Pope Francis also received the genocider Abiy Ahmed Ali of Ethiopia. This evil Oromo Antichrist offered a present of traditional Ethiopian prayer fabrics, along with a painting of the Risen Christ to the Pope. Can you see the similarity between what Zelensky gave the Pope and what Ahmed Ali presented? We remember that the dirty Ahmed Ali displayed the upside down cross in public during Easter. Both these criminal leaders (Zelensky is Jewish, and Ahmed Ali is Muslim-Protestant) are waging a genocidal war against the Orthodox Church.
😈 Well, when the hornets 666 armies meet, they ‘satisfy’ their prince Lucifer in this form.
😲 During a meeting with the Pope, Zelensky handed him an “icon” of the Mother of God with a void in the place where the Savior should have been.
Ukrainian President Vladimir Zelensky, who met with Pope Francis last week, presented the pontiff with gifts that are offensive to Orthodox Christian believers, the il Fatto Quotidiano newspaper wrote.
The controversial item is an icon of Virgin Mary holding the Child Jesus, who is depicted only as a black outline.
“It was supposed to symbolize the ‘loss’ of Ukrainian children in the conflict, but to the head of the Roman Catholic Church, the ‘loss’ of Child Jesus means the loss of the Messiah, the loss of the reason to exist for the institute of the church itself,” the paper quoted a prominent journalist, historian and former senator Raniero La Valle as saying.
In his opinion, the picture in fact symbolizes “erasing Christ from the cross and the denial of his resurrection.”
Another present by Zelensky was the painting of Madonna, made on a fragment of a bulletproof vest, against the bloody red background with stripes in colors of the Ukrainian flag.
In contrast, Pope Francis gave President Zelensky a bronze sculpture representing an olive branch, a symbol of peace. He also gifted him with several documents devoted to peace and fraternity.
👉 Selected comments courtesy of ‘Living Orthodox‘ who shared his reaction with us in the 2nd part of the video under the title: „The Heresy of Political Ideology—We Must Not Be of the World.„
– Though blasphemous…I can’t help but wonder if God allowed it as a message to His Children, and the world, that these two leaders are not cooperating with His Will to put it lightly, therefore, He is absent in the whole exchange for both the giver and receiver as depicted on the “icon”…where the giver is deliberate and obvious but the receiver’s current stance in corporation with the world portrays a cheap rendition of what our Lord and Savior is not (looks like it was created with magic markers or is a computer-generated print out amongst the “black void”)…therefore, this “icon” represents their truth as it relates to the war, social/political/global agendas, and the spiritual implications to all of it (unless they repent, God-willing). In other words, our Lord and Savior Jesus Christ is absent because the exchange and powers that be between these two are not in accordance with His Will…so in that way, the “icon” may be accurate in relaying God’s message regarding these affairs and possibly why He allowed such a disgraceful “icon” to be revealed openly to the public and the world at large.
– Living Orthodox: God does indeed permit things like this not only as a correction, but indeed to highlight and reveal different issues. More so, it is to spurn the faithful to action and to warn us from the sleep of worldliness and humanism. St. Justin Popovich wrote extensively on this matter.
– Not just blasphemous, but generally unskilled “icon” writing. The quality is as poor as the taste in which it was given. Kyrie Eleison!
– Father God Bless. If Zelensky views the ukrainian people only as a resource to exploit, why hasn’t he left Ukraine as soon as it got dangerous for him? Or do you think he is enjoying his portrayal as a brave and heroic leader in the western media so much that vainglory is his motivation?
– Lots of parallels to what Hitler did, he replaced the pastors, murdered or imprisoned those who wouldn’t go along, created his own churches, and wrote his own version of the bible. It is that same spirit.
– Father, do you think Zelenskyy is an Antichrist?
Living Orthodox: “I don’t have enough discernment to say for certain. But I would say he’s likely a type of one. He’s placed the identity of a nation in the place of God. Anti means “in place of or instead of”…”
– As an American, I feel grief and sorrow at my country’s role in this awful war and ecclesiastical confusion.
