest of the world. Catholic images are hemmed in by Catholic fences. My icons ignore walls. They belong wherever there is life.”

Here below are wondrous examples of his work which I view as a deep contribution to our Interfaith work. Click on image to see it fully.