As we’re coming into the Christmas period, a time of year when we celebrate religious festivals across many faiths, I bring you this, created when I was commissioned as the visual theologian in a book. I was one of three theologians in a book working out the origens of the New Testament. Sadly, the book never came to fruition, as one of the well known progressive theologians passed away suddenly. This image was one telling the truth that we really don’t know when Jesus was born, or indeed, when he died and showed himself again. There are many guesses based on many different interpretations of existing scriptures and secular history. What we know is that he was, as so many children are now, born into the burden of his times. The power of Empire shaped his world, the power of the scriptures shaped perceptions about who he was. In this image, the reeds which are said to have hid Moses sit alongside the architecture of power which sits alongside the commandment stones. The light shines on a manger and from a cave. People come and go, perhaps trying to make sense. Various dates hang about, unable to settle.
For any of us who say the old days were better, they simply weren’t. What history tells us is that whatever burdens we carry in our times, they will pass. Not easily, not without violence and atrocity, but they will pass. I hope, this season as we’re bombarded by capitalistic and sentimental temptations, we can stretch out our hope and grasp the power we need to love, to care, and to nurture radical hope. These times will pass. Heaven will connect with earth as shatteringly as before. There will be new and better times.