– Christ is Risen. So sad that many innocent people are dying because of this horrible behavior. Blessings to you and all Orthodox who are true to the faith
2000 Year Old Ethiopian Christianity With The Dark-Skinned Jesus
Ethiopia’s oldest icon (1370-98) made in Byzantium, or Siena
👉 Courtesy: Associated Press
Harvard art historian claims 150-year-old stained glass window in Rhode Island church depicts Jesus as a person of color
A 150-year-old stained glass window that appears to show Jesus as a person of color has been uncovered in a Rhode Island church
The image is made using brown glass and was first spotted by Harvard art historian Hadley Arnold
Arnold has invited art historians and experts to view the window which is thought to be the first to ever depict Jesus as a person of color
Scholars think the window, commissioned in 1877, could be the first of its kind. ‘It should stand as a landmark in American culture,’ says art historian Virginia Raguin
A nearly 150-year-old stained-glass church window that depicts a dark-skinned Jesus Christ interacting with women in New Testament scenes has stirred up questions about race, Rhode Island’s role in the slave trade and the place of women in 19th century New England society.
The window installed at the long-closed St. Mark’s Episcopal Church in Warren in 1878 is the oldest known public example of stained glass on which Christ is depicted as a person of color that one expert has seen.
“This window is unique and highly unusual,” said Virginia Raguin, a professor of humanities emerita at the College of the Holy Cross in Worcester, Massachusetts, and an expert on the history of stained-glass art. “I have never seen this iconography for that time.”
The 12-foot tall, 5-foot wide window depicts two biblical passages in which women, also painted with dark skin, appear as equals to Christ. One shows Christ in conversation with Martha and Mary, the sisters of Lazarus, from the Gospel of Luke. The other shows Christ speaking to the Samaritan woman at the well from the Gospel of John.
The window made by the Henry E. Sharp studio in New York had largely been forgotten until a few years ago when Hadley Arnold and her family bought the 4,000-square-foot (371-square-meter) Greek Revival church building, which opened in 1830 and closed in 2010, to convert into their home.
When four stained-glass windows were removed in 2020 to be replaced with clear glass, Arnold took a closer look. It was a cold winter’s day with the sunlight shining at just the right angle and she was stunned by what she saw in one of them: The human figures had dark skin.
“The skin tones were nothing like the white Christ you usually see,” said Arnold, who teaches architectural design in California after growing up in Rhode Island and earning an art history degree from Harvard University.
The window has now been scrutinized by scholars, historians and experts trying to determine the motivations of the artist, the church and the woman who commissioned the window in memory of her two aunts, both of whom married into families that had been involved in the slave trade.
“Is this repudiation? Is this congratulations? Is this a secret sign?” said Arnold.
Raguin and other experts confirmed that the skin tones — in black and brown paint on milky white glass that was fired in an oven to set the image — were original and deliberate. The piece shows some signs of aging but remains in very good condition, she said.
But does it depict a Black Jesus? Arnold doesn’t feel comfortable using that term, preferring to say it depicts Christ as a person of color, probably Middle Eastern, which she says would make sense, given where the Galilean Jewish preacher was from.
Others think it’s open to interpretation.
The 12-foot tall, 5-foot wide window depicts two biblical passages in which women, also painted with dark skin, appear as equals to Christ.
“To me, being of African American and Native American heritage, I think that it could represent both people,” said Linda A’Vant-Deishinni, the former executive director of the Rhode Island Black Heritage Society. She now runs the Roman Catholic Diocese of Providence’s St. Martin de Porres Center, which provides services to older residents.
“The first time I saw it, it just kind of just blew me away,” A’Vant-Deishinni said.
Victoria Johnson, a retired educator who was the first Black woman named principal of a Rhode Island high school, thinks the figures in the glass are most certainly Black.
“When I see it, I see Black,” she said. “It was created in an era when at a white church in the North, the only people of color they knew were Black.”
Warren’s economy had been based on the building and outfitting of ships, some used in the slave trade, according to the town history. And although there are records of enslaved people in town before the Civil War, the racial makeup of St. Mark’s was likely mostly if not all white.
The window was commissioned by a Mary P. Carr in honor of two women, apparently her late aunts, whose names appear on the glass, Arnold said. Mrs. H. Gibbs and Mrs. R. B. DeWolf were sisters, and both married into families involved in the slave trade. The DeWolf family made a fortune as one of the nation’s leading slave-trading families; Gibbs married a sea captain who worked for the DeWolfs.
Both women had been listed as donors to the American Colonization Society, founded to support the migration of freed slaves to Liberia in Africa. The controversial effort was overwhelmingly rejected by Black people in America, leading many former supporters to become abolitionists instead. DeWolf also left money in her will to found another church in accord with egalitarian principles, according to the research.
