Photo Prayer: Kyle Magri

One of the many things that made me fall in love with the Mediterranean was their amazing ancient churches! Particularly the fact that, within these ancient churches, “God” was nowhere to be found. By “God” I mean the bearded old patriarch in the sky casting a look of judgment on humanity with a pristine Holy Spirit dove perched upon his shoulder. No! These churches were filled with images of a much more chthonic God. A human God, never removed from the bosom of His Divine Mother, never without the companionship of His friends the Saints, never shying away from the dichotomy of a world full of immense suffering yet simultaneously full of indescribable joy. Oh how I love this God of the wild earth! Oh how I adore His Mother!  Oh how I enjoy the companionship of His Saints! This is my Christianity! So keep your white washed chapels and your jutting pulpits. For there is a God who lives in the prayer beads of an old woman, in the wellspring waters of a river, in a local shrine keeping its doors open in midst of a bustling city, in rugged mountains juxtaposed the vast blue sea, in the statues and icons of saints painted by the hands of a faithful artisan. This is the God I pray we all will come to know a little better this Lent. As He may be only God who knows how to sustain our hearts in the midst of so many a crisis. 

Photo: A roadside Shrine containing a statue of Padre Pio, The Sacred Heart of Jesus, and the Black Madonna of Tindari, taken in Sicily.