Another clue is the timing, Arnold said. The window was commissioned at a critical juncture of U.S. history when supporters of Republican Rutherford B. Hayes and their Southern Democrat opponents agreed to settle the 1876 presidential election with what is known as the Compromise of 1877, which essentially ended Reconstruction-era efforts to grant and protect the legal rights of formerly enslaved Black people.
What was Carr trying to say about Gibbs’ and DeWolf’s links to slavery?
“We don’t know, but it would appear that she is honoring people of conscience however imperfect their actions or their effectiveness may have been,” Arnold said. “I don’t think it would be there otherwise.”
The window also is remarkable because it shows Christ interacting with woman as equals, Raguin said: “Both stories were selected to profile equality.”
For now, the window remains propped upright in a wooden frame where pews once stood. College classes have come to see it, and on one recent spring afternoon there was a visit from a diverse group of eighth graders from The Nativity School in Worcester, a Jesuit boys’ school.
The boys learned about the window’s history and significance from Raguin.
“When I first brought this up to them in religion class, it was the first time the kids had ever heard of something like this and they were genuinely curious as to what that was all about, why it mattered, why it existed,” religion teacher Bryan Montenegro said. “I thought that it would be very valuable to come and see it, and be so close to it, and really feel the diversity and inclusion that was so different for that time.”
– NBD. There is a famous mountain top cathedral near Avellino, Italy, with a portrait of a black Virgin Mary. The large painting has been there for centuries. It didn’t stop the Italians from doing their annual pilgrimage for the first communion of girls to womanhood. People need to get over themselves as if the world never existed before they got here.
– Who cares what color Jesus was when he was on earth? What matters is that we believe his message. He said the he is the way, the truth, and the life and no one comes to God but by him.
– Well he went to the cross for our sins… the ultimate sacrifice. So, His color is irrelevant. Plus it wouldn’t surprise me considering many Mediterranean Jews were/are of dark complexion.
– Of course Jesus was dark skinned. Everyone around that region was dark skinned 2000 years ago. Is this a real question?
– Every event that took place in the Bible took place in Ethiopia and Egypt (Africa). Which reflects the complexion of the Jesus displayed on the stain glass window. The first image depicting Jesus as non-African was by Leonardo da Vinci, which used a friend by the name of Cesare Borgia.(commision by King Louis XII of France). Do your own research I would start first by visiting the Vatican online and see for yourself all the biblical figures portrayed as white in America are in fact of dark skin complexion. At the end history is only factual when you do the research. If you don’t then, it’s whatever you believe it’s being told to you will be your historical fact but it will be wrong. Enjoy the rest of the year. Truth Serum.
P.S. Egypt is in Africa.
Eden/Africa is Ethiopia
Isreal and Palestine before “divided” are part of Africa.
The land of Canaan is in North Eastern Africa.
Facts are facts. There’s no rewriting history. It’s logical common sense period.
[Isaiah 53:2]
„For he grew up before him like a young plant, and like a root out of dry ground; he had no form or majesty that we should look at him, and no beauty that we should desire him.”
🔥 Thousands of Christians throng Jerusalem for the traditional Holy Fire rite ahead of the Orthodox Easter, despite a security clampdown in the holy city.
❖ Every Orthodox Holy Saturday in Jerusalem’s Church of the Holy Sepulcher, thousands gather to witness a flame “miraculously” appearing in the tomb of Jesus.
Orthodox Christians believe it’s a potent symbol of the resurrection.
It’s the Church’s most important miracle. And it’s believed to have been happening annually for the past 1,200 years.
The ritual begins with the Greek Orthodox Patriarch of Jerusalem (or another Orthodox archbishop), descending into the empty tomb of Christ within the church and reciting special prayers. A non-Orthodox Christian is also said to examine the edicule (a small structure surrounding the tomb) to make sure no oil lamps have been left burning inside that the patriarch could use to light his candles.
In the crowded church above the tomb and surrounding the edicule, the faithful chant with one voice “Kyrie eleison” (Lord, have mercy). The wait might be long or short but eventually a light is said to appear in the tomb where the patriarch has been praying alone. He then lights his candles from this miraculous flame and, accompanied by the pealing of bells, emerges to spread the fire among the crowd. The oncedark church becomes illuminated by the miraculous Holy Fire.
It is said that for the first several minutes the fire burns, but does not consume. During this time, many of the faithful bathe their faces and hands in the flame, apparently without being harmed. The flame is passed from candle to candle and then placed in lanterns so that it can be spread far and wide.
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Addis Ethiopia Weblog 